Macon State College MVPs is a web feature that profiles notable students, alumni, faculty and staff.
Dr. Nancy Bunker received the 2012 faculty award for Outstanding Service.
Full Name: Nancy Mohrlock Bunker.
Residence: Macon and Great Bend, Kan.
Originally From: Omaha, Neb.
Family: Husband, Keith Bunker; sister, Chris Vitti, an elementary school teacher in Torrance, Calif.; brother, Jeff Mohrlock, mobile projects manager for southwest Gas Utilities Corporation in Las Vegas, Nev.
Job Title: Associate Professor of English.
Degrees: Ph.D. University of Tulsa; master of arts in English. Southwest Missouri State University; master of arts in speech. University of Nebraska at Omaha; bachelor of arts in speech, University of Nebraska at Omaha.
Year she joined the Macon State faculty: 2003.
Some of her teaching career highlights are … “Participating in theater/law Seminars at the World Shakespeare Congress 2006 and 2011; winning the Albert W. Fields Most Distinguished Article from Explorations in Renaissance Culture (2006) for my first article, ‘Feminine and Fashionable: Regendering the Iconologies of Mary Frith’s ‘Notorious Reputation;’’ being named to the Governor’s Teaching Fellow Program in 2008; shepherding my first English major and designated advisee for four years, watching her graduate 2011, and assisting her to gain admission into a graduate program; and mentoring a student as she published her first article in an undergraduate journal this spring.”
She enjoys teaching at Macon State College because … “Every day I am challenged to prepare the most interesting and transferable material from the English curriculum to students’ experiences. I appreciate the questions and criticism from students who require that I give them legitimate reasons for the viability of literature in today’s world. My job is to show and teach the ways that literature can instruct and enrich one’s entire existence. I love it when their eyes light up and they ‘get it’ because I know they will be able to utilize their literary lessons for the rest of their lives.”
Her favorite course to teach is … “Shakespeare! No one who knows me doubts this answer. Shakespeare informs all of my teaching because he is the master of understanding the human condition. He represents love, hate, jealousy, fear, greed, imagination, trickery, leadership, loyalty, and a thousand additional human qualities in ways that highlight strategies for living in this changing world. He is also the master of exposing what NOT to do.”
One thing people don’t know about Macon State is … “The superior credentials of its faculty.”
One thing people don’t know about her is … “I love gardening. At our home in Kansas I am in the yard and flower beds from sun up to sun down tending to my beautiful plantings.”
In her spare time she likes to … “Watch basketball, screen films, play trivia, read mystery novels, visit museums, and try new recipes."
The one person she’d most like to meet is … “William Shakespeare. For a man with a cottage industry of his own, thousands of scholarly articles as his subjects, and five hundred years of examination by persons all over the entire planet, very little is verifiable about his life. I’d like to ask him about the periods when he was not writing plays for the stage. I am also intrigued to know his views about his talented peers. Contemporary playwrights Thomas Middleton, Ben Jonson, John Webster, and Thomas Dekker thrived alongside Shakespeare and each other at the start of theater’s professional evolution and when camaraderie was the norm.”
If she wasn’t a college professor she would … “I’d like to work for the NCAA because college basketball rules and regulations are constantly under revision, which strengthens the players, coaches, and the game."