Criticise rubbish written about case for Arkansas (5)
I believe the answer is:
roast
'criticise' is the definition.
(thesaurus)
'rubbish written about case for arkansas' is the wordplay.
'rubbish' becomes 'rot' (I've seen this before).
'written about' means one lot of letters goes inside another.
'case for' says to hollow out the word (remove centre letters) (the letters which encase the others are used).
'arkansas' with its centre taken out is 'as'.
'rot' going around 'as' is 'ROAST'.
(Other definitions for roast that I've seen before include "Become very warm" , "Get very warm" , "Cook (meat) in oven" , "Large piece of oven-cooked meat" , "Grill" .)