Cara News – University of Michigan
, Medieval and Early Modern Studies

Posted on April 26, 2021 by Chris

University of Michigan
 Medieval and Early Modern Studies
1029 Tisch, 435 S. State St., Univ. of Michigan
Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1003
Phone: 734-763-2066  //  Fax: 734-647-4881

Program Associate: Terre Fisher (telf@umich.edu)

Faculty Contact, 2019-2021: Achim Timmermann (achimtim@umich.edu)

Department of History of Art University of Michigan
Ann Arbor MI 48109-1003
Phone: 734-763-6112

For further information about programs, degrees, and affiliated faculty, please visit our website: www.lsa.umich.edu/mems/

Lectures and Events:

In 2020-2021 due to COVID restrictions most events were conducted via Zoom. Lecturers/presenters included U-M graduate students Rheagan Martin (History of Art), Salim Amir (Middle East Studies), Persephone Hernadez-Vogt (Romance Languages), Katherine Tapia (Comparative Literature) and Gerui Wang (History of Art), as well as faculty members Blake Gutt (Michigan Society of Fellows), Nathan Martin (Musicology), Erin Brightwell (Asian Languages and Cultures), Miranda Brown (Asian Languages and Cultures), Achim Timmermann (History of Art), Christian de Pee (History), Hieu Phung (Center for Southeast Asian Studies), Lang Chen (Center for Chinese Studies), Samer Ali (Middle East Studies), Kathryn Babayan (History and Middle East Studies), SE Kile (Asian Languages and Cultures), and Cameron Cross (Middle East Studies). Outside guests included Charlotte Eubanks (Comparative Literature and Asian Studies, Penn State); Ricardo Padron (Spanish, University of Virginia). Alison Cornish (Italian, New York University), Pablo F. Gomez (History, University of Wisconsin-Madison) and Paul Binski (History of Art, Cambridge University), Dana Sadji (Middle East Studies, Boston College), Sarah Strousma (History, Hebrew University of Jerusalem), Shatha Almutawa (Judaic Studies, American University), Shannon McSheffrey (History, Concordia University).

Special lectures and ongoing U-M colloquia featured SEP: MEMS Fall Kickoff: “Transmigration of Souls (Reincarnation) in the Druze Religion”; “Building a Digital Humanities Project during COVID.” OCT: “Reflecting the Past: Place, Language, and Principle in Japan’s Medieval Mirror Genre”; “The Indies of the Setting Sun: Asia and the Early Modern Spanish Geopolitical Imagination.” NOV: “How Milk Became Ethnic: Qing Koumiss Rituals”; “The Chinese Renaissance: Problems of Form and Style in Writing a Trade Book about Eleventh-Century China”; “Voice as Talisman: Theorizing Sound in Medieval Japanese Treatises on Sutra Chanting”; “Rethinking Medieval Narratives Beyond the Canon-On Ordering the Past”; “The City in the Present Tense: Writing the Urban Landscape in Eleventh-Century China.” DEC: “What Kind of Ecological Culture Do We Need? Drought History and Lessons from Premodern Southeast Asia.” JAN: “Maverick or Modern: Gong Zizhen (1792 -1841) and the Origins of Buddhist Studies.” FEB: “Risk, Bodies, and Disease: Transatlantic Slavery and the History of Science and Medicine”; “‘Our Father’: The Medieval Abrahamic Religion(s)”; “Blood and Nationalism in the Writings of Feliciana Enriquez de Guzman.” MAR: “Orientalism and the Erasure of Arab Women Poets: Reinscribing Gender in Medieval Adab Culture”; “Family Archives and Female Spaces of Intimacy”; “Humans and Monsters in Early Medieval Literature”; “Fiction and Motivation in Medieval Art.” APR: “In Defense of Damascus: A Tradition in Words”; “The Making of a Medium: Borrowing Views from Painting and Fiction in Early Modern Chinese Garden Design”; “Taming the Dragon: Monsters and Humans in Medieval Persian Epic”; “The Buddha in 10th-17th Century Muslim, Christian, and Jewish Narratives”; “Evil May Day, 1517: Xenophobia, Labour, and Politics in Early Tudor London.”

Additionally, as usual we supported meetings of the Premodern Colloquium on the following topics: “Le Roman de Saint Fanuel: Plant-Thinking, Family Trees and Grafted Fictions”; “Musical Topics as Pathosformeln: From Monelle and Allanbrook to Aby Warburg and Back Again”; “The Late Medieval City and Its Periurban Sacred Landscape: The case of Biberach an der Riß”; “Cheap Seats in Dante’s Heaven”; “Gothic Art, Realism and Genre: Thoughts on Erich Auerbach”; and “Why Did Public Infrastructure Appear in Song Court Landscape Painting?”.

Annual budget: $34,000

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Call for Papers – Communities and Networks in Late Medieval Europe (c. 1300–1500)

Posted on April 26, 2021 by Chris

Communities and Networks in Late Medieval Europe (c. 1300–1500)
St Catharine’s College, Cambridge, 9–10 September 2021*

Keynote: Prof. Felicitas Schmieder (FernUniversität in Hagen), ‘Did Magdeburg Law create a network of culturally mixed urban communities across Europe?’

Concluding Remarks: Prof. Wim Blockmans (Leiden University)

Confirmed Speakers: Prof. Jan Dumolyn (Ghent University), Prof. Christina Lutter (University of Vienna), Dr Flávio Miranda (University of Porto), Dr Justyna Wubs-Mrozewicz (University of Amsterdam)

Historical research has witnessed a rapidly growing interest in ‘networks’ since the turn of the twenty-first century. This is due not only to the utility of networks in describing interrelations between historical actors, but also to the adoption of the concepts and methodologies associated with social network analysis (SNA).

This conference aims to build on and contribute to this expanding field of research by focusing on networks as a lens through which to investigate the internal and external dynamics of communities in the last two centuries of the European Middle Ages, a time of great cultural, socio-economic, and political change. ‘Community’ is defined as any form of interpersonal association, including urban, political, legal, cultural, intellectual, monastic, and friendship-based ones.

We are inviting proposals, especially from junior researchers (doctoral and post-doctoral), for papers lasting 20–25 minutes. Papers might address, but are not limited to, the following themes:

  • Networks and the development of communities
  • Networks in conflict and conflict resolution
  • Oral and written communication networks
  • The impact of key late medieval processes on networks and communities (e.g. literacy and bureaucratization, development of infrastructure, warfare)
  • Possibilities and drawbacks of social network analysis as a conceptual and methodological approach to the study of medieval communities

Abstracts of max. 300 words, together with a short biography of the author, should be submitted to commsandnetworks21@gmail.com by 7 June 2021. The confirmation of accepted papers will be announced by 21 June.

*The conference is currently planned as an in-person event (registration fee: £20), but we are open to the possibility of employing a hybrid or online format in order to cater for the changing global situation and for different personal circumstances.

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SIMS Virtual Lecture Series_VisColl 2.0 This Friday, April 23

Posted on April 21, 2021 by Chris

The Schoenberg Institute for Manuscript Studies is pleased to announce the next installment of the SIMS Virtual Lecture Series:

Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combinations: Symbolizing the Elements That Create Manuscripts and Their Structural History with VisColl 2.0

Presented by

Alberto Campagnolo, University of Udine
Dot Porter, Schoenberg Institute for Manuscript Studies, Penn Libraries

Friday, April 23, 2021, 1:00 -2:15pm (via Zoom)

The ultimate working unit of the codex is the gathering structure known as the quire, a group of folded (or single) leaves bound together with other quires to form the text block. This structure, characterized by a limited number of elements and variations in their spatial arrangement, is fundamental to the study of the codex format for manuscript books. Traditionally, gathering structures are described in highly formalized alphanumerical formulaic representations, referred to as collation formulas. It is customary to include these formulas in paper-based and online catalogues. For what concerns manuscript studies, however, there are no actual standards, and different catalogues and scholars use their own set of rules and practices, making broader analysis difficult. In addition, the information density of collation formulas hinders the immediacy of their interpretation.

In this lecture, creators Dot Porter, SIMS founding member and Curator of Digital Research Services, and Alberto Campagnolo, book conservator and adjunct professor at the University of Udine, will present a new version of the online collation modeler VisColl to address these challenges. VisColl 2.0, with its new interface VCEditor, has been updated to model complex structures, with quires, subquires, and a variety of attachment methods, also through an intuitive graphic interface that guides the user and permits data input without knowledge of the XML data model behind it.

This event is free and open to the public. To receive the zoom link, click on this link to registration.

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Virtual event 4/27 — Fragmentary Remains: Books of the Dead at Williams College

Posted on April 21, 2021 by Chris

The Chapin Library at Williams College invites you to attend a virtual event with Foy Scalf on April 27 from 3:00-4:30pm EDT.

Fragmentary Remains: Books of the Dead at Williams College
Register to receive the Zoom link: https://forms.gle/7rdy8sBF2t8rh6Zq8

In 1922 Alfred Clark Chapin purchased a small album filled with scraps of ancient Egyptian papyrus inscribed with the Book of the Dead. This album now resides in the Chapin Library at Williams College, along with a collection of inscribed linen mummy bandages. Together these material remains form an excellent corpus to exemplify the practice of fragmentology, both in terms of the modern methodology for tracing chains of provenance and potential digital restoration, but also in terms of Victorian collecting practices. Chapin’s modest album reveals the late eighteenth century predilection for pasting somewhat random scraps of papyrus together to present the illusion of more interesting—and thus more valuable—manuscripts. This presentation will open a discussion of these fragmentary remains by showing how a seemingly modest collection can be deconstructed, connected with other fragments around the globe, and ultimately reconstructed for the digital age.

Foy Scalf is a scholar, librarian, and humanist interested in the history of the ancient world, the methods of its study, and how to spread that knowledge. He is Research Associate; Head of Research Archives; and Head of the Integrated Database Project at the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago. He also acts as Principal Investigator for a corpus-based digital project known as OIDOO, the Oriental Institute Demotic Ostraca Online. He received his PhD in Egyptology from the University of Chicago with a dissertation examining funerary literature from Roman Egypt and identifying its origins in the oral traditions attested in graffiti from preceding centuries. He curated a special exhibit for the Oriental Institute Museum called “Book of the Dead: Becoming God in Ancient Egypt” and assembled a group of internationally-acclaimed scholars as editor of the accompanying catalog. In 2016, he was awarded the Archival Innovator Award by the Society of American Archivists for his role in the Oriental Institute’s Integrated Database Project.

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MAA Publication Subventions: Deadline May 1

Posted on April 21, 2021 by Chris

MAA Book Subventions: Apply by May 1

The Medieval Academy Book Subvention Program provides grants of up to $2,500 to university or other non-profit scholarly presses to support the publication of first books by Medieval Academy members. Click here for more information.

NEW: The Medieval Academy Inclusivity and Diversity Book Subvention Program provides subventions of up to $5,000 to university or other non-profit scholarly presses to support the publication of books concerning the study of inclusivity and diversity in the Middle Ages (broadly conceived) by Medieval Academy members. Click here for more information.

Applications for subventions will be accepted only from the publisher and only for books that have already been approved for publication. Eligible Medieval Academy members who wish to have their books considered for a subvention should ask their publishers to apply directly to the Academy, following the guidelines outlined on the relevant webpage. The deadline for proposals is 1 May 2021.

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Jobs for Medievalists

Posted on April 16, 2021 by Chris

The Bibliographical Society of America (BSA) seeks a new Editor or co-Editors of the Papers of the Bibliographical Society of America (PBSA). The Editor is responsible for the editorial direction of the journal, which serves to fulfill the mission of the BSA to foster the study of the material text.

The Editor oversees publication of four issues of PBSA each year and attends BSA meetings in New York annually during Bibliography Week. The Editor of PBSA works closely with the Managing/Reviews Editor and the production team at the University of Chicago Press, supervising the Managing/Reviews Editor.

The next Editor of PBSA will also work with the Council and Publications Committee toward reaching the goals outlined for the journal in the Society’s Equity Action Plan (EAP). As outlined in the EAP, the BSA seeks to broaden PBSA’s coverage to include works that represent a wider array of textual artifacts from diverse authors in English and in other languages and to address issues of equity related to the composition and role of the Editorial Board. We welcome applications from members of underrepresented groups who feel that their background and experience make them uniquely qualified for this work in collaboration with the Council and Publications Committee.

The Society has some flexibility in filling this position and welcomes candidates to apply on their own or as an editorial team of two (2) individuals. Candidates may be affiliated with an academic or research institution, or work independently in the humanities. The BSA is open to accommodating the various modes of professional life encountered in the search process.

Negotiations for compensation for the Editor, team, or a partnering institution by means of an agreement begin at $16,000.

Application instructions, a job description, and other details are available on the BSA website at https://bibsocamer.org/news/bsa-seeks-editor/.

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Seats Still Available for Rare Book School Courses

Posted on April 13, 2021 by Chris

The following classes are still accepting applications on a rolling basis:

–C-75c: Introduction to the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, taught by Cheryl Beredo, Joy Bivins, Michelle Commander, Tammi Lawson, Shola Lynch, and Michael Mery (6 hours)
–C-85a: Law Books: History and Connoisseurship, taught by Mike Widener, with Ryan Greenwood (22 hours) ALMOST FULL
–G-10b: Descriptive Bibliography: The Fundamentals, taught by David Whitesell (10 hours) ALMOST FULL
–G-65a: Forgeries, Facsimiles & Sophisticated Copies, taught by Nick Wilding (22 hours)
–G-85c: Why Black Bibliography Matters, taught by Kinohi Nishikawa (6 hours)
–H-90a: Teaching the History of the Book, taught by Michael F. Suarez, S.J. (22 hours)
–H-105a: The Bible and Histories of Reading, taught by Peter Stallybrass, with Lynne Farrington (22 hours)
–H-120b: Textual Connected Histories: Books and Reading in the Early Modern European World, taught by Roger Chartier and John H. Pollack (10 hours) ALMOST FULL
–H-170b: Spanish American Textual Technologies to 1700, taught by Hortensia Calvo, Christine Hernandez, and Rachel Stein (10 hours)
–H-180c: Six Degrees of Phillis Wheatley, taught by Tara Bynum (6 hours)
–H-185c: African American Print Cultures in the Nineteenth-Century United States, taught by Derrick R. Spires (6 hours)
–I-45b: The Photographic Book since 1843, taught by Richard Ovenden (10 hours)
–L-25a: Reference Sources for Researching Rare Books, taught by Joel Silver (22 hours) ALMOST FULL
–L-120a: Introduction to Audiovisual Archives Management, taught by Erica Titkemeyer and Steve Weiss (22 hours) ALMOST FULL
–L-125a: Scientific Analysis of the Book, taught by Raymond Clemens and Richard Hark (22 hours)
–M-100a: Fragmentology, taught by Lisa Fagin Davis (22 hours)

Apply soon, before classes are filled! If you have questions about the courses, please contact rbsprograms@virginia.edu.
With best regards,
The RBS Programs Team

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Schwarz Fellowship at the Gennadius Library for Research on Music

Posted on April 12, 2021 by Chris

Deadline: April 30, 2021

The Schwarz Fellowship for Research on Music supports research on music that
focuses on cultural interactions in the Mediterranean world broadly defined. The
fellowship aims to promote the study of interactions among Western European,
Byzantine, Islamic and Jewish cultures from the medieval to the modern period.

Eligibility: Career musicians, or researchers who are either currently PhD candidates or have received their PhD within the last 5 years.

Fields of Study: Musical composition; Music conducting; History of Music; Musicology; and related fields. Fellows will be expected to conduct a program of original research on a theme related to the collections of the Gennadius Library.

Terms: A stipend of $11,500 plus room, board, and waiver of School fees. Fellows are expected to be in residence at the School for the full academic year from early September to late May. A final report is due at the end of the award period, and the ASCSA expects that copies of all publications that result from research conducted as a Fellow of the ASCSA be contributed to the Gennadius Library. Fellows are expected to participate in the academic life of the School.

Application: Submit an online application form for the “Schwarz Fellowship at the Gennadius Library for Research on Music.” An application consists of a curriculum vitae, description of the proposed project (up to 750 words), and three letters of reference to be submitted online. Student applicants must submit transcripts. Scans of official transcripts are acceptable.

Link to online application: https://ascsa.submittable.com/submit/189405/schwarzfellowship-at-the-gennadius-library-for-research-on-music

Website: https://www.ascsa.edu.gr/research/gennadius-library/educational-programs/fellowships

Email: application@ascsa.org

The award will be announced by mid-June.

The American School of Classical Studies at Athens does not discriminate on the basis of race, age, sex, sexual orientation, color, religion, ethnic origin, or disability when considering admission to any form of membership or application for employment.

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Schwarz Fellowship at the Gennadius Library for Research on Urban Architecture

Posted on April 8, 2021 by Chris

Deadline: April 30, 2021

The Schwarz Fellowship for Research on Urban Architecture supports innovative and
cross-disciplinary research on architecture, urban planning, and the history of the built
environment in Greece from 1821 to the present.

Eligibility: Ph.D. candidates and recent Ph.D. holders within five years of receiving the degree. Open to all nationalities.

Fields of Study: Includes Architectural and Urban Design, History of Architecture, History of the City, Historical Geography, and related fields. Projects should incorporate the holdings of the Gennadius Library (maps, topographical plans, landscapes etc.) and other appropriate resources of the American School of Classical Studies.

Terms: A stipend of $11,500 plus room, board, and waiver of School fees. Fellows are expected to be in residence at the School for the full academic year from early September to late May. A final report is due at the end of the award period, and the ASCSA expects that copies of all publications that result from research conducted as a Fellow of the ASCSA be contributed to the Gennadius Library. Fellows are expected to participate in the academic life of the School.

Application: Submit an online application form for the “Schwarz Fellowship at the Gennadius for Research on Urban Architecture.” An application consists of a curriculum vitae, description of the proposed project (up to 750 words), and three letters of reference to be submitted online. Student applicants must submit transcripts. Scans of official transcripts are acceptable.

Link to online application: https://ascsa.submittable.com/submit/189403/schwarzfellowship-at-the-gennadius-for-research-on-urban-architecture

Website: https://www.ascsa.edu.gr/research/gennadius-library/educational-programs/fellowships

Email: application@ascsa.org

The award will be announced by mid-June.

The American School of Classical Studies at Athens does not discriminate on the basis of race, age, sex, sexual orientation, color, religion, ethnic origin, or disability when considering admission to any form of membership or application for employment.

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Call for Papers – Once and Future English

Posted on April 7, 2021 by Chris

The Once and Future English conference will be held March 10-12, 2022 at the University of Notre Dame London Global Gateway in Trafalgar Square (http://sites.nd.edu/once-and-future-english/).

This conference begins with the notion that English is today used by about 1.5 billion people, less than a third of whom speak it as their first language. This minority-majority reversal has significantly impacted the grammatical characteristics of English, the demographics of the Anglophone population, the domains in which English is used, and attitudes towards the language, which has been described both as a venue for increased global communication and as a cultural and economic predator. The history of the language is being rewritten as well, from one defined by conventional periodization and the triumph of English as a Germanic language, to one that has reoriented the historical and contemporary significance of the language’s traditional homelands. The Once and Future English asks the question: How will English’s present and past look to future speakers?

Plenary Speakers: Anne Curzan, University of Michigan; Seth Lerer, University of California – San Diego; Lynda Mugglestone, University of Oxford

Abstracts are invited for 20-minute papers on any of the following threads: mutual intelligibility; written and spoken language; the impact of language contact; historical periodization; social and cultural consequences of the spread of English; the definition of English and of Anglophone speech communities; resistance to the spread of English; the status of English in relation to other languages; the relative status of current varieties of English; L2 speakers and the future of English; grammatical changes in progress; written standards; and English language historiography.

Interested speakers should send a 300-word abstract, including names and affiliations, to onceandfutureenglish@nd.edu.

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