The Medieval Academy Blog

(Re)Building Networks: A Medieval and Early Modern Studies Conference

University of Maryland, College Park
October 9-10, 2015

Networks are widely recognized as modes of professional collaboration as well as objects of scientific inquiry. The University of Maryland’s Graduate School Field Committee in Medieval & Early Modern Studies will hold a two-day symposium that brings together scholars in a wide range of fields to exchange research on medieval and early modern networks within and across disciplines, social classes, and national boundaries.

We are also interested in examining the various methods by which contemporary researchers identify and analyze networks. How were networks constructed in the medieval and early modern periods, and how and why do we reconstruct them today?  We aim to facilitate an interdisciplinary dialogue on the nature, interest, and potential of networks both as a practice and as an analytical concept.

Confirmed speakers include Ruth Ahnert (English, Queen Mary University of London), Sebastian Ahnert (Physics, University of Cambridge), Michiel van Groesen (History, University of Amsterdam), Alicia Walker (Art History, Bryn Mawr College), David Wallace (English, University of Pennsylvania), and Colin F. Wilder (Digital Humanities, University of South Carolina).

We invite proposals for 20-minute papers from scholars of all disciplines that address the medieval and/or early modern periods. Some proposals may be selected for alternative formats.

Topics may include:
• What constitutes a network?
• Networks and scientific collaboration
• Networks as/and interdisciplinarity
• Computer-aided networks analysis
• Visualizing/depicting networks
• Vehicles of transmission within networks
• Networks and space
• Networks over time
• Non-elite/popular networks

Please send a 250-word abstract and a short professional biography to rebuilding.networks@umd.edu by Friday, April 3, 2015.

Warmly,
Chris Maffuccio

The Mary Jaharis Center for Byzantine Art and Culture and the Michael G. and Anastasia Cantonis Chair of Byzantine Studies at Hellenic College invite proposals for the 2015 Graduate Student Conference on Byzantine Studies, which will be held at Hellenic College Holy Cross in Brookline, MA on April 18, 2015. Brookline is located just outside Boston and is easily reached from any metropolitan location.

We welcome graduate student proposals for papers in all subjects, disciplines, and methodologies related to Byzantine studies broadly conceived. We invite proposals in two categories: 20-minute conference papers and dissertation reports of 5–7 pages. Conference participants will have a chance to read the reports ahead of time to encourage dialogue.

A lunchtime roundtable, Byzantium in the Public Sphere, will convene leading figures in Byzantine studies who are using traditional and digital means to build a broader audience for the field inside and outside the academy. A list of participants will be available on the conference webpage (http://maryjahariscenter.org/events/2015-graduate-student-conference-on-byzantine-studies/) in early February.

This year’s conference immediately follows Trading Places: Cultural Crossings in Late Medieval and Early Modern Europe, Byzantium, Islam, and the West, a symposium organized by the Mary Jaharis Center and the Harvard University Committee on Medieval Studies. The symposium will take place on April 16 and 17 at Harvard University. Please check the Mary Jaharis Center website (http://maryjahariscenter.org) in early February for details.

To submit a proposal for either type of paper, complete the short online form and upload a 500-word abstract on the Mary Jaharis Center website (http://maryjahariscenter.org/events/2015-graduate-student-conference-on-byzantine-studies/). The deadline for submissions is February 10, 2015. Notifications will be made by the end of February.

An accepted paper represents a commitment from the contributor to present his or her paper in person at the conference. Given the brevity of the conference, please do not submit a proposal if you cannot attend all conference sessions.

The registration fee for the conference is $25. Shared accommodation at the Courtyard Boston Brookline will be provided the nights of April 17 and 18. Breakfast and lunch will be provided on the day of the conference. Participants are responsible for travel expenses; however, partial financial aid for students outside the Boston area who could not otherwise attend is available.

Contact Brandie Ratliff, Director, Mary Jaharis Center for Byzantine Art and Culture (mjcbac@hchc.edu) with any questions about the conference.

Organizing Committee: Brandie Ratliff, Director, Mary Jaharis Center for Byzantine Art and Culture, Hellenic College Holy Cross, Dr. James C. Skedros, Dean of the Holy Cross Graduate School of Greek Orthodox Theology and Michael G. and Anastasia Cantonis Professor of Byzantine Studies and Professor of Early Christianity, Hellenic College Holy Cross, and the Very Reverend Dr. Joachim Cotsonis, Director, Archbishop Iakovos Library and Learning Resource Center, Hellenic College Holy Cross

Support comes from The Mary Jaharis Center for Byzantine Art and Culture and the Michael G. and Anastasia Cantonis Chair of Byzantine Studies

Villes/Cities
12th Annual Symposium of the International Medieval Society, Paris
Dates: 25 -27 June 2015, Paris, France

CALL FOR PAPERS

Deadline for Abstracts: 30 January 2015

Keynote Speakers: Emma Dillon (King’s College, London), Carol Symes (University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign), and Boris Bove (Université Paris VIII).

The International Medieval Society, Paris (IMS-Paris) invites abstracts and session proposals for our 2015 symposium on the theme of cities in Medieval France.  After the decline of late-antique cities in the course of the fifth and sixth centuries, a revival of cities began in the course of the eleventh century.  This phenomenon, which profoundly transformed the dynamics of the West to our day, is a field of research that has been enriched in pace with archeological discoveries and by new technologies that offer original perspectives and approaches.  This symposium will approach new lines of investigation that will deepen our knowledge of medieval cities (11th – 15th centuries) not only in their cartographic and monumental dimensions, but also political and cultural ones.

The question of the construction of urban space could be explored in a variety of ways:

– Through its material dimensions, consisting of different forms of cityscapes, its urbanism, and its architecture.

– Through uses of space and their performative function.  For instance, the role of rituals and urban processions, how music and theater contribute to the establishment of urban space in its practical use and representations.

We also wish to explore urban culture, which consists of material, intellectual, or spiritual culture, including:

– The role of writing in the development of a literate, mercantile culture, and new modes of government
– The daily lives of city dwellers:  their lifestyles and patterns of consumption, their culinary tastes, etc.
– The development of practices related to the rise of intellectual institutions (schools, universities, patronage, mendicants, etc.)

Finally, we wish to explore the question of visual representations of the city and in the city, notably:
– The ways in which cities were represented in the Middle Ages, and how medieval cities are represented now
– Models for cities and the role of imaginary cities in the construction of urban spaces

Proposals should focus on France between the eleventh and fifteenth centuries, but do not need to be exclusively limited to this period and geographical area.  We encourage proposals and papers from all areas of medieval studies, such as anthropology, archeology, history, economic and social history, art history, gender studies, literary studies, musicology, philosophy, etc.

Proposals of 300 words or less (in English or French) for a 20-minute paper should be e-mailed to communications.ims.paris@gmail.com no later than 30 January 2015. Each should be accompanied by full contact information, a CV, and a list of audiovisual equipment you require.

Please be aware that the IMS-Paris submissions review process is highly competitive and is carried out on a strictly blind basis. The selection committee will notify applicants of its decision by e-mail by February 26th 2014.

Titles of accepted papers will be made available on the IMS-Paris web site. Authors of accepted papers will be responsible for their own travel costs and conference registration fee (35 euros, reduced for students, free for IMS- Paris members).

The IMS-Paris is an interdisciplinary, bilingual (French/English) organization that fosters exchanges between French and foreign scholars. For the past ten years, the IMS has served as a center for medievalists who travel to France to conduct research, work, or study. For more information about the IMS-Paris and the program of last year’s symposium, please visit our website:  www.ims-paris.org.

IMS-Paris Graduate Student Prize:

The IMS-Paris is pleased to offer one prize for the best paper proposal by a graduate student. Applications should consist of:

1) symposium paper abstract/proposal
2) current research project (Ph.D. dissertation research)
3) names and contact information of two academic references

The prizewinner will be selected by the board and a committee of honorary members, and will be notified upon acceptance to the Symposium. An award of 350 euros to support international travel/accommodations (within France, 150 euros) will be paid at the Symposium.

Second call for papers
*Please note new dates and extended submission deadline.

The Gregorian Institute of Canada and The University of British Columbia’s Medieval Studies Committee

invite paper and session proposals for

THE 43rd UBC MEDIEVAL WORKSHOP / THE 10th GIC COLLOQUIUM, a joint interdisciplinary research conference:

Liturgical and Secular Drama in Medieval Europe: Text, Music, Image (c. 1000-1500)

Taking place at Green College, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada, on OCTOBER 9-10, 2015.

This conference will focus on the Medieval segment of the long history of European theatre. One objective will be to analyze aspects of the great repertoire of liturgical drama, from its supposed modest beginnings in the Gregorian liturgy of Easter, through its various developments in Latin and the vernaculars, into liturgical, semi-liturgical and secular plays.  Just as importantly we recognize the fact that European drama did not begin in the Medieval church. When one considers the secular themes appearing in semi-religious plays then in comic genres of the late Middle Ages, such as the farce, it often becomes necessary to study the direct or indirect influence of secular sources such as Latin comedies, Medieval French fabliaux, or the troubadours’ satirical dialogues. Beyond this intertextuality, combined in many cases with musical exchanges, Medieval drama gradually acquired visual components including manuscript illuminations, props, theatrical machines, sets, and different approaches to spatial organization in relation to the audience.  The transformations in drama over the period 1000-1500 are connected to evolving attitudes toward music in the church, music in theatre, spoken vs. sung plays, the place of the actor in society, religious and secular themes, interactions with other genres, and the manuscript tradition (notations, text transmission, stage directions and commentaries).

Given the diverse aspects of this conference theme, we hope to receive paper and session proposals in: historical musicology, theatre studies, history, performance studies, philosophy, religious studies, translation studies, art history, palaeography and edition. We particularly invite contributions involving two or more of these disciplines.

Proposals for 20-minute papers or 3-paper sessions, in English or in French, should be submitted by FEBRUARY 15, 2015, addressed to

James Blasina and Chantal Phan
2015 GIC/UBCMW

and sent by email to:

jblasina@fas.harvard.edu and chantal.phan@ubc.ca

or by mail or fax to:

Prof. Chantal Phan (Medieval Studies), FHIS, 797-1873 East Mall, VANCOUVER, BC V6T 1Z1, CANADA. Fax: (1)-604-822-6675