Jobs for Medievalists

Posted on December 9, 2013 by Chris

The Department of Literatures, Cultures, and Languages at the University of Connecticut, College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, solicits applications for a tenure-track appointment at the rank of Assistant Professor.  We are seeking a specialist in Italian Studies (13th-16th centuries) with broader interdisciplinary and trans-cultural focus in the area of Mediterranean Studies. This position will be in Italian Studies, but the candidate will have the opportunity to serve as an important link to Medieval Studies, the Middle Eastern Minor, the Program in Comparative Literary and Cultural Studies, and/or Hebrew and Judaic Studies.

Minimum Qualifications:  A Ph.D. (or foreign equivalent) in Italian Studies, Medieval and Renaissance Studies, or a related field by June 1, 2014; native or near-native command of Italian and English; evidence of an active research agenda; strong commitment to innovative teaching.

Preferred Qualifications:  Research specialization in the following possible areas:  migration, race, and slavery; symbolic, cultural, material trade and exchange with the Levant or Africa; cultural and intellectual exchange and interaction with Southern, Central, and Northern Europe, or the Ottoman Empire, or the Judaic and Levantine intellectual traditions.  Knowledge of Arabic or another non-European language.

This is a full-time, 9-month, tenure-track position with an anticipated start date of August 23, 2014.  Salary will be commensurate with qualifications and experience.

Candidates please apply at http://www.jobs.uconn.edu/facult/ and submit letter of application, curriculum vitae, evidence of successful teaching, and an article-length writing sample by January 25, 2014.  Additionally, please follow the instructions in Academic Jobs Online to direct three reference writers to submit letters of recommendation on your behalf.  If you have questions or need further information you may contact Dr. Rosa Helena Chinchilla vie email at rosa.chinchilla@uconn.edu.  The University of Connecticut is an EEO/AA employer and is strongly and actively committed to diversity within its community. Members of populations traditionally under-represented in US institutions of higher education are especially encouraged to apply. (2014325)

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Jobs for Medievalists

Posted on December 9, 2013 by Chris

The Department of Italian Studies and the Program of Middle East Studies invite applications for a Mellon Postdoctoral Fellowship offered by the Cogut Center for the Humanities at Brown University for a term of two (2) years beginning July 1, 2014.

Applicants will have received a Ph.D within the past five (5) years from an institution other than Brown in the fields of Italian Studies, Middle East and North African Studies, Comparative Literature, History, History of Art and Architecture, Anthropology, or any other related field with the Mediterranean as a primary focus. The candidate should have worked in Italian and Arabic. Cogut Fellows participate in the activities of the Center and teach two courses each year in English. The term of the fellowship is two years.

We solicit applications by scholars who approach the Mediterranean in a non-traditional and interdisciplinary manner, but who nevertheless have the Mediterranean as the central focus of their research. Scholars concentrating on the constructed or built environment, on migration studies, media, literature, critical geography or archaeology are especially welcome to apply.
Applicants should submit, along with a cover letter, a curriculum vitae, a research statement, a writing sample (in English and of approximately 25 pages), three letters of recommendation,and two course proposals dealing with the topic of Mediterranean Studies.

Stipend: $61,449 (2014/15), 63,907 (2015/16) plus benefits and a yearly $2,000 research budget.

Review of applications will begin on February 1, 2014 and will continue until the position is filled. For additional information contact Suzanne_Stewart-Steinberg@brown.edu (Italian Studies) or Beshara_Doumani@brown.edu (Middle East Studies).  Brown University is an EEO/AA employer.  We strongly encourage women and minorities to apply.

For complete job description and application instructions please see:

apply.interfolio.com/24051

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Fellowships – Connecting Art Histories in the Museum

Posted on December 9, 2013 by Chris

Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz – Max Planck Institut
Staatliche Museen zu Berlin – Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz
Announce  a call for Applications
Doctoral and Postdoctoral Fellowships for the Year 2014
Connecting Art Histories in the Museum. The Mediterranean, Asia and Europe

Deadline for applications: 15 January 2014

The Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz – Max Planck Institut (KHI Florenz) and the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin – Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz (SMB) are pleased to announce a call for applications for up to three doctoral or postdoctoral fellowships within the program ‘Connecting Art Histories in the Museum. The Mediterranean, Asia and Europe’, beginning approximately 1 April 2014.

http://www.khi.fi.it/en/forschung/projekte/projekte/projekt133/index.html

The fellowship program, directed by Hannah Baader und Gerhard Wolf (KHI Florenz) together with Michael Eissenhauer and Jörg Völlnagel (SMB), aims to strengthen the collaboration between museums and research institutes and to promote projects to be realized in close contact with the objects and collections of the SMB. The fellowships are open to scholars of art history (for example Asian, Byzantine, European and Islamic Arts) and related fields. We seek scholars whose work has a broad horizon and whose interests focus on the artistic and intercultural agency as well as the mobility of ideas, artists and artefacts within the framework and in relation to the program. This also includes research projects dedicated to its historiographical and museographical dimension.

The fellowships will be located in the individual museums of the SMB. These are actually the Museum für Islamische Kunst (Museum of Islamic Art; Stefan Weber), the Museum für Asiatische Kunst (Museum of Asian Art; Klaas Ruitenbeek, Lilla Russell-Smith), and the Kunstbibliothek (Art Library and Collection of Photography; Moritz Wullen). At the same time the fellows will work as a research group, with joint seminars, workshops and conferences involving museum curators, international experts and scholars/fellows of the KHI Florenz and the ‘Art Histories and Aesthetic Practices’ program at the Forum Transregionale Studien, Berlin. Working languages are German and English.

Fellowships are for one year, with the possibility of an extension for a second year. The fellowship (including travel expenses) follows the rules of the Max Planck Society. A second fellowship year will be considered upon presentation of the researcher’s first year results.

Applications in German or English language should include
– a detailed cv
– a research proposal (max. 5 pages)
– a list of publications and one substantial writing sample
– one letter of recommendation and the name of a second referee

Please send your electronic application as one pdf file (max. 2 MB) by 15 January 2014 to dirwolf@khi.fi.it

The Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz is an equal opportunity employer and particularly encourages applications from women and disabled persons.

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Call for Papers – Charlemagne after Charlemagne

Posted on December 9, 2013 by Chris

Charlemagne after Charlemagne
11th Annual Symposium of the International Medieval Society (IMS-Paris)

Call for Papers

Location: Paris, France
Dates: Thursday June 26th – Saturday June 28th 2014
Keynote speaker: Dominique Boutet
Deadline for submissions: February 10th 2014

The International Medieval Society Paris (IMS-Paris) invites paper proposals and session themes for its upcoming symposium centered on “Charlemagne after Charlemagne.”

A looming presence during the Middle Ages and beyond, this Frankish king and emperor, who died in 814, had a cultural afterlife that far exceeded any other medieval historical figure. The symposium for 2014 seeks to examine the medieval reception (and representation) of Charlemagne on the 1200th anniversary of his death, as he became a model sovereign, a literary personage, and a saint. The holy emperor was venerated in a complex though limited manner, resulting in the elaboration of a distinct hagiographical discourse and the composition of a liturgical office.

The literary fortunes of Charlemagne, highlighted as early as 1865 by Gaston Paris, experienced multiple permutations. Latin and vernacular literature (French, Italian, German, English, etc.), produced divergent associations and separate developments, from historical works to chansons de geste. These literary representations went hand in hand with visual portrayals in manuscripts, stained glass, sculpture, and architecture. Charlemagne was also conjured as a figure of pilgrimage and a founder (real or imagined) of monasteries, cities, and universities, attached to these institutions through stories and forged documents to which his name was affixed. The figure of Charlemagne served to construct and define an ideal, which was shaped and reshaped by different eras according to their respective needs.

For its 2014 symposium, the International Medieval Society seeks to mark this anniversary through a reevaluation of Charlemagne’s legacy during the medieval period. Although the geographic area of France will be given priority, comparisons with other regional ‘Charlemagnes’ are certainly possible. We invite papers that deal with material from after Charlemagne’s death in 814 to the end of the Middle Ages.

Proposals of 300 words or less (in English or French) for a 20-minute paper should be e-mailed to ims.paris.2014@gmail.com no later than February 10th 2014. 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 centre for medievalists who travel to France to conduct research, work, or study. For more information about the IMS-Paris and the programme of last year’s symposium, please visit our website: www.ims-paris.org.

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2014 Medieval Academy of America Annual Meeting

Posted on December 5, 2013 by Chris

To the Members of the Medieval Academy,

The Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies at the University of California Los Angeles is pleased to host the 2014 Annual Meeting of the Medieval Academy of America, which will be held jointly with the annual meeting of the Medieval Association of the Pacific at UCLA on April 10-12, 2014. The meeting’s theme is “Empires and Encounters.”

The program will include four plenary sessions:

Presidential Address: Richard Unger, University of British Columbia
Opening Plenary Session: Susan Boynton, Columbia University
Fellows Plenary Session: Margaret Mullett, Dumbarton Oaks
CARA Plenary Session

The meeting will conclude with a private reception at the Getty Villa in Malibu on Saturday evening. The annual meeting of CARA delegates will take place on Sunday.

Registration is now open. The Program, registration link and hotel information can be found here: http://www.cmrs.ucla.edu/medieval_academy/index.html

We hope you will join us for what promises to be a very successful meeting.

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Fellowship: Jews, Christians and Muslims (Cambridge, 2015)

Posted on December 3, 2013 by Chris

The Woolf Institute, which specializes in the study of relations between Jews, Christians and Muslims from a multidisciplinary perspective, invites applications for its annual visiting fellowship. The Fellowship is tenable for a two to three month period that overlaps one of the Cambridge terms 2015:

Lent term: 13 January–13 March 2015
Easter term: 21 April–12 June 2015

The successful candidate will be expected to be involved in a project of academic research, public education or of the arts in an area relevant to the Institute’s work. The Fellow will be asked to present their work at a symposium on the subject of their project proposal.

There is no stipend attached to the Fellowships, but Fellows will be entitled to free accommodation in Cambridge and round-trip travel from their country to Cambridge. They will also have access to the Woolf Institute and Cambridge University libraries.

The Fellowship is available for a postdoctoral scholar of any academic rank, a policymaker or analyst in a relevant area of work, or an artist (writer, painter, photographer, etc.) and will most likely be asked to participate in some of the Institute’s teaching or practice-based activities. Further information about the Institute can be found at: http://www.woolf.cam.ac.uk.

A letter of application, CV, the names of two referees who may be approached, a project proposal (1,500 words max.), and a sample of work should be sent to:

Electors of the Visiting Fellowship, Woolf Institute, Wesley House, Jesus Lane, Cambridge CB5 8BJ, UK or e-mailed to Tina Steiner at bs411@cam.ac.uk.

Questions may be addressed informally to the Deputy Director, Dr Shana Cohen at sc736@cam.ac.uk.

Deadline for the submission of applications is 24 January 2014.

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Call for Papers – 20th Annual Postgraduate Medieval Studies Conference

Posted on December 3, 2013 by Chris

Postgraduate Medieval Conference
CALL FOR PAPERS
20th Annual Postgraduate Medieval Studies Conference
21-22 February, 2014
Centre for Medieval Studies, University of Bristol, UK

DEPENDENCE/INDEPENDENCE

Keynote address by Dr. Alastair Macdonald (University of Aberdeen)

The University of Bristol hosts the longest-running international medieval postgraduate conference in the UK. This annual event offers medievalists the opportunity to present their research and discuss ideas in an interdisciplinary setting. This year, the conference will celebrate its 20th anniversary, and proposals are invited for papers from postgraduates and early career scholars on the theme of “Dependence/Independence”.

The aim of this year’s conference is to consider the connections and relationships between people, entities, and institutions in the medieval world. We are interested in the way ideas of dependence and independence existed in the political sphere, the personal realm, the religious institutions, and beyond, as well as the influence of region, socio-economic status, gender and/or other factors upon these concepts. We welcome a wide range of discussion from a variety of disciplines and perspectives, from the literary and historic to the visual arts and the performative to explore how perception and practice of dependence/ independence influenced the medieval world and our understanding of it.

Topics may include but are not limited to:

  • Political connections- local, national, and international
  • Private relationships, public relationships
  • Community connections
  • Dependence and independence in monastic communities
  • Trade and the economy
  • Intellectual in/dependencies: schools and universities, scholars and students
  • Patronage in the arts
  • Performers and audiences
  • Text and oral traditions

Papers must be no more than 20 minutes long. Papers welcome from current postgraduates and early career researchers.

Abstracts of 250-300 words should be sent by email (by preference) to Jenny Markey (jm8585@bris.ac.uk)

or by post:

Jenny Markey
103 Queen’s Road
Clifton, Bristol     BS8 1LL
UK

Deadline for applications: Friday 6th December 2013

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Announcing the 4th Annual Seminar on “Understanding the Medieval Book”

Posted on December 3, 2013 by Chris

The University of South Carolina invites participants to its 4th annual seminar, “Understanding the Medieval Book,” which will be held at the Hollings Library, University of South Carolina, Columbia, from 7-9 April 2014. This two-day hands-on seminar explores medieval books (e.g., Books of Hours, bibles, breviaries, etc.) under the direction of a specialist. Participants will use the university’s collection of 130 medieval manuscripts and fragments.

Our 2014 specialist will be Dr. Timothy Graham, Professor of History and Director of the Institute for Medieval Studies, University of New Mexico. Dr. Graham is holds a PhD from the University of Cambridge and an MPhil from the Warburg Institute, University of London. He teaches courses and seminars on medieval history, paleography, manuscript culture, and Anglo-Saxon studies. A recognized authority on medieval manuscripts, their production and use, his best-known book is Introduction to Manuscript Studies, which has become the leading international textbook on the subject of manuscripts and manuscript culture.

This seminar is free but limited to 25 participants. If you are interested in attending, information and a brief application can be found at this link:

http://artsandsciences.sc.edu/engl/files/Understanding_the_Medieval_Book_Graham.pdf

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Executive Director, Medieval Academy of America

Posted on December 2, 2013 by Chris

The Medieval Academy of America invites applications to serve as Executive Director of the world’s largest scholarly organization devoted to the study of the Middle Ages. The Executive Director is appointed for a five-year term by the Council; the term is renewable.

The position of Executive Director is of vital importance to the successful fulfillment of the mission of the Medieval Academy of America. As its highest-ranking professional employee, the incumbent is responsible for representing the organization’s members, their elected leadership, and the vibrant programs in Medieval Studies whose role in contemporary society and culture we support. Working from the Academy office in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in collaboration with and reporting to the organization’s elected Board (a sixteen-member Council which includes the officers – president, first- and second-vice presidents, and treasurer), the Executive Director proposes, develops and implements policies and programs addressing the present and future needs of a national and international community of medieval scholars.

Responsibilities include advancing the interests of the Academy and implementing policies in conjunction with the elected Officers and Council, overseeing the Academy’s governance and membership services, supervising Academy finances and fundraising efforts, promoting membership growth, facilitating the work of Academy committees, coordinating the Annual Meeting and meetings of the Council and Executive Committee, and managing the Academy office and staff. A fuller description of the position is available on request from the chair of the search committee.

Position qualifications include:

  • Proven leadership skills
  • Excellent oral and written communication abilities
  • Demonstrated ability to direct an office and supervise staff
  • Knowledge of financial systems and non-profit accounting
  • Ability to engage the Academy’s various constituencies in a positive, tactful manner
  • Strategic planning and organizing skills
  • Knowledge of and experience in dealing with current challenges confronting higher education and learned societies.

In addition to meeting the above criteria, the ideal candidate will possess a PhD in a recognized sub-discipline of Medieval Studies and have a distinguished record of publications in that field. Compensation will be based on qualifications and comparable to that of administrative leaders in similar institutions.

Nominations, including self-nominations, are welcome. Interested parties should submit applications including a curriculum vitae, a statement outlining plans for the development of the organization, and three names (with contact information) of individuals who can speak to the applicant’s qualifications, to directorsearch@themedievalacademy.org or as hard copy to the Academy office, 17 Dunster St., Suite 202, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA addressed to Director Search. Screening of applications will begin 15 February 2014. EEO/AA

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Call for Papers – Conversion Texts

Posted on November 26, 2013 by Chris

The Center for the Study of Conversion and Inter-Religious Encounters is announcing its first four-day annual conference on the theme of Texts of Conversion to be held at Ben-Gurion University in Be’er Sheva, Israel, from the 26th-29th May 2014.

The first aim of the conference is to explore the broad range of available literary sources in which relevant information about converts can be found and discuss the methodology for extracting such information and analyzing it. Scholars of all disciplines, interests, geographic and chronological focuses are invited to propose papers which will shed light on the extant data and propose methodological strategies for its accumulation and analysis. Sessions might include, but are not limited to, such topics as:

Law and conversion: courts records, regulations, and legal opinions
Religious and Secular Governance: decrees, official records,
Narrative and conversion: historiography, hagiography, biography, poetry
Intellectual and cultural brokerage: convert-authored scientific and educational treatises, poetry, and fiction
Theology: debates, exegesis, polemics, and apologetics
Archeology: tombs, dedications, houses of worship
Psychological, linguistic and semiotic analysis of conversion texts

We especially welcome papers that address related texts from the Medieval and Early Modern periods, but also welcome proposals dealing with Antiquity and the Modern Era which bear relevance to the theme of the conference.

The second aim of the conference is to showcase the proposed database and prepare the ground for international cooperation on inputting relevant data. Participants are requested to prepare materials relevant to one or more converts (or an example of mass conversion) according to the parameters of the database set out above. We will study these test cases together, input the materials, and attempt to deal with the problems that arise, thereby creating a protocol for the database and ironing out the difficulties.

Proposals should include the title and abstract (300 words) of your proposed paper (30 mins) along with the outline of the materials to be presented to the group relating to the database.
Please send the materials to hirik@bgu.ac.il

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