Hwaet?

Hi, I'm a long-time lurker here.  I'm currently saving up to do a Masters next year.  Just looking for advice really...

Do you have any advice for preparing should I prepare for a masters? It's been 11 years since my undergrad degree (English Lit) and I'm finding the prospect daunting!  I'm thinking of learning Latin and reading as much as I can.  Could you recommend any books? Are there any useful websites you'd use? Any recommendations for resources of any kind gratefully accepted!

I'm in Dublin so the degree's focus is on Irish history, but I'm interested in Britain and Europe too.

( CFP: Forms and Theories of Allegory )

( CFP(KZOO): Romancing History )

( CFP(KZOO): Performative Gestures in the Middle Ages )

( CFP(KZOO): Medieval Plays and the Five Senses )

( CFP: Insular Identities in Medieval Britain )

Does anyone know/can anyone think of a situation in which we might see the phrase "per manum" for a male donor of property? (for the MA, preferably)

At the moment, I'm thinking it's pretty much used for female donors...

The latest edition of Carnivalesque is now up at Medievalist, food history person, and sf/f writer Gillian Polack's Food History Blog. It's got a cool organizational theme, and the Food History blog has all sorts of other interesting posts as well.




x-posted

Does anyone have access to J.A. Szirmai's Archaeology of Medieval Bookbinding? My university doesn't have it and I am having a heck of a time trying to locate it. I need a quick look-up of a word for my dissertation chapter and if anyone has it I would be deeply grateful if they would perform said look-up for me. Please comment here or email me at noellep (AT) interchange.ubc.ca if you can help out!

(cross-posted to gradstudents)

For reasons vaguely relate to my dissertation, I need to find out about mediaeval rivers, specifically flood control or the lack thereof, and where people settled in relation to rivers. As I am a literary scholar, I haven't the faintest idea where to start. Are there any well informed people (archaeologists, I imagine?) who could point me towards some basic sources?

Hello! I am a new member here. And predictably, I have an uneasy and awkwardly-winded question. Here goes.

I am on the hunt for a terminal MA program in Medieval Studies. I am especially interested in languages and historical linguistics.

I graduated in 2007 with a degree in English, but because my school was a small Idaho liberal arts college there wasn't much in the way of medieval courses or specialists. By the time I had graduated, I had only been able to take a general medieval history course, a Chaucer class, and a six week Middle English independent study that I had talked our Elizabethan specialist into doing with me.

I studied the full allotment of Latin offered by my college (two semesters) and four semesters of German. I also took the sole linguistics class offered by the college, an introduction to the field that never got far afield of basic IPA and grammatical parsings. Also, I studied Spanish regularly on my own for about two years, including an independent five week immersion course in Mexico after graduation. However, while the Latin was intense, there wasn't very much of it, and my German feels paltry at best.

I finished school with a 3.3 GPA (though all of my linguistics and language course grades were A's). I took the GRE last year and while I did a little below average on the quantitative section, I happily did much above average on the verbal.

The crux of my concern is, however, that given my relative lack of formal language background and medieval training and my slightly less-than-perfect grade point average, I might have trouble proving to prospective grad programs of my viability as a candidate. This is part of why right now I am focusing in my search on terminal MA programs, in the hopes that in such a one I might be able to really prove myself as a serious language and medieval student. I would also certainly have no problem doing extra or intensive courses to catch up, or even summer programs. I am also not adverse to leaving the US to study overseas.

So far I have had little luck with the obvious avenues of research (Google, researching Big Name schools, &c). Most programs I've found do not offer terminal Masters Degrees, or only offer Medieval Studies certificates to give interdisciplinary grounding" to current Ph.D. students. I do not know if this is a common occurrence, but the frustrating hours spent searching have nudged me here to ask for outside assistance.

Would anybody be willing to volunteer similar experiences or advice? Or any programs they have taken or heard of that might well answer my background?

Thank you so much for your time and consideration! Meanwhile, the search continues.

Not exactly Medieval, but I think some of us may have students who are interested...

MA in Archaeology by Research - Fee Waiver
Visualising Late Antiquity: Everyday Life AD 300-650
Centre for Late Antique Archaeology, University of Kent


The School of European Culture and Languages is able to offer two MA fee waivers at Home /EU rate for the academic year 2009-2010, to support guided research into the Visualisation of Everyday Life in Late Antiquity. This degree will be taught through tutorials and guided research, although it will also be necessary to attend lectures and seminars on late antique archaeology in the first term. Assessment will be based on a 40,000 word dissertation, though students will be asked to write preparatory essays in the first term, connected to their subject. The theme of the dissertation will be set by their supervisor and may include topics such as the architecture, furniture and material culture in late antiquity.

Programme Duration: Full-time 12 months
Start date: September 2009

Entry Requirements: Applicants are generally expected to have obtained an upper second-class honours degree, or the international equivalent, in archaeology or a related field. Applicants whose first language is not English are expected to have obtained IELTS 6.5 or TOEFL 570. Candidates should have an established interest in late antiquity and its architecture or material culture, and intend to progress to a PhD at Kent on this theme, if the opportunity presented itself. Excavation experience and organisational skills are desirable, as students will be expected to participate for one month in the Ostia Excavation Project, and offer some administrative assistance to the Centre for Late Antique Archaeology during the year. Knowledge of one or more modern European languages (French, German and Italian) would be an advantage, as would experience of Mediterranean archaeology.

Fee Waiver: the successful candidates will be offered a fee waiver of 3,670 GBP to cover one year of postgraduate fees at home / EU rate. No maintenance fee would be offered. Fees could be repayable in whole orpart if the degree was abandoned without completion, or if efforts made were deemed to fall below the acceptable minimum standard for MA work.

Application Process
To be eligible for these studentships, candidates must send to Dr Luke Lavan (via email) a CV and a letter explaining why they would like to be considered for the University of Kent studentship, accompanied by a piece of written work. The deadline for submissions is 16th June 2009.
Selection will be based on written submissions, with the option of interview by telephone / email.

Contact: Dr Luke Lavan,
Email: l.a.lavan AT kent.ac.uk
Tel: 01227769665
School of European Culture and Languages,
Cornwallis North West,
University of Kent,
Canterbury,
Kent CT2 7NF
http://www.kent.ac.uk/secl/classics/staff/LukeLavan/
www.lateantiquearchaeology.com

(cross-posted to my own journal)

From the Toronto Star: Manuscript may be a women's magazine. The article argues that a mid-fifteenth-century miscellany is aimed at women and is an ancestor of Cosmopolitan (!). I leave you to judge just how much the reporter simplified her data, but the article's a fun read.

Also, I have emailed the Star to inform them that Biblioteca Nazionale is not actually the name of the manuscript, so you all don't have to.

Obit -- JoAnn McNamara

For those of you not on the list-serv circuit, JoAnn McNamara has died. I think most medieval historians are aware of her work, and I know that it has helped me to frame some of the questions I ask in teaching and in my current research. I met JoAnn only once, last year at the Berkshire Conference, and felt very privileged. She was very gracious to all of us junior scholars, and was funny and warm, and supportive. She was very much the person she seemed in her writing -- smart, vibrant, feminist -- and in fact, I was sort of shocked into accepting my own age when I met her and Natalie Davis. I'd always thought of them as just a tad older than me, even though intellectually I knew that they had to be around my mother's age (I have a young mother). They always felt like slightly older peers in my head. And that was how JoAnn felt to me in real life, during a dinner and a couple of conference panels. A slightly older peer, gently mentoring people like me, even while she did seem to carry the air of the grande dame of women's history that she was.


Her memorial will be at Hunter College in the fall.



x-posted

Hi All,

I've been hearing some rumblings that UK Customs is giving US graduate students a difficult time when they try and enter the UK to perform research. I'll be leaving in less than two weeks for a month in London, and I wanted to see if any members of medievalstudies had the same types of problems.

Let me preface this by saying that I've been going to the UK to perform MS research for the past three years and I've never had more than the obligatory nod from the customs agent. I'll also be speaking at a conference at the end of my research trip, so I plan to include the conference program and a letter from the institution who's running the conference in my arsenal.

In the Spanish town of Soria, wooden protective boards and a glass panel have been taken away to fully reveal a rare medieval artwork depicting Thomas Becket's murder, which was discovered 30 years ago.

Archaeologists have discovered the remains of a so-called "lost" medieval village church in Ceredigion.

Heroic Age CFP: http://theheroicage.blogspot.com/ (Other CFPs and announcements are posted here too.)

Call for Papers


The Heroic Age: A Journal of Early Medieval Northwestern Europe invites submissions for our upcoming issues. In each issue, we plan to publish papers on any topic that falls approximately in the era between 300 and 1200 CE and within the general geographical region of Northwestern Europe and periods, and areas. Each issue contains:

*a general section of papers and notes that covers any topic in our range of dates and geography;
*a themed section of papers on an announced topic;
*a Forum section of review essays, special topics, and the like;
*a number of columns dealing with aspects of Early Medieval scholarship and research

Thus, The Heroic Age publishes the following types of materials:
*Feature Articles;
*Notes;
*Review Essays;
*Editions and Translations;
*History by Biography;*Book Reviews;
*Film and Television Reviews.

The following special sections are planned for future issues:

Issue 15: Ten Year Anniversary Issue: The World of Late Antique Britain.
For our ten-year anniversary, The Heroic Age is planning to revisit the topic of its first issue, the Matter of Arthur. Issue 15 will have three sections. The first will be historical, examining the world of Late Antique Britain, connections with the rest of the continent in Late Antiquity, and new views of the Adventus Saxonum. The second section will examine Arthur and Arthurian literature. The third section will include studies of "understudied" early medieval authors. Deadline for submissions is November 2009.

Issue 16: Alcuin and His Impact
Alcuin spans the Anglo-Saxon and Continental worlds and his influence is felt far beyond his own period and place. This issue seeks to explore the man, his times, and his influence on his contemporaries and on subsequent generations.The Heroic Age

Issue 17: Carolingian Border-Lands.
This issue seeks to explore the lands and peoples surrounding the Carolingian kingdom(s) and their impact on the Carolingians.

Future planned issues include themed sections on Old French/Provencal/Occitan studies, Charlemagne, Rise of the Normans, and Study of the Bible in Late Antiquity and Early Medieval Europe.

Articles should be 7000 words including bibliography and endnotes, and conform to The Heroic Age's in-house style. Instructions may be found under Submission Instructions. All submissions will be reviewed by two readers according to a double-blind policy. All submission should be sent to Larry Swain at haediting@yahoo.com

Two CFPs for Leeds, 12-15 July 2010, sponsored by the Early Middle English Society, which seeks to promote the study and scholarly discussion of English literary and cultural production from the late twelfth century to the mid-fourteenth century:

( Travel and Exploration in Early Middle English Texts )

( The Travelling Manuscript in Early Middle English )

We particularly, but by no means exclusively, welcome papers with interdisciplinary and/or diachronic approaches, papers that deal with several texts in relation to each other, and papers that reach beyond the conventional chronological, linguistic and geographical borders of Early Middle English studies.

Please send proposals for twenty-minute papers (title and an abstract of about 250–300 words, with a short bibliography) by e-mail to Sjoerd Levelt (s.levelt {at} seh.oxon.org) by September 6, 2009. Inquiries are welcome.

*****CALL FOR PAPERS******

The seventeenth biennial New College Conference on Medieval and Renaissance Studies will take place March 11-13 2010 in Sarasota, Florida. The program committee invites one-page abstracts of proposed twenty-minute papers on topics in European and Mediterranean history, literature, art, and religion from the fourth to the seventeenth centuries. Interdisciplinary work is particularly appropriate to the conference’s broad historical and disciplinary scope. Planned sessions are welcome. ( More info under the cut! )

Hi all,

Sorry to make this my first post here, but I'm attending the Leeds International Medieval Congress for the first time this year.  I've been advised that either the Bodington or Oxley flats are the best places to stay.  However, I don't know any other (post)graduate students attending.  Is anyone in this community attending and looking for a flatmate?  Or do you know friends looking for flatmates?  If so, please email me ASAP: aletheis (at) gmail.com.

I'm a female (post)graduate student, very clean & quiet... I'm presenting the first day of the conference & will probably be more interesting after that's over (provided it goes well).

Additionally, does anyone know how housing is assigned?  If I don't request specific flatmates, can I expect to be assigned to a flat with other women?  I don't care overmuch... just curious.  Or is it not worth requesting a place in the flats if I don't have specific flatmates in mind?  It says if the flats are booked, then delegates will be allocated a Bodington student room... I assume they refund the price difference if this happens? 

Time to go calm my nerves!  I hate the awkwardness of figuring out conference housing.

Apologies for cross-posting:

Hey everybody!!!! Carnivalesque 48 is now up at Muhlberger's Early History. It's a fantastic one, with lots of interesting stuff on women and by women! It's going to be my reading at breakfast tomorrow!

And don't forget -- carnivalesque is always looking for hosts. If you're interested, email us at carnivalesque AT earlymodernweb DOT org DOT uk

Has anyone come across the translation of the "De triumphis ecclesiae" by John of Garland/Johannes de Garlandia into modern languages (English/French/German/Italian/etc)? I've seen only Thomas Wright's Latin edition cited elsewhere.

( Call for Submissions: Spaces of Consumption and Disposable Culture: A Material Dialogue in Medieval Europe (c.1100-1500) )

( CFP: Medieval Chronicle Society, Leeds 2010 )

( CFP: Rhetoric of the Apocalypse )

( CFP: Medievalism Transformed )

The Harvard Celtic Department cordially invites proposals for papers
on topics which relate directly to Celtic studies (Celtic languages
and literatures in any phase; cultural, historical or social science
topics; theoretical perspectives, etc.) for their 29th Annual Celtic
Colloquium, to take place at Harvard University, October 9-11, 2009.
Papers concerning interdisciplinary research with a Celtic focus are
also invited. Attendance is free.

Presentations should be no longer than twenty minutes. There will be
a short discussion period after each paper. Papers given at the
Colloquium may later be submitted for consideration by the editorial
committee for publication in the Proceedings of the Harvard Celtic
Colloquium.

Potential presenters should send a 200-250 word abstract, plus a
brief biographical sketch. We encourage online responses, but
submissions may also be sent by e-mail to hcc@fas.harvard.edu, faxed,
or posted to the departmental address.

Further information and online submission form available at our
Website: http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~hcc/

Closing date for proposals: May 15, 2009.