Facebook user Guillaume Lourdel recently sent us a link to the fantastic photos he took at the 600th Anniversary of the Battle of Agincourt (1415-2015). Thanks Guillaume!
You can view the photos at Guillaume’s Facebook page, found here: https://www.facebook.com/gui.gui.1974/media_set?set=a.496293730535586.1073741894.100004648893046&type=3
ARC Centre of Excellence for the History of Emotions – Call for Associate Investigators for 2016
The call for Associate Investigators for 2016 is now open. Full details are on our website: http://www.historyofemotions.org.au/get-involved/associate-investigators.aspx
There are two Calls for Applications for 2016:
Eligible applicants will:
Applications close: 31 August, 2015.
The International Association for Robin Hood Studies (IARHS) is pleased to announce the creation of a new, peer-reviewed, open-access journal, The Bulletin of the International Association for Robin Hood Studies. The journal will be published bi-annually beginning in Spring 2016 and will be available on the IARHS’ website, Robin Hood Scholars: IARHS on the Web: http://robinhoodscholars.blogspot.com.
Scholars are invited to send original research on any aspect of the Robin Hood tradition. The editors welcome essays in the following areas: formal literary explication, manuscript and early printed book investigations, historical inquiries, new media examinations, and theory / cultural studies approaches.
We are looking for concise essays, 4,000-8,000-words long. Submissions should be formatted following the most recent edition of the Chicago Manual of Style. Submissions and queries should be directed to both Valerie B. Johnson (valerie.johnson@lmc.gatech.edu) and also Alexander L. Kaufman (akaufman@aum.edu).
The Faculty of Arts at the University of Western Australia is planning to cut the Medieval & Early Modern Studies Majors. Help stop these cuts!
Please visit the following website for links to all the ways in which you can stop these cuts!
The Senses in Medieval and Renaissance Europe: Sight and Visual Perception
University College Dublin
11–12 March, 2016
Proposals for papers are invited for The Senses in Medieval and Renaissance Europe: Sight and Visual Perception, which aims to provide an international and interdisciplinary forum for researchers with an interest in the history of the senses in the Middle Ages and Renaissance.
The history of the senses is a rapidly expanding field of research. Pioneered in Early Modern and Modern studies, it is now attracting attention also from Medieval and Renaissance specialists. Preoccupation with the human senses and with divine control over them is evident in a range of narrative texts, scientific treatises, creative literature, as well as the visual arts and music from the pre-modern period. This conference – the first in a series devoted to the five senses – aims to contribute to this expansion by bringing together leading researchers to exchange ideas and approaches.
The theme of the inaugural meeting is ‘Sight and Visual Perception’. Sight has been chosen as the first topic for investigation as it was considered the primary sense and was treated as an abstract philosophical and religious concept in many medieval texts. But the study of sight can also provide insights into various aspects of medieval society: ‘eye-witness’ descriptions; sight impairment and the care of the blind; deprivation of sight as punishment or revenge; the development of spectacles and other optical aids; ideas about colours and their significance; ‘second sight’ as manifested in visions and apparitions; the concept of ‘the gaze’ in visual arts. The conference aims to address these and other themes and to foster interaction between established and younger scholars working in the area.
Keynote Speakers:
Professor Robertson’s research and publications are concerned with vernacular theology, medieval poetics, literacy in the Middle Ages, and gender and religion in Middle English literature. Her recent work has focused on vision and touch in devotional literature. With J. Jahner she edited Medieval and Early Modern Devotional Objects in Global Perspective: Translations of the Sacred for the New Middle Ages series (Palgrave MacMillan, 2010). This collection contains her important paper, ‘Julian of Norwich’s Unmediated Vision’.
Professor Woolgar’s research and publications are concerned with the social and economic history of late-medieval England and in particular with the evidence contained in domestic household accounts. He is the author of The Senses in Late Medieval England (Yale, 2007) and co-author of A Cultural History of the Senses in the Middle Ages, 500–1450, ed. Richard Newhauser (Bloomsbury Academic, 2014).
Contributions on any aspect of the conference theme of ‘Sight and Visual Perception’ are welcomed from established and early career scholars as well as postgraduates. Proposals for panels are also warmly encouraged. Titles and abstracts (maximum 300 words) together with a short biography, institutional affiliation and contact details, should be forwarded to medrenforum@gmail.com by 8 November 2015.
The conference is organised by Edward Coleman, School of History, UCD and the Forum for Medieval and Renaissance Studies in Ireland. It is generously supported by UCD Seed Funding.
Organizing Committee:
Forum for Medieval and Renaissance Studies in Ireland (FMRSI)
Web: www.fmrsi.wordpress.com
Email: medrenforum@gmail.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ForumMRSI
Twitter: @FMRSI
Love & the Word
Australasian Universities Languages & Literature Association (AULLA) Conference 2016
Victoria University, Melbourne, Australia
7-9 December, 2016
The conference theme draws on AULLA’s origins as an association of scholars working in fields of philology. Thus we examine both philos (love) and logos (word). How does affection affect words? What do people mean by ‘love’ and its counterparts in the world’s languages? Or perhaps: how does it ‘do’ those meanings?
We encourage papers with a focus on engaged studies and discussions of teaching practice and of critical/exegetical responses to creative practice. Papers that respond to ‘love and the word’ in the fields of languages, the literary study of other languages, and philosophical approaches to cultural expression are expressly welcome. We also expressly welcome interdisciplinary angles on the theme, such as Cultural Studies, Indigenous Studies, Postcolonial Studies, and comparative approaches
The organisers welcome submissions for individual presentations of 20 minutes and panel sessions of 90 minutes. Please note, submissions are due by Monday the 29 February, 2016. Submissions should include: name/s of author/s (including affiliations), title of presentation, an abstract of up to 200 words, and a biographical note of up to 50 words per author. Panel proposals should include the above for each presentation as well as a title and abstract for the session as a whole. If you would like to nominate a chair for your panel session, that would also be welcome. To submit a proposal, please visit: http://conference2016.aulla.com.au/2015/07/27/call-for-papers.
The Snorri Sturluson Icelandic Fellowships
The Árni Magnússon Institute for Icelandic Studies invites applications for the Snorri Sturluson Icelandic Fellowships for 2016. The Fellowships are granted to writers, translators and scholars (not to university students) in the field of humanities from outside Iceland, to enable them to stay in Iceland for a period of at least three months, in order to improve their knowledge of the Icelandic language, culture and society.
The amount of the Fellowships is based in principle on travel expenses to and from Iceland, plus living expenses while in the country. Should two equally-qualified candidates be under consideration, preference will, as a rule, be given to a candidate from Eastern or Southern Europe, Asia, Africa, Latin America or Oceania.
The Árni Magnússonar Institute for Icelandic Studies assists Fellows during their stay in Iceland, at the conclusion of which Fellows are expected to submit a report to the Institute on how the grant was spent.
There is no special application form for the Fellowships. Applicants should submit a brief but thorough account of the purpose of their stay in Iceland, specifying period of stay, as well as details of education and publications.
Further information at: http://www.arnastofnun.is/english. Applications should be sent by ordinary mail (no e-mail application) no later than 31 October, 2015 to:
The Árni Magnússon Institute for Icelandic Studies
The Sigurður Nordal Office
P.O.Box 1220
121 Reykjavík
Iceland
We invite you to join us at this research event featuring new work by visiting scholars from the Center for Early Modern History at the University of Minnesota, the Besterman Centre for the Enlightenment at Oxford University, and the Eighteenth-Century Centre at the University of Warwick.
Date: Thursday 6 August, 2015
Time: 11:00am–3:00pm
Venue: Seminar Room, Level 4, Forgan Smith Building, University of Queensland
RSVP: By July 30. To register, please email Jill Paxton (and advise of any dietary restrictions).
To view the preliminary schedule, please visit: http://www.ched.uq.edu.au/index.html?page=222462&pid=170139
As part of the ANZAMEMS Postgraduate/ECR Travel Bursary Funding for 2015, bursary recipients are required to submit a brief report about the recent 10th ANZAMEMS Conference and PATS at The University of Queensland in July 2015. Over the next few months these reports will be posted to the newsletter as part of the ANZAMEMS member news section. First up are Julie Anne Davis (University of Melbourne) and Julie Robarts (University of Melbourne). Thanks to you both.
Julie Anne Davis, Doctoral Candidate, School of Historical and Philosophical Studies, University of Melbourne
The biennial ANZAMEMS Conference is, to me, one of the most significant conference events in our field. I believe that having the opportunity to talk with a variety of specialists from around the world is very important for emerging scholars, as is meeting other postgraduate students from other universities. Every two years ANZAMEMS provides the opportunity for friendships to be forged and renewed and a forum in which new research can be both tested and absorbed. I was particularly pleased this year to meet several of the Queensland based scholars who I have, as yet, not been fortunate enough to encounter in person though I have been engaging with their work for several years.
I also appreciate the collegial environment fostered by ANZAMEMS that promotes, for by far the most part, constructive and supportive feedback that encourages both speakers and listeners to continue to develop and improve their work. Observing the discussion about other people’s work, even when not directly related to my own, is something that I find is always valuable, encouraging me to find new angles from which to explore and assess my own work. I feel that I learnt a lot over the course of this conference not only from the discussion of my own work, but also from the exposure to a variety of other fields, methodologies and approaches.
Given the importance of this event I do have some concerns that it is becoming more difficult for postgraduate students to attend. The student rate for ANZAMEMS is now significantly more for postgraduate registration than other similar conferences including AHA and ANZASA. I would like to thank the Committee for offering the bursaries which I am sure helped make all the difference for many of the recipients. I would, however, also like to ask the Committee to please consider revisiting the subsidisation of the postgraduate rate to ensure that the student discount is making a genuine difference and not being cancelled out by rate exclusions so that as many emerging scholars as possible can continue to benefit from this wonderful event.
Julie Robarts, Doctoral Candidate, Italian Studies, School of Languages and Linguistics, University of Melbourne
Thanks to the bursary granted by the ANZAMEMS committee I was delighted to be able to attend the Tenth Biennial International Conference at the University of Queensland between 14-18 July, 2015, and the PATS on the Monday following. It was a great pleasure to meet scholars and postgraduate ANZAMEMS members that I have not seen since Tasmania 2008, while working on my MA. Presenting a portion of my PhD research on the first day of the conference was a new and welcome experience, and meant I was free to engage fully in the intellectual stimulation of sessions and keynotes, and opportunities for socialising offered by the meal breaks. The excellent time-keeping of those chairing panels made it easy to make the conference one’s own, for those who choose to panel hop. I am grateful too, for receiving a ticket to the magnificent conference dinner, in the magnificent Customs House. At the PATS on Monday the 20th, post-graduates benefited from the generosity of our three conference keynote speakers, Prof. Alexandra Walsham (University of Cambridge), Prof. Laura Knoppers (University of Notre Dame), Prof. Jesse Anne Owens (University of California, Davis), and CHE UQ visitor Prof. Graeme Boone (Ohio State University) as they engaged with each of the eighteen attendees about our research, and shared their insights on methodologies to inform and challenge our work. Dr Dolly MacKinnon and the UQ organising committee were an inspiration throughout the week, modelling the energy, warmth and hospitality that inform the emotional bonds of the ANZAMEMS community.
“Farmyard choreographies in early modern England”, Professor Erica Fudge (English Studies at the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow, and Director of the British Animal Studies Network)
Co-presented with HARN, the Human Animal Research Network at the University of Sydney
Date: 5 August, 2015
Time: 6:00-7:30pm
Venue: Law School Common Room, Level 4, Sydney Law School, Eastern Avenue, the University of Sydney
RSVP: Free and open to all with online registration requested. To register, visit: whatson.sydney.edu.au/events/published/sydney-ideas-professor-erica-fudge
How do we read animals that have left almost no textual traces? That is the central question here. Following a path from the 2001 foot and mouth outbreak, and the work of John Law and Donna Haraway, through Renaissance dance manuals (encountering some drunks along the way), the paper ends up in the fields and farmyards of early seventeenth-century Essex, chasing glimpses of human-livestock interactions. The problem faced is that these relationships were largely tacit ¬ there is very little written record of what it was like to live with a cow; or what it was like to be a sheep in the early modern period.
The paper asks, then, what kind of reading might we do when we are engaging with texts that are not there? The evidence used to begin to answer these questions is early modern, but the hope is that some of the implications might have a wider resonance in animal studies.
Professor Erica Fudge is Professor of English Studies at the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow, and is the Director of the British Animal Studies Network. Her publications are in two main areas: work written for a wider than academic audience on human/animal relations – Animal (2004) and Pets (2008) as well as articles in History Today magazine; and academic work on early modern culture – her books Perceiving Animals: Humans and Beasts in Early Modern English Culture (2000) and Brutal Reasoning: Animals, History and Humanity in Early Modern England (2006). She will be taking up an AHRC one-year research fellowship in September 2015 to undertake further work exploring the lives of the people and animals on early modern English smallholdings – she wants to know what it was like to be a cow in the early seventeenth century.