Daily Archives: 14 May 2018

Celtic Learning study days: Bede and The Book of Kells

Two upcoming study days from the Australian School of Celtic Learning www.celticlearning.com.au

Saturday 19 May: The Venerable Bede study day

The Venerable Bede wrote his famous Ecclesiastical History of the English People early in the eighth century. This, together with his other writings, is one of our main sources of information about the English and Celtic regions in the seventh and eighth centuries. In this study day, we will look at the world Bede lived in, from Anglo-Saxon and Celtic perspectives. We will explore his interests and writings in history, biography and science. We will discover more about the people he knew and the people he wrote about.

Schedule
9.30-11.00 – Celtic/Anglo-Saxon churches
11.30-1.00 – Bede’s Ecclesiastical History
1.30-3.00 – Bede’s Lives of saints
3.30-5.00 – Bede’s scientific works

Venue
Sydney Mechanics’ School of Arts, 280 Pitt Street, Sydney

Cost
AU$95     $65 student/unwaged
includes morning and afternoon teas, light lunch and booklet
Venerable Bede study day registration form

Saturday 2 June: The Book of Kells study day

The Book of Kells is an illuminated manuscript of the four Gospels in Latin, dating from around 750 CE. It is one of Ireland’s greatest treasures. In this lavishly illustrated study day, we will look at the background of the Book: where was it made, in what circumstances, and what happened to it? We will then examine the decoration of the Book, considering the different artistic influences on it, its place in the Insular manuscript tradition, the pigments and how they were made.

Schedule
9.30-11.00 – St Columba and the church
11.30-1.00 – Iona and Kells
1.30-3.00 – the Book of Kells
3.30-5.00 – artistic influences on the Book

Venue
Sydney Mechanics’ School of Arts, 280 Pitt Street, Sydney

Cost
AU$95     $65 student/unwaged
includes morning and afternoon teas, light lunch and booklet
Book of Kells study day registration form

CFP for RSA 2019 Seminar: “Sex, Gender, and Race in the Atlantic and Mediterranean Worlds: A Comparative View”

The Renaissance Society of America Meeting in 2019, which will take place in Toronto, 17-19 March, is launching new seminar sessions.  Seminars will be a discussion of 3-6 pre-circulated papers (approx. 4000 words) dealing with the period 1300-1700 from any discipline.  Seminars are open to attendees although the assumption is that everyone will read the papers in advance. 

Please see below for the seminar description that Janine Peterson (History) and Patricia Ferrer-Medina (Spanish) are convening on “Sex, Gender, and Race in the Atlantic and Mediterranean Worlds: A Comparative View”. For further information, please contact  Janine.Peterson@marist.edu

This seminar will explore how Europeans constructed the identities of non-European and non-Christian peoples in the early modern Atlantic and Mediterranean worlds.  We invite papers that examine how Europeans racialized, sexualized, or in any way “othered” Jews and Muslims in Southern Europe, the indigenous peoples of the Americas, and the peoples of North/West Africa that they encountered in Africa in addition to those encountered as slaves when traveling to the Caribbean and Central America.  Renaissance and early modern European views of different peoples was closely connected to, and constructed by, prevailing ideas about gender and sexuality as well as notions of civilization and nature.  This panel aims to explore these conceptions comparatively by fusing European Renaissance studies to date with new Atlantic world and transatlantic scholarship.  We welcome papers that bridge the geographical and disciplinary divisions inherent in much of the literature to date of the period from 1300-1700.

Any RSA member may submit an abstract for consideration for a seminar through the standard submissions website (opening 1 July 2018). These abstracts will count as the one allotted paper submission per member for the annual conference cycle, and will be vetted by the seminar organizers. Any abstract not selected for a seminar will then be rolled over for consideration by the conference program committee, during its review of regular submissions.  The deadline for submission is 15 August.  You will be notified about acceptance by 31 August.  If not accepted, your submission will be sent to general submission pool with notification about possible inclusion on another panel in September.

CFP: 2019 MLA International Symposium, Lisbon 23-25 July

The (re)emergence of populism(s), the increase in hate speech, and the resurgence of ethnic and religious violence and xenophobia—in what Pankaj Mishra has called “the age of anger”—all evince a complex web of relations and gestures toward the Other, which call the project of modernity into question.

In the face of this resurgent social, political, and religious instability, as well as the impending threat of ecological catastrophes, it seems urgent to recuperate the “lost voices” of humanity. These lost voices belong to two different groups: those that have been buried or forgotten throughout time and those that have been marginalized or othered on the grounds of their perceived foreignness. All these voices contribute to a culture of debate and dissension against and within emerging paradigms centered on intolerance and conformity, oftentimes propelled by technological developments that elide difference and naturalize absolutist ideas about the uses and misuses of power.

Re-membering (in both senses of recalling and assembling) lost voices is a way of acknowledging and bringing them to the forefront of cultural discussions as an act of resistance and as a creative impulse. In the words of the poet Tolentino Mendonça, it entails the opportunity to be filled with awe.

Inspired by Proust’s search in À la recherche du temps perdu, and with the goal of re-membering marginal voices, the 2019 MLA International Symposium calls for paper and session proposals that place the humanities at the center of world affairs and encourage debate about the circumstances and potentialities of being in awe of the other that inhabits the self and others. This “being in awe” may produce new forms of conviviality in a world devastated by hatred, poverty, bigotry, and environmental dead ends.

Thus, in the hope that a new version of George Steiner’s “humane literacy” can come into existence, we invite humanities scholars to search for “lost voices.”

Proposals may address diverse historical periods, disciplines, texts, and practices that represent, interact with, and interrogate a wide range of models of thought.

The conference will feature the following formats:

  • panel sessions and discussions
  • paper sessions composed of 3–5 individual papers
  • roundtable conversations including 3–6 participants

We invite proposals for any of the above formats. Sessions will be ninety minutes long, including time for discussion. The conference languages will be English, Portuguese, French, and Spanish.

Paper proposals should include the paper title, a brief abstract, and the speaker’s institutional affiliation (if any).

Proposals for panels and roundtables should contain the above items as well as a session chair, abstract, and title.

Please use the MLA International Symposium’s submissions portal to submit your paper, session, or roundtable proposal(s). All submissions must be received by 21 September 2018, and participants will be notified of the outcome of the selection process by 3 December 2018.

Further information can be found at https://symposium.mla.org/2019-details/