Newsletter

  • MEMRN Winter Conference 2026: Otherworlds

    The MEMRN Committee Winter Conference event is returning for a third year.

    Broadly conceived, the theme invites participants to consider the creation of literary & artistic otherworlds, abstract otherworld journeys, or mythical, spiritual and social otherworlds. We encourage practice and industry-based researchers to consider historic buildings, museums, and modern media forms such as period television, film, historical fiction writing, theatrical performance and videogames as windows into the ‘Other’ worlds of the past. Narratives of travel, conflict, colonisation and encounter can be explored as the intersection of ‘Other’ worlds colliding. We look forward to seeing how our brilliant community responds to this invitation and interprets the theme within the context of their own research projects. 

    We welcome papers on a range of topics within medieval and early modern studies for this interdisciplinary conference, including:

    • History and politics 
    • Philosophy and theology 
    • Literature, drama, performance culture and music 
    • Latin and vernacular languages 
    • Art history, architecture and archaeology 
    • Manuscript studies and book history 
    • Museum & heritage studies
    • MEMs in the modern world

    We invite abstracts of up to 300 words for individual research papers of twenty minutes in length (or 700 words for a panel of three people presenting on a particular subject or sub-theme). 

    The MEMRN conference, kindly sponsored by the CHASE doctoral training partnership (AHRC), is open to all UK and overseas postgraduates, professionals & practitioners. This includes independent researchers who are unaffiliated at this time.

    To submit your abstract: email your submission to chasememrn@gmail.com, with your name & ‘Conference Paper Submission’ in the subject line.

    When submitting your abstract, please indicate whether you plan to present in-person or remotely; include your institution (if applicable) and, if from a CHASE-affiliated university institution, whether or not you are directly funded by CHASE.

    Deadline for submissions: Midnight on Friday 25th September

  • Join the Medieval Academy of America

    The Medieval Academy, the world’s oldest and largest organisation of medievalists, supports research and teaching in medieval records, literature, languages, arts, archaeology, history, philosophy, science, life, and all other aspects of medieval civilisation. It has now adopted a new dues category specifically for medievalists who are not residents of North America.

    For only $25/year, medievalist outside of North America can take advantage of all the MAA has to offer, including access to the entire run of our flagship journal, Speculum.

    For more information, visit https://www.medievalacademy.org/general/register_member_type.asp

  • Workshop: Feelings of Safety and Security in the Early Modern World, Friday 27 November, Macquarie University

    What did it mean to feel safe or secure for early modern populations? How did people persist and build futures for themselves and their families in challenging conditions? This workshop aims to fill a key gap in our knowledge of how people created conditions to feel safe during times of existential danger or crisis in early modern Europe.

    Safety and security can be defined in multiple ways: economic, social, political, physical, psychological, cultural and emotional. In the context of modern history, especially as it pertains to twentieth-century constructions of ‘risk’, there is now an established literature on the development of health and safety in workplaces, insurance and risk, ‘risk society’, including nuclear anxieties and environmental concerns, and in relation to child-rearing and childhood opportunities, where children’s ‘worlds’ are reduced by safety concerns. Within colonial contexts, there is a literature on ‘cultural safety’ and its absence, as a dimension of security for marginalised groups. There is some work on early modern security, particularly in relation to political and national security, physical safety, and individual freedoms, and growing work on economic insecurity and its impacts. Religion is an important part of this story, but people not only lived for the next life but the one on earth. Parents imagined futures for their children; children hoped for themselves; families aspired to long lineages and survival over generations.

    This workshop hopes to build on and expand this foundational research to consider how early modern people acquired the social and emotional resources to persist ‘at the end of the world’.

    Registration is now open: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSc9Z9IU65dL7EmcZlZMRQDQyMkWrbg-CFxzU29Cx1SdMzHZEw/viewform

    Registrations close: 31 October 2026.

  • Attend: HDR Masterclass – Papyri and Manuscripts: Exploring Layers of Ages

    You are warmly invited to participate in an HDR Masterclass of the EU-Horizon PAMΞLA research consortium: ‘Papyri and Manuscripts: Exploring Layers of Ages’. The event will be held at Macquarie University on Friday 7 August from 9:30am–4:30pm in Room 113, WW17 (the Michael Kirby Law Building).

    This Masterclass provides an exciting opportunity for HDRs to engage with the textual cultures of the ancient and medieval worlds, and to meet and learn from our team of visiting scholars from the Horizon-Marie Skłodowska-Curie project PAMΞLA (Papyri and Manuscripts: Exploring Layers of Ages), of which Macquarie University is a partner. PAMΞLA is hosted by our strategic partner, Charles University, Prague.

    To secure a place please contact Trevor Evans (trevor.evans@mq.edu.au). A program will be circulated to participants.

    PAMΞLA is a ground breaking initiative that seeks to bridge centuries of cultural heritage through innovative research combining two usually separate types of written artefacts: ancient papyri and medieval manuscripts. PAMΞLA pioneers a new research paradigm by integrating expertise from manuscript studies, papyrology, AI-driven analysis, material sciences, and digital humanities. The project combines interdisciplinary expertise with inter-sectoral and international collaboration, addressing some of the most pressing challenges in the study and preservation of these precious objects. This cross-disciplinary synergy establishes a holistic and systematic approach that enables deeper comparative studies, methodological advancements, and a richer understanding of textual traditions over time. PAMΞLA’s findings will not only reshape academic research but also enhance museum curation, digital archiving, and heritage preservation, ensuring lasting cultural and technological impact.

  • ANZAMEMS Reading Group

    The next session of the 2026 ANZAMEMS reading group is on Tuesday, 28th July. This week, the group will be focusing on Vikings, and the reading will be Matthew Firth’s 2025 article “Viking Across Conversion: Depictions of Víkingar in the Sagas of Icelanders.” Journal of Medieval History 51 (5): 587–603.

    Times are as follows:
    10am Perth
    12pm Melbourne
    2pm New Zealand

      The Zoom links, readings, and full schedule can be found on the Google Drive at https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1Qi0W8i-38w0Dgwia9jJ0aDCh5OEQjpRF.

      Please contact the convenor with any queries: Emily Chambers (Murdoch University), emily.chambers@murdoch.edu.au.

    1. PhD Position: History of the Hourglass

      Applications are invited for a PhD position as part of the Australian Research Council funded project The History of the Hourglass.

      This PhD research opportunity forms part of a project that undertakes the first history of the hourglass from its origins c.1300 through to its global circulation in the sixteenth century. The most precise time-measurement device of its era, the hourglass changed the course of history through its role in maritime travel, scientific experiments and everyday time management. It transformed time into a silent, interior flow crucial to a wide range of cultural projects: in Cairo classrooms or alchemical labs; in the cook’s kitchen or preacher’s pulpit. Alongside its critical intervention in the history of time, the project seeks to pioneer new scientific methods for analysing these fragile objects, with major benefits for their conservation in Australian and international collections.

      This is an exciting opportunity to join a collaborative, world-leading research team investigating the intersections of the history of temporalities and material culture. The successful candidate will receive advanced research training while developing skills in digital humanities, the analysis of visual and material culture and materials conservation through an innovative interdisciplinary research project.

      The successful applicant will receive a scholarship package which includes a tuition fee waiver and living allowance up to 3.5 years.

      Expressions of Interest close Monday 21 September at 1700 (Melbourne time). For more infomation, visit https://findanexpert.unimelb.edu.au/opportunity/1790-histories-of-the-hourglass

    2. EOI: Editorship of Parergon

      Dear ANZAMEMS members,
       
      The current Parergon editors, Sarah Ross and Ros Smith, will be stepping down from their roles in 2027. We are looking for an editor or editorial team from the ANZAMEMS community to replace them. If you would like to discuss the possibility with Sarah and Ros, please contact them (emails: Rosalind.Smith@anu.edu.au and Sarah.Ross@vuw.ac.nz)
       
      To apply, please submit a CV, including relevant experience, plus statement up to 500 words on what you would bring to the journal and your ideas for its future. Submit your application to info@anzamems.org. 

      Closing date: 29 August 2026.

    3. ANZAMEMS Newsletter

      Apply: UWA Research Fellow – History

      The School of Humanities at The University of Western Australia is seeking to appoint a four-year Research Fellow in History or a relevant discipline. This role sits within the Truth Telling in the Goldfields research program, led by Professor Jane Lydon. The project brings together academic expertise and industry partners—including Goldfields Aboriginal Language Centre Aboriginal Corporation (GALCAC), the State Library of Western Australia, and the Department of Planning, Lands and Heritage—to develop new, inclusive ways of understanding and sharing Australia’s past. First Nations candidates are strongly encouraged to apply.

      Closing date: 11:55 PM AWST on Wednesday, 22 July 2026.

      https://external.jobs.uwa.edu.au/cw/en/job/523653?lApplicationSubSourceID=

      …

      CFP: Faces of the Early Medieval World
      30 September–2 October 2026, University of Newcastle, Australia and Online

      The Australian Early Medieval Association invites submissions for its 2026 conference—AEMA 21: Faces of the Early Medieval World.

      The late antique and early medieval periods were, like our own, worlds full of faces. Some faces – of rulers, clergy, saints and villains, were recognisable locally and regionally. Other faces were relegated to obscurity but nonetheless left their marks in the literary and material records. Faces could be metaphorical, others literal. A pious public face might be presented to obscure a more sordid private life, or a face of foolishness to obscure secrets. Some faces were remembered and depicted through imagination and tradition, reflecting local practices of memory. Faces in art could convey emotion and spirituality, virtue and vice, while faces in manuscript illuminations could shape the visualisation of the reader, transforming the understanding of characters in a text.

      We invite reflections on the many faces of the early medieval world: individuals, imagined figures, depictions, impressions, reflections, and everything in between. In keeping with the inclusive spirit of AEMA’s annual international conferences, submissions may equally contain an absence of faces, as long as the submission is centred on the early medieval period (c. 400–1100 CE) in any geographical location or its reception in later contexts or media.

      Please submit your abstract for a standard 20-minute paper to aemaconference2026@gmail.com by 31 July 2026. Each proposal should include: the presenter(s), their academic affiliation(s) (if applicable), paper title, an abstract of 150–250 words, a short presenter(s) biography of 50 words, preferred mode of presentation (in-person or online), including the timezone if online. Graduate and ECR AEMA members presenting in person may apply for a limited number of modest travel bursaries.

      …

      CFP: Conquest, Invasion, Colonisation Experience and Memory in Early Medieval Britain, Leeds International Medieval Congress, 5–8 July, 2027

      Conquest is not a singular event, but an ongoing process, experienced, negotiated, re-sisted, and remembered in different ways. Across early medieval Britain and Ireland, political and military transformations reshaped communities, from the expansion of early English kingdoms and Scandinavian settlement to the incorporation of neigh-bouring polities and the arrival of new ruling elites. These processes could be traumat-ic, provoking resistance, adaptation, and the renegotiation of individual and collective identities. Yet conquest rarely entailed straightforward replacement. Rather, its effects were mediated through accommodation, cultural exchange, and historical memory. This session invites papers that explore the diverse experiences, representations, and legacies of conquest, invasion, and colonisation across the early medieval Insular world.

      Proposals should include paper title, contact details and an abstract of up to 150 words. Submissions and questions should be sent to Matthew Firth (matthew.firth@flinders.edu.au) by 31 August 2026.

    4. ANZAMEMS NEWSLETTER

      CFP: The Australian and New Zealand Postgraduate Conference 2026, University of Sydney

      The University of Sydney History Department is pleased to invite proposals for its biennial conference, which will take place on September 29-30, 2026. This event is an opportunity for Honours, Postgraduates, and ECRs (within two years of submission) to present their research, to seek feedback on emerging projects, and to grow in community.

      We welcome a broad range of scholarship from all areas of History, along with adjacent disciplines, including Archaeology, Ancient History and Classics, History and Philosophy of Science, Art History, and Museum and Heritage Studies.

      Please submit a proposal for an individual paper, thematic panel of 3-4 speakers and/or roundtable (300 words, plus the paper title), along with a short biography (100 words) to anzpc2026@gmail.com The deadline for submission is 10 July.

      There will be a limited number of bursaries available to assist with travel and accommodation expenses. To apply for this, please submit an additional statement (100 words) outlining why a bursary would be beneficial and how the funds will be used, if offered.

      For more information, please contact us at anzpc2026@gmail.com

      Attend: George Rudé 2026 French History and Culture Seminar, 2026

      The conference organisers are pleased to invite you to the 25th George Rudé Seminar in French History and Culture, which will be held from 8-10 July 2026 in Boorloo / Perth at the University of Western Australia on the unceded land of the Whadjuk Noongar on the banks of the Derbal Yerrigan / Swan River.

      The George Rudé Seminar, held every second year in Australia or New Zealand, brings together specialists in French history and culture from across the world in recognition of the contribution made by George Rudé to the study of French history and culture in Australasia and internationally.

      We are excited to announce our two keynotes: Jennifer Yee, Oxford: Romanticism and the Oriental Despot: from Delacroix to Balzac and Baudelaire; and Dr Tracy Ryan, Playing with the facts: Writing French women’s history into fiction.

      We encourage you to complete your registration at this link:  https://payments.uwa.edu.au/RudeFrenchStudiesConference

    5. CFP: Feelings of Safety and Security in the Early Modern World

      Friday 27 November 2026, Macquarie University, Sydney

      What did it mean to feel safe or secure for early modern populations? How did
      people persist and build futures for themselves and their families in challenging
      conditions? This workshop aims to fill a key gap in our knowledge of how people
      created conditions to feel safe during times of existential danger or crisis in early
      modern Europe.

      Safety and security can be defined in multiple ways: economic, social, political,
      physical, psychological, cultural and emotional. In the context of modern history,
      especially as it pertains to twentieth-century constructions of ‘risk’, there is now an
      established literature on the development of health and safety in workplaces,
      insurance and risk, ‘risk society’, including nuclear anxieties and environmental
      concerns, and in relation to child-rearing and childhood opportunities, where
      children’s ‘worlds’ are reduced by safety concerns. Within colonial contexts, there is
      a literature on ‘cultural safety’ and its absence, as a dimension of security for
      marginalised groups. There is some work on early modern security, particularly in
      relation to political and national security, physical safety, and individual freedoms,
      and growing work on economic insecurity and its impacts. Religion is an important
      part of this story, but people not only lived for the next life but the one on earth.

      Parents imagined futures for their children; children hoped for themselves; families
      aspired to long lineages and survival over generations.

      This workshop hopes to build on and expand this foundational research to consider
      how early modern people acquired the social and emotional resources to persist ‘at
      the end of the world’. We welcome papers for the period 1400-1800 and for any
      geographical context.

      We now call for papers that elucidate this topic. Papers might consider but are not
      limited to:

      • Definitions and practices of safety and security
      • Safety and security for individuals, groups, nations and other collectives
      • Positive emotions as a counterpoint to fear and anxiety
      • Consolations and comfort during challenging times
      • The emotions of resilience and persistence
      • Hope for the future as a dimension of safety
      • Imagination as a place for safe feeling or future building

      Papers should typically be twenty minutes long; proposals for panels and
      roundtables are also welcome. If you would like to propose something less
      conventional, please do get in touch. Hybrid options are a possibility; please indicate
      on your proposal if that is desired.

      Please send a title, 200-word abstract and two-sentence bio for each speaker to katie.barclay@mq.edu.au by 30th JUNE.

    6. ANZAMEMS PG/ECR Reading Group

      The next session of the ANZAMEMS PG/ECR Reading Group will take place on Tuesday, 26 May at 11am Perth/ 1pm Melbourne/ 3pm New Zealand. The reading for this month is “Spinning and Economy,” by Judith M Bennett, in Needed But Deplored: Spinners and Singlewomen in Industrial Coventry, c.1490–1525, Past & Present 269, no. 1 (2025): 46- 86.

      We ask all those interested in joining to email either of the convenors Emily Chambers (Murdoch University), emily.chambers@murdoch.edu.au, or Elizabeth Newton-Jackson (University of Auckland), enew505@aucklanduni.ac.nz. Drop-ins are still welcome.


      All readings and any updates to the schedule will be shared through the reading group’s Google Drive folder: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1Qi0W8i-38w0Dgwia9jJ0aDCh5OEQjpRF Sessions run for 1 hour via Zoom.


      Join here: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/85868062846?pwd=tQDc6UwmusUc2sBfyPDrJwiJLz
      RFR9.1
      Meeting ID: 858 6806 2846
      Passcode: ANZARG
      Please contact the convenors with any queries

    7. 102nd Annual Meeting of the Medieval Academy of America

      The 2027 MAA Meeting Program Committee welcomes innovative panels that cross traditional disciplinary boundaries or that use various disciplinary approaches to examine an individual topic. Especially encouraged are papers on Asia, Africa, the Middle East, or Eastern Europe, and the networks and exchanges between East and West, and proposals from graduate students. Individuals may propose to offer a paper or propose a full panel of papers and speakers. Panels typically consist of three 25-minute papers, and proposals should be geared to that length. The Program Committee may choose a different format for some panels after the proposals have been reviewed. Panel organizers may wish to propose different formats for their panels, subject to Program Committee approval. In order to be considered, proposals must be complete and sent via uoft.me/MAA2027

      Paper proposals will need to include the individual’s information (name; a statement of Medieval Academy membership, or statement that the individual’s specialty would not normally involve membership in the Academy; professional status; email address; postal address; home or cell and office telephone numbers) and paper information (title, abstract of no more than 250 words, and audio-visual needs).
       
      Session proposals will need to include the above proposer’s information as well as a session title, session abstract, list of proposed papers and speakers, and audio-visual needs.
       
      If the proposer will be at a different address when decisions are announced in September 2026, that address should be included.
       
      DEADLINE: JUNE 1, 2026
      CONFERENCE DATES: April 15, 16, 17, 2027 at the University of Toronto campus.

      For more information, see: https://www.medieval.utoronto.ca/news/2027-maa-annual-meeting-call-papers.

    Editors

    This newsletter is edited by ANZAMEMS Communications Officer Dr Elizabeth Burrell. Please contact the Editor with any notices to be posted in the Newsletter. ANZAMEMS reserves the right to edit the content of all notices. Unless noted, ANZAMEMS does not endorse any event, product or service advertised in this newsletter.

    Submissions

    We regularly post call for papers, conference announcements, job postings, prize announcements, workshops, and other listings that may be of interest to our members. All postings to the newsletter also are published on our Twitter page. Please email submissions as a word document or in plain text to the Editor.

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