CALL FOR PAPERS: Drama and Pedagogy

Swiss Association of Medieval and Early Modern English Studies 2014 Conference, 12-13 September, 2014, University of Fribourg, Switzerland

Convenors: Elisabeth Dutton and Indira Ghose, University of Fribourg

In medieval England, when literacy was low and the liturgy in Latin, what did drama teach, and how? What were the implications for Middle English drama of its vernacularity, and how did it engage Latinity? The mystery plays teach scriptural material in the vernacular; the morality plays present subtle theological and philosophical teaching through allegory. In the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries drama is a way of disseminating theological and philosophical ideas: in the sixteenth century, with the rise of humanism, drama is one way the academic community debates those ideas. In early modern England, as the theatre came to rival the pulpit as a mass medium, leading many to attack the stage and many others to defend it, did drama teach or seduce, instruct or distract? As historical circumstances change, how does drama balance the requirements of doctrine and delight – and does it manifest any sense of contradiction between the two?

As well as pedagogy of drama, conference papers might consider pedagogy in drama – scenes in which instruction is portrayed, whether seriously or satirically. How do the Cycle plays engage with Christ as a teacher, or the Morality plays portray the pedagogical methods of Virtue and Vice figures? Humanist influence on the Tudor interlude ensures an interest in education, and examples of dramatized instruction abound in the plays of the early modern professional stage. Hamlet clearly thinks drama itself can teach and reveal – is his view typical, and is it right? Academic drama is a particularly pregnant locus for the exploration of drama and pedagogy: universities and the Inns of Court trained some of the leading playwrights of the early theatre, and, because productions were privately funded by colleges and performed in privately owned halls, the commercial constraints of the professional playhouses did not apply to university drama. In addition to exploring the role of academic drama in socio-political history and theatre history, the conference will examine the reasons for the strong connections between drama and education. Why was drama given a central role in pedagogical practice?

Confirmed keynote speakers: Prof. Lynn Enterline (Vanderbilt), Prof. John McGavin (Southampton), Prof. Alan Nelson (UC Berkeley), Prof. Michelle O’Callaghan (Reading). Perry Mills (Director of Edward's Boys) will be discussing productions of plays written for early modern boys' companies.

The conference will include a reception at the elegant, historic Grande Salle, with accompanying performance of a sixteenth century university play, William Gager’sDido, in a new translation from the Latin, directed by Elisabeth Dutton.

Papers are invited which explore, in any way:

  • relationships between drama and pedagogy in the medieval and early modern periods
  • the use of drama in varied instructional settings
  • portrayals of pedagogy in drama
  • the extent to which study of early theatre and study of historical educational practice may be mutually illuminating

Proposals for panels are welcome, too. A selection of papers will be published in a peer-reviewed volume to be edited by Elisabeth Dutton and James McBain.

For further details, please see our website: http://samemes2014.wordpress.com/
For further information on the Swiss Association of Medieval and Early Modern English Studies, please visit http://www.unil.ch/samemes

Please send a 400 word abstract and a short biographical note to samemes2014@zoho.com by December 6th 2013.

Premodern Queenship and Diplomacy in Europe: Workshop

Two workshops, open to the public, part of the ‘Premodern Queenship and Diplomacy in Europe’ conference, Canterbury Christ Church University, 11-13thSeptember 2014.

Friday 11 September, St Gregory’s Centre, Canterbury Christ Church University

The early modern dance workshop examines the sexual politics of early modern diplomacy by way of non-verbal codes of conduct. Dr Anne Daye’s workshop relies fully on audience participation, as she will recreate a ballet scene from The Nine Muses: A Trope for Peace in Female Diplomacy. Through the precision of dance, Anne Daye will bring to life the means by which early modern queens could engage with diplomacy, at the same time as revealing the limitations to their power.

For more information about the dance workshop, please see the dance workshop webpage: http://www.premodernqueenship.com/#!untitled/c1mij

Saturday 12 September, St Gregory’s Centre, Canterbury Christ Church University

The early modern performance workshop seeks to investigate the complex and fascinating ways in which Elizabethan dramatists theatricalised British& European Queenship. Whether they staged events from the thirteenth century, or, provided flattering portraits of Elizabeth I, early modern dramatists were keen to reimagine Queenship and diplomacy. The workshop is important in investigating three major Elizabethan dramatists, John Lyly - who introduced Queens onto the early modern stage - Shakespeare, and Marlowe, to assess how the early modern theatre contributed to cultural and social understandings of powerful Queens. Featuring a talk by Dr Andy Kesson (Roehampton), the drama workshop explores the textual and performative means available to premodern elite women to engage informally with diplomacy. It will be followed by scenes from three plays by five professionally trained actors, Sophia Kayes, Sarah Mackenzie, Stephanie Winiecki, Ruth Rundle and Brian McMahon. The aim of the workshop is to invoke audience participation via an open floor discussion at the end of the performance between the actors, literary specialists and audience members.

For more information about the drama workshop, please see the drama workshop webpage: http://www.premodernqueenship.com/#!untitled/c152x

Symposium on the History of Newspapers and Serials during the 17th and 18th Centuries

The editors of the journal Media History are holding a one day symposium at which issues relating to the history of newspapers and other serials, during the 17th and 18th centuries, will be discussed. The event will be held on Tuesday 9th September at King’s College, London and will provide an opportunity for specialists in a range of areas to discuss ideas and strategies with an invited audience of not more about twenty-five people who themselves have some relevant research experience.

The papers, with their provisional titles will be given by:
  • Dr Michael Harris, Birkbeck College, University of London: ‘A structure for research in London newspapers ca. 1680-1720’.
  • Dr Jason McElligott, Marsh’s Library, Dublin: ‘The poor relation? Writing the history of the Irish newspaper in the long eighteenth century.'
  • Dr Noah Moxham, University of St Andrews: ‘Science in 17th century serials’.
  • Professor Joad Raymond, Queen Mary College, University of London: ‘17th-century news networks’

The purpose of the day is to encourage discussion about the subject in a group of specialists small enough for the exchanges to be detailed and productive.

There is no registration fee for the event, and tea and coffee will be provided. Registration will be from 9.30 and the papers will start at 10.am. The day will be finished by 4.30pm. The venue is:
Kings College London, Virginia Woolf Building, 22 Kingsway, London, WC2B 6NR. The room details will be forwarded nearer the date.

If you can attend, please email Tom O’Malley, at tpo@aber.ac.uk. by 18th of August.

We would very much like to have your input at the event. We would be grateful if you could let us know whether you can attend.

Organised by the Media History Journal - http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals/titles/13688804.asp

Cartography between Europe and the Islamic World, 1100–1600

September 8–9, 2014, Queen Mary University of London 














Registration is now open for the conference of the international Leverhulme Network ‘Cartography between Europe and the Islamic World, 1100–1600’. The conference aims to promote comparative, cross-disciplinary scholarship on Islamic and European cartography by bringing together experts in these two fields. 

Partners: Institut für den Nahen und Mittleren Osten (LMU Munich), École Pratique des Hautes Études (Paris), The Bodleian Library, Factum Arte,Warburg Institute, British Library.

Monday September 8

9.15-10.30 Welcome and Plenary
Emilie Savage-Smith (University of Oxford): Title tbc

Respondent: Jerry Brotton (Queen Mary) 10.30-11.00 Coffee

11.00-12.15 Session 1 Chair: Yossef Rapoport (Queen Mary)
Jean-Charles Ducène (Ècole pratique des hautes études): The Map entitled Geography

used by Ibn Sa‘îd (13th c.) and al-‘Umarî (d. 1348) as Source

Stoyanka Kenderova (Sts Cyril and Methodius National Library Bulgaria): The Balkan Peninsula Represented on Al-Idrisi’s Maps

12.15-1.00 Lunch
1.00-2.00 Session 2 Chair: Alfred Hiatt (Queen Mary)

Technology/Innovation in the History of Cartography (Pelagios, Factum Arte) 2.00-3.45 Session 3 Chair: Alessandro Scafi (Warburg Institute)

Ramon J. Pujades i Bataller (Archivo de la Corona de Aragón):

Stefan Schröder (University of Helsinki): Transcultural Knowledge and Latin- Christian Cartography in the First Half of the Fourteenth Century. Impact and Function of Arabic Elements in the World Map of Pietro Vesconte.

Robin Seignobos (Université Paris-I Panthéon-Sorbonne): The Nile in Arabic and Latin Cartography (14th Century): The “Idrisian” Model and their Latin Adaptations

3.45-4.15 Coffee
4.15-5.30 Session 4 Chair: Ingrid Baumgärtner (Universität Kassel)

Emmanuelle Vagnon (Laboratoire de médiévistique occidentale de Paris): The Islamic Sources of the Catalan Atlas (1375)

Piero Falchetta (Marciana National Library Venice): Influences of Islamic Geographic Knowledge in Fra' Mauro's World Map, ca. 1450

Arabic Roots of Hybrid Late Medieval mappae mundi: A Reconsideration of the On the Proposed Evidence


5.30 Reception
7.30 Conference Dinner (invited guests and conference speakers)

Tuesday September 9

9.00-10.15 Session 5 Chair: tbc
Elly Dekker (Independent Scholar): The Pair of Celestial Maps in MS Schoenberg LJS 057. A Case of Transmission from the Islamic World to Europe?

Ilana Wartenberg (University College London): Geographical Elements on the Medieval Hebrew Scientific Bookshelf

10.15-10.45 Coffee
10.45-12.30 Session 6 Chair: Peter Barber (British Library)

Pnina Arad (Hebrew University of Jerusalem): Maps of the Holy Land: Objects of Devotion

Zur Shalev (University of Haifa): Geography and Orientalism: The Cippi Hebraici of Johann Heinrich Hottinger (1659)

Joachim Gierlichs (Qatar National Library): From Claudius Ptolemaeus to Carl Ritter: Qatar and the Gulf in Early European Maps

12.30-1.30 Lunch
1.30-2.45 Session 7 Chair: Jerry Brotton (Queen Mary)

Zsolt Gyözö Török (Eötvös Loránd University): Opposite Views: Source, Audience and Cartographic Representation of the 1566 Siege of Sziget in Hungary

Marian Coman (Nicolae Iorga Romanian Academy): Turks and Sea Monsters in Renaissance Cartography

2.45-3.15 Coffee
3.15-4.30 Session 8 Chair: Tony Campbell

Jeremy Ledger (University of Michigan): Geographies of Conquest: A Maghrebi Chart of the Western Mediterranean, ca. 1350

Dimitris Loupis (Harvard University): Exploring the Exchange of Skill and Style in Mediterranean Nautical Cartography. Piri Reis’s Bahriye and its Sources.

4.30-5.30 Concluding Round Table: Comparative Approaches to the History of Cartography

Yossef Rapoport (Queen Mary), Alessandro Scafi (Warburg Institute), Hilde de Weerdt (Leiden)

To register, see http://www.cartography.qmul.ac.uk/.

CALL FOR PAPERS: Social Networks 1450-1850

The term ‘social network’ has become a prominent part of modern day discourse, and in recent years there has been rapid growth in the field of social network studies. Yet a world in which individuals are connected to one another in multifarious ways—spanning time, place, institutional affiliation, and other social boundaries—is not just a modern phenomenon. In the early modern period, neighbourhoods, villages, cities and continents were criss-crossed with relationships and ties of obligation, through which passed friendship, as well as animosity; money, ideas, information, material goods, and more. The concepts and methodologies of social network analysis, together with new digital technologies, provide the tools to uncover the nature of these communities in the past.

At stake is the very nature of society: how did people connect to one another, to what ends, and with what results? These are questions with relevance to disciplines across the humanities and social sciences. As such, this conference brings together historically minded scholars with an interest in social networks from a range of perspectives and disciplinary backgrounds.

Proposals for 20-minute papers or panels of three speakers are welcome from a wide chronological and geographical reach, exploring social network concepts, methodologies and findings. For example, papers might consider:
  • Methodologies: sources, challenges, and approaches; digital technologies and techniques for the collection, storage, analysis and presentation of data
  • ‘Ego-centric’ or ‘whole’ networks
  • Familial and kinship networks
  • Merchants or trading communities
  • Religious, intellectual, literary, political or institutional communities
  • The cultural values underpinning social networks: for example honesty, trust, or desire for profit
  • How social networks change over time
  • The geographical reach of networks: local, regional, national or international; urban or rural

Deadline for submission of proposals: 31 January 2015

For individual paper proposals, please submit a title and 200-word abstract, along with contact details. For panel proposals, please include a title and 200-word abstract for each paper and contact details for one speaker on the panel. Contact: kate.davison@sheffield.ac.uk

Details about postgraduate bursaries will be publicised in due course.

CALL FOR PAPERS: Towards a History of Error


The Forschungszentrum Gotha and the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, Berlin invite submission of paper abstracts for a workshop to be held in Berlin, 10-11 December 2015: Towards a History of Error.

The aim of the workshop is to identify key topics and episodes in European intellectual history of error in theology, philosophy, medicine, scholarship, and the sciences, from the late Middle Ages through the early nineteenth century. Themes include not only concepts but also methods for avoiding and eliminating error, as well as reflections on the causes and consequences of error.

Paper abstracts should be no more than 750 words long, and may be submitted in French, German, or English. Applicants are also asked to submit a curriculum vitae (including publications); applications from younger scholars are especially welcomed.

Organizers:
Lorraine Daston (Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, Berlin), Fabian Krämer (Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München), Martin Mulsow (Gotha Research Center of the University of Erfurt)

Please submit all materials to Ms. Tanja Neuendorf by no later than October 1, 2014. Successful applicants will be notified by November 1, 2014.

Liminal Time and Space in Medieval and Early Modern Performance

5th-7th September 2014, University of Kent

Plenary Speakers: Professor Carol Symes (Illinois at Urbana-Champaign) and Professor Andrew Hiscock (Bangor)

This interdisciplinary, cross-period conference explores the representation, effects and meanings of liminal time and space in medieval and early modern performance culture. Emphasising the inherently liminal and ephemeral nature of performance, it will consider space and time in conjunction across a range of performance events between the tenth and seventeenth centuries. Bringing together scholars working on medieval and early modern performance in its broadest sense, the conference will initiate cross-disciplinary, cross-period dialogues that explore the continuities and ruptures between cultural thinking in the two periods, and draw out the ambiguous, transitional and transitory aspects of both concepts. On the evening of Friday 5th September the Early English Performance Cultures and Contemporary Creative Practice session will explore the ways in which cultural and creative practices might both elide and emphasise spatio-temporal divisions. During this session, theatre practitioners and writers will present, discuss, and answer questions about their most recent work, all of which has engaged with early English performance culture and narrative. This event will be followed by a drinks reception and is open to the public.

BURSARIES: Thanks to the generosity of the Society for Renaissance Studies, we are able to offer two fee-waiving bursaries to postgraduate delegates working in the early modern period. If you fall into this category please email the organisers, giving your name, institution, a brief summary of your dissertation (c.100 words) and your supervisor’s name. The bursaries will be distributed to the first two postgraduates who apply.

INFO AND REGISTRATION: http://www.kent.ac.uk/english/research/conferences/liminaltimeandspace.html

ORGANISERS:

Dr Sarah Dustagheer - S.Dustagheer-463@kent.ac.uk
Dr Clare Wright - C.Wright-468@kent.ac.uk

Hakluyt Society Essay Prize

From 2015, the Hakluyt Society will award an annual essay prize (or more than one, if the judges so decide) of up to a total of £750. Winners will be invited to publish their essays in the online Journal of the Hakluyt Society (www.hakluyt.com) if they wish to do so. The prize or prizes for 2015 will be presented at the Hakluyt Society’s Annual General Meeting in London in June 2015, where winners will be invited to attend as the Society’s guests; travel expenses within the UK will be reimbursed. Winners will also receive a one-year membership of the Hakluyt Society.

Eligibility criteriaThe competition is open to postdoctoral scholars of not more than two years’ standing on 31st December, 2014, and to undergraduate and graduate students registered as such on that date. Only one entry may be submitted per entrant per year.

Scope and subject matterEssays submitted, which should be based on original research in any discipline in the humanities or social sciences, may be on any aspect of the history of travel, exploration and cultural encounter or their effects, in the tradition of the work of the Hakluyt Society. For a conspectus of the Society’s history, aims and publications, visit www.hakluyt.com .

Essays should be in English (except for such citations in languages other than English as may appear in footnotes or endnotes) and between 6,000 and 8,000 words in length (including notes, excluding bibliography). Illustrations, diagrams and tables essential to the text fall outside the word count. Submissions should be unpublished, and not currently in press, in production or under review elsewhere. Authors may wish to consult the Society’s style sheet, which is also the Journal’s style sheet, at http://www.hakluyt.com/authors_info.htm .

Submission procedures and deadlineEssays should be submitted as email attachments in Word.doc format to Dr Surekha Davies, Chair of the Essay Prize Committee, at surekha.davies@gmail.com and to Richard Bateman, Administrator of the Hakluyt Society, at office@hakluyt.com by 1 November 2014. The entrant’s name, address (including preferred email address), institutional affiliation (if any, with date of admission), and degrees (if any, with dates of conferment) should appear within the body of the email, together with a note of the title of the submitted essay. The subject line of the email should include the words ‘HAKLUYT SOCIETY ESSAY PRIZE’ and the author’s name. By submitting an essay, an entrant certifies that it is the entrant’s own original work.

Selection procedureThe Prize Committee encourages innovative submissions that make an important contribution to knowledge, or a critical or methodological contribution to scholarship. The Committee and selected reviewers will pay attention to the analytical rigour, originality, wider significance, depth and scope of the work, as well as to style and presentation. The Prize Committee comprises selected academic faculty from among the Hakluyt Society's Council.

The Prize Committee reserves the right not to award a prize, if no submission is judged to be of sufficient merit. The Committee’s decision will be announced in April 2015. For further information regarding the Hakluyt Society, please visit www.hakluyt.com.


CALL FOR PAPERS: Shakespeare Jahrbuch / Yearbook of the German Shakespeare Society

The 2016 volume of Shakespeare Jahrbuch will be a special issue devoted to “Heroes and Heroines”.

The editorial board of Shakespeare Jahrbuch invites articles on the following topics:

• Shakespeare as a cultural/national hero
• Heroes and heroines in Shakespeare’s plays
• Heroism in Shakespeare’s plays
• Shakespearean anti-heroes
• Tragic and comic heroes/heroines
• Heroism and genre
• Shakespeare and the heroes of early modern England
• Shakespeare and (early modern, Romantic, Victorian, modern …) hero-worship
• Actors and actresses as heroes/heroines
• Heroes /heroines in Shakespeare adaptations
• …

Shakespeare Jahrbuch, the Yearbook of the German Shakespeare Society, is a peer-reviewed journal. It offers contributions in German and English, scholarly articles, an extensive section of book reviews, and reports on Shakespeare productions in the German-speaking world.

Papers to be published in the Shakespeare Jahrbuch should be formatted according to our style sheet, which can be downloaded from the website of the German Shakespeare Society at http://shakespeare-gesellschaft.de/en/jahrbuch/note-on-submission.html.

Please send your manuscripts (of not more than 6,000 words) to the editor of the Shakespeare Jahrbuch, Prof. Dr. Sabine Schülting (email:sabine.schuelting@fu-berlin.de), by 31 March 2015.


CALL FOR PAPERS: 6th International Conference of European Society of History of Science

Lisbon, 4-6 September 2014

The 6th International Conference of the European Society of History of Science will be held in Lisbon, 4-6 September 2014 and is organized by the Interuniversity Centre for the History of Science and Technology(CIUHCT),a research centre associated with the Faculty of Sciences of the University of Lisbon and the Faculty of Sciences and Technology of the New University of Lisbon.

The theme of the conference is "Communicating Science, Technology and Medicine”.

Communicating science, technology and medicine has always been central to the scientific and technological enterprise, but across ages and spaces agents, audiences, means, aims and agendas behind this complex process have varied considerably. The interpretations put forward by historians of science, technology and medicine have also changed considerably. Historians have been compelled recently to move away from former historiographical categories opposing creative producers to passive recipients and consumers, and contrasting the production of knowledge with its transmission. The vertical model of diffusion has been superseded by a horizontal conception of circulation and appropriation of science, technology and medicine, which gives voice to various actors and to their different, often contradictory, agendas. Within this framework, science, technology and medicine are envisaged as active forms of communication, to such an extent as ultimately blurring the distinction between the making and the communicating of science, technology and medicine.

The 6th ESHS aims at stimulating historical and historiographical studies and debates on the communication of science, technology and medicine along the following sub-thematic clusters.

1) Human and non-human agents: experts, amateurs, and institutions;

2) Networks of circulation and communication of knowledge;

3) Means of communication: correspondence, papers, books, textbooks, popularization outlets, newspapers, radio, theatre, films, cartoons and internet;

4) Spaces and modes of communication: conferences, classrooms, public demonstrations, exhibitions, instruments, collections and museums;

5) Audiences: lay and specialized audiences, consumers;

6) Rhetorical devices;

7) Communication in the European Periphery;

8) Communication in a globalized world: challenges and constraints; ideology of communication, hegemonic values and commercialized science, technology and medicine

DeadlinesProposal Session Submission (Max 4 papers) and abstract of papers– 15 Dec 2013
Decision of accepted sessions – 1 February 2014
Abstract Submission (for stand-alone papers) – 20 February 2014
Decision of accepted papers – 30 March 2014

Language
Abstracts, presentations and proceedings should be preferably in English.

A second Call for papers, with website address, fees and further information will be sent on 1 October 2013.

For any other information please contact the local secretariat Fátima de Haan (occoe@occoe.pt)

Philosophy’s Problem with Religion: The Interplay of Faith and Reason from Scholasticism to Enlightenment

British Academy Early Career Regional Event, Thursday, 4 September 2014
German Historical Institute London, 17 Bloomsbury Square, London WC1A 2NJ

9:30 am
Welcome

9:45 am
Cornelia Linde (German Historical Institute London): Faith and Reason in Thirteenth-Century Quodlibeta

10:30 am
Coffee break

11:00 am
Kantik Ghosh (Oxford): Religio-Intellectual History in Late-Medieval England: Possible Directions of Research

11:45pm
Jill Kraye (Warburg Institute): Christian Humanism, Platonism and Concordism: New Approaches to the Double Truth in Fifteenth-Century Italy

12:30 pm
Lunch

1:45 pm
Guido Giglioni (Warburg Institute): Averroes’s Destructio destructionum in the Renaissance

2:30 pm
Roberta Giubilini (Warburg Institute): ‘Favello sempre secondo i filosofi’: The Incompatibility of Philosophical and Theological Speculation in Benedetto Varchi (1503-1565)

3:15 pm
Maria Rosa Antognazza (King’s College London): The Place of Theology in Leibniz’s Thought
4:00 pm
Coffee break

4:30 pm
Neil Tarrant (Imperial College): Censoring Medical Astrology in Late Sixteenth-Century Italy: Defining Astral Knowledge in an Augustinian Age

5:15 pm
Conclusion

Attendance is free, but please register with Cornelia Linde (linde@ghil.ac.uk) as seats are limited.