Faculty: Professors Reames (chair), Busby, Corfis, Courtenay, Cowell, Cravens, Dale, DuBois, Earp, Geiger, Harris, Howell, Mazzaoui, Miernowski, Morgan, Newlands, Niles, Scarborough, Schamiloglu, Schulenburg, Shank, Wolf; Associate Professors Calomino, Chamberlain, Livanos; Assistant Professors Ancos-Garcia, Cooper, Hsia, Schalick, Shoemaker
The aim of offerings in medieval studies is to apply an interdisciplinary approach to the phase of Western history and culture known as the Middle Ages. Three purposes are envisioned: to make students aware of the great range of disciplines and fields that are involved in the study of the medieval world; to introduce students to the large number of faculty members on the UW–Madison campus who specialize in various areas of medieval study; and to provide opportunities for both students and faculty to pool their interests and knowledge and explore the interrelationships among the medieval disciplines in ways usually not feasible within conventional academic compartmentalization.
Students who wish to earn the certificate in medieval studies must complete eight courses in the medieval area, according to specific distributional requirements, and maintain a B average in those courses that count toward the certificate.
A separate graduate degree in medieval studies is not offered at this time. Graduate students may develop a distributed Option B Ph.D. minor with course work in the medieval area distributed among two or more departments.
Opportunities are provided for individualized independent study with participating faculty members. In addition to those departments that cross-list courses with the program (classics, English, French and Italian, German, Hebrew and Semitic studies, history, history of science, languages and cultures of Asia, medical history and bioethics, pharmacy, religious studies, Scandinavian studies, Spanish and Portuguese, women's studies), the following departments and programs offer some courses and seminars in the medieval area: art history, comparative literature, folklore, Jewish studies, music, philosophy, political science, and Slavic languages and literatures.
Since its establishment more than 30 years ago, the program has gained an excellent reputation in North America through its numerous activities and the strength of its participating faculty. Indeed, if there were a ranking of such programs, the UW–Madison program would be among the top five programs for the variety and range of its courses, the expertise and diversity of its faculty, and the number and scope of its activities.
The program draws its strength from the large number of committed faculty members who participate in its activities. The program received a major curriculum development grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities for the period 1976–79 and, under the auspices of that grant, developed a set of interdisciplinary "core" courses, which form part of the present curriculum. The program aims to offer some of its own interdisciplinary courses every year, as well as cross-listing pertinent courses and seminars in other departments.
The resources available in Memorial Library provide excellent support for the wide variety of research activities underway on the UW–Madison campus. Lecturers from other universities both here and abroad regularly come to Madison during the academic year, and the program also sponsors lectures featuring its own faculty and students, as well as mini-symposia in connection with courses. In sum, the program attempts to provide interesting curricular and extracurricular activities for faculty and students during the course of the academic year. The program maintains a large email list of campus medievalists and friends of medieval studies to whom it sends notices about local, regional, national, and international activities and events.
In addition to teaching and research, the program fulfills its important outreach mission through sponsorship of lectures, symposia, and colloquia on a variety of topics and through faculty participation in activities organized by the Division of Continuing Studies, including international seminars. Cooperation with other departments and units on campus is a key to the program's success, and in this regard the program has cosponsored many lectures and other events, including major international conferences on St. Benedict of Nursia, St. Augustine and His Legacy, the Millennium, Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts, and Al-Andalus: Cultural Diffusion and Hybridity in Iberia (1000–1600). The program also hosted the annual meetings of the Medieval Academy of America in 1989, the Medieval Association of the Midwest in 2001, and the International Courtly Literature Society in 2004.
For more information: Professor Sherry Reames, 7195C H. C. White Hall, 600 N. Park St., Madison, WI 52706, 608-262-7836; slreames@wisc.edu; polyglot.lss.wisc.edu/msp.
