Tag Archives: International Congress on Medieval Studies

Kalamazoo: Tolkien Symposium and ICMS Conference

28 Saturday Jan 2017

Posted by in Conferences, Medieval, Medievalisms, Tolkien

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The program for the  International Congress on Medieval Studies  is now online, and there are numerous sessions for those interested in Tolkien and medievalism.  I’ve copied these from the preview program; of course, you should read the final program to double check the accuracy of this list.

The Congress has been cutting back the number of sessions available to the Tolkien at Kalamazoo group, so to counteract that, a pre-conference Tolkien Symposium has been scheduled for Wednesday, May 10 in the Western Michigan University Library. I’ve previously posted the schedule, but a revised version is posted again below in case you’re planning to attend the ICMS and can add on the Symposium, which will occur on the first afternoon that the Congress opens its doors. The theme of the Symposium is Tolkien Anniversaries.

Please note: you will not find the Tolkien Symposium schedule in the Congress program. This Symposium is not connected with the Congress organization.

Tolkien Symposium.  Wednesday, May 10. 1:00 – 5:00. Western Michigan University Library (revised schedule, April 19)

Western Michigan University Library

1:00-1:30 p.m.
Kristine Larson, Ragnarok and the Rekindling of the Magic Sun

1:40-2:10 p.m.
Sandra Hartl, The Ainur and the Greek Pantheon: From The Book of Lost Tales to The Silmarillion

2:20-2:50 p.m.
Erik Mueller Harder, The river Swanfleet: A journey from the Misty Mountains to flat fenlands and half way back again; or, How the discovery of Tolkien’s annotated map of Middle-earth by Blackwell’s Rare Books in Oxford extricates Pauline Baynes’ cartographic reputation from the marsh of Nîn-in-Eilph

3:00-3:30 p.m.
Michael Wodzak, An Auto-Ethnographic Study of Bilbo’s Party

3:40-4:10 p.m.
Andrew Higgins, Mapping Tolkien’s The Book of Lost Tales: Exploring ‘I Vene Kemen’ (‘The Ship of the Earth’)

4:20-5:00 p.m.
Victoria Holtz-Wodzak, ‘On Golden Grove Unleaving’: Tolkien, Gerard Manley Hopkins, and the Inscape of Middle-earth

You can find abstracts of the papers here (revised April 19)


Tolkien Unbound.  Thursday evening, May 11.  Kalamazoo College Recital Hall.

[This item added here Feb.2nd] Another event that will not appear in the Congress program is Tolkien Unbound, an annual night of entertainment that last year moved out of the Congress-approved sessions and into nearby Kalamazoo College, where it will be held again this year. The 2017 program features:

A dramatic reading of Leaf by Niggle, directed by Thom Foy
Maidens of Middle-earth VII: Treaty Brides. A musical performance by Eileen Marie Moore.

 [added April 9]: Download the Tolkien Unbound Flyer [pdf] with directions and information about rides.

ICMS sessions on Tolkien and on medievalism, May 11 -14.

Kalamazoo campus swan pond

Organization of this list: 1. sessions devoted entirely to Tolkien studies; 2. sessions that include Tolkien; 3. sessions on medievalism, starting with the ones sponsored by the International Society for the Study of Medievalism; 4. an invitation to a rogue workshop (also not in the official program) on Whiteness in Medieval Studies; and 5. Kristine Larsen’s Astrolabe Workshop

1. Sessions devoted entirely to Tolkien Studies

Friday 10 a.m.
348 VALLEY I HADLEY 102
“Eald enta geweorc”: Tolkien and the Classical Tradition
Sponsor: Dept. of Religious Studies and Philosophy, The Hill School
Organizer: John Wm. Houghton, Hill School
Presider: John Wm. Houghton

  • The “Other” Classicism: Tolkien, Homer, and the Greek Novel. John R. Holmes, Franciscan Univ. of Steubenville
  • The Winnowing Oar: Odysseus, Frodo, and the Search for Peace. Victoria Holtz Wodzak, Viterbo Univ.
  • The Politics of Tragedy: Plato’s Athenian Atlantis, Tolkien’s Numenorian Atalante, and the Nazi Reich. Joshua Hren, George Fox Univ.
  • J.R.R. Tolkien and Plato’s Timaeus. Christopher T. Vaccaro, Univ. of Vermont

Saturday noon: Tolkien at Kalamazoo business meeting. Bernhard 106

Saturday 1:30
402 FETZER 1010
Tolkien and Language
Sponsor: Tolkien at Kalamazoo
Organizer: Brad Eden, Valparaiso Univ.
Presider: Brad Eden

  • “O’er the Moon, Below the Daylight”: Tolkien’s Blue Bee, Pliny, and the Kalevala. Kristine Larsen, Central Connecticut State Univ.
  • Music: The One Language in Which the Noldor Were Not Fluent. Eileen Marie Moore, Cleveland State Univ.
  • Elvish Practitioners of the “Secret Vice.” Andrew Higgins, Independent Scholar
  • Tolkien and Constructed Languages. Dean Easton, Independent Scholar


Saturday 3:30
454 FETZER 1010
Asterisk Tolkien
Sponsor: Tolkien at Kalamazoo
Organizer: Brad Eden, Valparaiso Univ.
Presider: Kristine Larsen, Central Connecticut State Univ.

  • The “Third Spring”: New Discoveries and Connections. Brad Eden
  • “He came alone, and in bear’s shape”: Tolkien’s Attempt at Correcting the Thwarting of Bodvar Bjarki. Michael David Elam, Regent Univ.
  • Landscape as Character in The Lord of the Rings. Robert Dobie, La Salle Univ.
  • Tolkien’s Monsters: An Asterisk in his Translation of Beowulf. Yvette Kisor, Ramapo College


2. Sessions that include Tolkien

Thursday 7:30 p.m.
161 BERNHARD 210
The Teaching of Old English (A Roundtable)
Sponsor: Old English Forum, Modern Language Association
Organizer: Matthew T. Hussey, Simon Fraser Univ.
Presider: Robin Norris, Carleton Univ.

  • A Course in Beowulf and Tolkien. Paul Acker, St. Louis Univ.
  • Teaching Old English in History of the English Language. Heide Estes, Monmouth Univ.
  • Assignments to Enliven a Dead Language. Jacqueline A. Fay, Univ. of Texas–Arlington
  • An Anglo-Saxon Sampler. Damian Fleming, Indiana Univ.-Purdue Univ.–Fort Wayne
  • Material Culture and Old English Pedagogy. Breann Leake, Univ. of Connecticut
  • Reading Like Anglo-Saxons. Erica Weaver, Harvard University

This next one is interesting: a performance of Leaf by Niggle (in the same evening as a “filthy French farce”)  A one-man Leaf by Niggle show was a hit last year in the UK; it will be interesting to hear how this version is performed.

Thursday night 8 p.m. Gilmore Theatre Complex

  • Leaf-by-Niggle . Univ. of Maryland
  • It’s a Miracle! The Harlotry Players, Univ. of Michigan–Ann Arbor
  • Cooch E. Whippet (Farce of Martin of Cambray). Radford Univ.

$15.00 General Admission. $10.00 presale through online Congress registration
Shuttles leave Valley III (Eldridge-Fox) beginning at 7:15 p.m.

A triple bill featuring a Tolkien fairy tale staged in a medieval style, a florilegium of fakery from the Harlotry Players, and a filthy French farce.

Saturday 1:30
434 SCHNEIDER 2355
Teaching the Edda and Sagas in the Undergraduate Classroom: Strategies and Approaches (A Roundtable)
Organizer: Ilse Schweitzer VanDonkelaar, Grand Valley State Univ.
Presider: Rachel S. Anderson, Grand Valley State Univ.

  • Using Tolkien as a Gateway to the Edda and Sagas in the Undergraduate Classroom. Lee Templeton, North Carolina Wesleyan College
  • “I advise you, Loddfafnir, to take this council”: Teaching College Writing and Research Using the Eddas. Gregory L. Laing, Harding Univ.
  • Teaching Germanic Mythology 101. Johanna Denzin, Columbia College
  • Material Culture and Norse Mythology. Ilse Schweitzer VanDonkelaar


3. Sessions on medievalism

International Society for the Study of Medievalism

Thursday 7:30
157 BERNHARD 204
Performing Medievalisms (A Roundtable)
Sponsor: International Society for the Study of Medievalism
Organizer: Amy S. Kaufman, Middle Tennessee State Univ.
Presider: Carol L. Robinson, Kent State Univ.–Trumbull

  • The One True Hero: Performing Medievalism in ABC’s The Quest
    Susan Aronstein, Univ. of Wyoming
  • Negotiating the Future: Subversive Southern Medievalism in The House behind the Cedars. Alexandra Cook, Univ. of Alabama
  • “An Indifferent Nebula”: Fantasy Role-Playing Games, Leisure Culture, and the Simulated Middle Ages. Gerald Nachtwey, Eastern Kentucky Univ.
  • Playing Chaucer: Performance, Adaptation, and Its Importance in Fandom in Medieval Studies. Hillary Yeager, Middle Tennessee State Univ.
  • Habits and Habitus: The Western Martial Arts Revival and Embodied Hermeneutics. Robert Rouse, Univ. of British Columbia

Friday 10:00
218 BERNHARD BROWN & GOLD ROOM
The United States of Medievalism
Sponsor: International Society for the Study of Medievalism
Organizer: Susan Aronstein, Univ. of Wyoming
Presider: Susan Aronstein

  • Philadelphia’s Medievalist Jewels: Bryn Athyn Cathedral and Glencairn. Kevin J. Harty, La Salle Univ.
  • The Vikings are Due on Main Street: Norse Incursion into Minnesota’s Literary Imagination. Glenn Davis, St. Cloud State Univ.
  • Robin Hood’s Greenwood in Texas: Sherwood Forest Faire. Lorraine Kochanske Stock, Univ. of Houston
  • Orlando: Theme Park Medievalisms. Tison Pugh, Univ. of Central Florida
  • Las Vegas: Getting Medieval in Sin City. Laurie A. Finke, Kenyon College; Martin B. Shichtman, Eastern Michigan Univ.


Friday 1:30
270 BERNHARD 208
Medievalism and Immigration I
Sponsor: International Society for the Study of Medievalism
Organizer: Amy S. Kaufman, Middle Tennessee State Univ.
Presider: Pamela J. Clements, Siena College

  • Images of Immigration and Notions of Nation in Early Modern Medievalism. Sarah A. Kelen, Nebraska Wesleyan Univ.
  • Medieval Religion in New France: Marie de l’Incarnation and the Ursuline Nuns of Québec. Nancy Bradley Warren, Texas A&M Univ.
  • Arthur Hugh Clough’s Mari Mango, or, How to “Victorianize” The Canterbury Tales. William C. Calin, Univ. of Florida


Friday 3:30
329 BERNHARD 208
Medievalism and Immigration II
Sponsor: International Society for the Study of Medievalism
Organizer: Amy S. Kaufman, Middle Tennessee State Univ.
Presider: Elizabeth Wawrzyniak, Marquette Univ.

  • Medievalism, Brexit, and the Myth of Nations. Andrew B. R. Elliott, Univ. of Lincoln
  • “I’m 20% Viking”: Englishness, Immigration, and the Public Reception of Histor­ical DNA. Michael Evans, Delta

Other sessions on medievalism

Friday 10:00
190 SCHNEIDER 1225
Growing Up Medieval: The Middle Ages in Children’s and Young Adult Literature
Sponsor: Tales after Tolkien Society
Organizer: Helen Young, Univ. of Sydney
Presider: Geoffrey B. Elliott, Independent Scholar

  • The Dream Frame of Baum’s Wizard of Oz. William Racicot, Independent Scholar
  • Women Piercing through the Medieval Fantasy Genre: A Look at Tamora Pierce’s Influence on Women in Medieval Fantasy. Rachel Cooper, Univ. of Saskatchewan
  • Heralds of the Queen: Upholding and Subverting the Medieval Ideal through
    Girl Power, Sexuality, and le Merveilleux in Mercedes Lackey’s Valdemar Series
    Carrie Pagels, St. Mary’s College, Notre Dame


Saturday 10:00
389 BERNHARD 210
Atmospheric Medievalisms/Medieval Atmospheres (A Roundtable)
Sponsor: postmedieval: a journal of medieval cultural studies
Organizer: Myra Seaman, College of Charleston
Presider: Myra Seaman

  • Anglo-Saxon Atmospheres. Edward J. Christie, Georgia State Univ.
  • The Water Subtext of The Book of the Duchess. Brantley L. Bryant, Sonoma State Univ.
  • An Atmosphere of Anxiety in Late Medieval English Drama. Christina M. Fitzgerald, Univ. of Toledo
  • The Air of Fiction. Julie Orlemanski, Univ. of Chicago
  • Racialized Sound. Molly Lewis, George Washington Univ.
  • Airing Out the Senses. Richard Newhauser, Arizona State Univ.


Saturday 1:30
440 BERNHARD 209
Medievalism and Pedagogy
Sponsor: Medieval Association of the Midwest (MAM)
Organizer: Audrey Becker, Marygrove College
Presider: Audrey Becker

  • Play, Games, and the Medieval World: Teaching Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s The White Company. Robert Sirabian, Univ. of Wisconsin–Stevens Point
  • Teaching Westeros: Medieval Studies, Medievalism, and George R. R. Martin. Carol Jamison, Armstrong State Univ.
  • “Medieval” Rhetoric, ISIS, and the Syrian Refugee Crisis: A Lesson for Teaching Political Medievalisms in the Undergraduate Classroom. Erin S. Lynch, Medieval Institute, Western Michigan Univ.
  • “Have you ever heard of Robin Longstride?”: Anachronism, Authenticity, and Teaching Robin Hood. Christian Sheridan, Bridgewater College


Sunday 8:30 a.m.
527 BERNHARD 158
Medievalism and Disability (A Roundtable)
Sponsor: Society for the Study of Disability in the Middle Ages
Organizer: Joshua Eyler, Rice Univ.
Presider: John P. Sexton, Bridgewater State Univ.

  • Urs Graf ’s Daughter Courage: Violence and Disability in Late Medieval Europe. Jess Genevieve Bailey, Univ. of California–Berkeley
  • A Visual Database for Medieval Disability. Christopher Baswell, Barnard College
  • Impaired in Camelot: An Analysis of Ableism in Hal Foster’s Prince Valiant. Tirumular Narayanan, California State Univ.–Chico
  • Trope or Truth? Medievalism and the Ubiquity of Disability. Kisha G. Tracy, Fitchburg State Univ.
  • Life Was Like That: The Grotesque Medieval in the Modern Imagination. Elizabeth Wawrzyniak

Sunday 10:30
549 SCHNEIDER 1225
Settlement and Landscape II: Textual Approaches to the Medieval in the Modern
Organizer: Vicky McAlister, Southeast Missouri State Univ.; Jennifer L. Immich, Metropolitan State Univ. of Denver
Presider: Jennifer L. Immich

  • Approaching the Medieval in Comic: How the Adventures of an Arthurian Knight are Appropriated for a Contemporary Audience. Annegret Oehme, Univ. of Washington–Seattle
  • Hive Minds: Interdisciplinarity in Research and Pedagogy. Lahney Preston-Matto, Adelphi Univ.
  • America’s “Poisoned Landscape”: Medievalism and the Alt-right. Mary A. Valante, Appalachian State Univ.

Finally, I’m signal-boosting this workshop and invitation:

4. Rogue Workshop (not in the official program)

Saturday, 6:00-7:30 p.m. Fetzer 1005

From In the Middle: Whiteness in Medieval Studies: a rogue workshop on racial politics that will explore how medievalists in all areas of study can be effective allies for diversity and inclusion within our institutions and across our field.

 5. Kristine Larsen’s Astrolabe Workshop

[This item added here Feb. 2] Tolkien scholar and astronomer Kristine Larsen has run a very popular astrolabe workshop for several years now at the Congress, and she’s at it again this year.

Friday 9:30 p.m. A Hands-On Introduction to Astrolabes: Valley III Eldridge 309
Calculating Traditional Prayer Times in the Christian Monastery (A Workshop)
Organizer: Kristine Larsen, Central Connecticut State Univ.
Presider: Kristine Larsen
A hands-on workshop on the use of a medieval astrolabe to calculate the Christian monastery’s traditional times of prayer. The first 50 participants will receive a cardboard astrolabe that can be taken home.

Let me know in the comments if I’ve missed something that belongs in this list. I’m not planning to go to Kalamazoo this year, but, my friends, please blog and tweet all kinds of reports from these sessions!  And have an extra dance for me.

Note: This post was edited on February 2nd to add information on the Tolkien Unbound session, listed above, and on item 5. Kristine Larsen’s Astrolabe Workshop

Kzoo 2017 calls for Tolkien papers

30 Thursday Jun 2016

Posted by in Calls for Papers, Conferences, Medievalisms, Tolkien

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The approved sessions for Kalamazoo (the International Congress on Medieval Studies) have just been announced. In spite of very well attended sessions in the past and plenty of paper submissions, the Tolkien at Kalamazoo group has once again been reduced by the conference organizers, as have other groups attending the Congress.  For 2017, only two sessions were approved for the Tolkien at Kalamazoo group, and one other as a separately-sponsored session. The ICMS organizers seem determined to downsize their conference, a process that has been ongoing for a few years now. As far as I know, those proposing sessions are not given explanations for the selection or rejection of their submissions, leaving everyone to guess which topics might “go” and which might be turned down every year — and how many might be allowed.

In any case, here are the calls for papers for the three Tolkien sessions in 2017. The complete list of calls for all sessions can be viewed here.

Tolkien at Kalamazoo sessions

Tolkien and languages

This session will explore Tolkien’s contributions as a philologist of both early languages as well as the creation of his own languages.

Asterisk Tolkien

This session will examine various threads and tangents related to Tolkien studies and research.  This may include papers on influences, lacunae, and other related topics important to the field.

The deadline for submission of proposals is September 1, 2016 to Dr. Brad Eden at brad.eden@valpo.edu.  If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact Brad.

The Hill School session

“Eald enta geweorc”: Tolkien and the Classical Tradition

“Finnish,” J. R. R. Tolkien famously commented, “nearly ruined my Honor Mods”: but even a bottom-of-the-barrel Second on the first examination in Litterae Humaniores in 1913 reflects a considerable depth of classical learning by our standards a century later. Despite his academically dangerous attraction to the northern fringes of Europe, Tolkien’s scholarly and literary projects could no more escape the intellectual relics of Greco-Roman civilization than could the Anglo Saxons whose landscape still showed its physical ruins, the “old work of giants.” This session seeks papers which will consider Tolkien the medievalist as receiver and transmitter of the classical heritage.

organizer: John Wm. Houghton
The Hill School
Dept. of Religious Studies and Philosophy
717 E. High Street
Pottstown, PA 19464
jhoughton@thehill.org

Anyone thinking of submitting a proposal to these or any other sessions should read the information on the conference website about the forms that need to be sent in with abstracts. You can also contact the session organizers for information.

Tolkien’s King Sheave story

27 Friday May 2016

Posted by in Conferences, Old English, Research, Tolkien

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Atlantic seashore

I’m finding Tolkien’s Notion Club Papers* a fascinating and deep well of ideas. Last summer at the New York Tolkien Conference, I commented on the sub-creators who appear in the story; this year, for my conference presentation at the International Congress on Medieval Studies, I talked about another part of Notion Club, the embedded legend of King Sheave (which was also part of the Tolkien’s plan for the earlier and unfinished The Lost Road).

According to Christopher, his father called the King Sheave legends “an astonishing tangle.” My presentation was an attempt to untangle at least one or two threads, but I had to ignore how tightly woven into the picture are texts such as  “The Seafarer” and “The Death of St. Brendan.” There’s only so much you can do in a 15-minute presentation.

I started with what is likely to be the most recognizable appearance of Sheave in English literature: the Scyld Scefing story that opens the Old English poem Beowulf. The Beowulf-poet merges two mythical or legendary figures. The first is the warlike Scyld, the eponymous founder of the Scyldings, another name for the Danes in the poem; (“sc” is pronounced like “sh” in Old English). The other figure is Scef (or Scéaf / Scéafa): Sheaf, who is an ancient culture-hero or corn-god. In numerous sources, this Sheaf is said to arrive from an unknown land as a child sleeping on a boat with a sheaf of grain by his head. In his Beowulf commentary, Tolkien finds this Sheaf figure “the more mysterious, far older and more poetical myth” of the two.

Atlantic salt marsh

Other medieval sources also mention one or both of these figures. Alexander Bruce, in his book Scyld and Scef, publishes and discusses 43 references from English, Danish, and Icelandic sources, in chronicles, poems, and genealogies, covering several centuries — in other words, the legends must have been well known in early Germanic cultures. In my talk, I enumerated a few sources that Tolkien used and reshaped in his own version of Sheaf / Sheave (Tolkien spells it differently in different places), including the one unique version of the legend, the Beowulf story in which Scyld Scefing is given a ship burial at the end of his life, sent back out to an unknown destination with treasures piled around his body.

But what is even more interesting to me are the ways in which Tolkien’s version is different from his medieval sources.  For one thing, Tolkien’s story is remarkable for its vivid visualization of details added to the legend. Here you can see Tolkien’s characteristic descriptive style, with an attention to the visual qualities of light: “a ship came sailing, shining-timbered, without oar or mast, eastward floating. The sun behind it sinking westward with flame kindled the fallow water.” (NCP 273-74).

Tolkien adds other elements to the story, such as the harp that comes with the child, and how Sceaf reveals his extraordinary powers through song. In most legends, Sheaf is meant to bring agricultural fertility; in Tolkien’s version, he also brings linguistic and artistic ripeness to the people. Tolkien’s version brings us right into the events of the story imaginatively and vividly, as if we too are there witnessing the scene along with the other marvelling people who rush out of their houses to gaze on and listen to Sheaf.

Atlantic seashore and clouds

Finally, Tolkien adds hints or glimpses of how his King Sheave is tied to his own mythology of Númenor and the Blessed Lands to the West. For example, Sheaf’s ship sails in from the West to a dark, shadowed, deprived Middle-earth. There are also premonitions of the Eagles of the Lords of the West, a repeated refrain in NCP deriving from the story of Númenor as several characters experience or see it.

As interesting as I find Tolkien’s version of King Sheave, the full meaning of the story has to take into account not only what Tolkien makes of the legend but where he puts it. For Tolkien’s story of Sheaf is only one layer, deeply embedded, in a narrative about envisioning the past and about sea-longing. The Sheaf story is told in an Anglo-Saxon hall in King Éadweard’s reign, recited by Tréowine and concluded by his friend Ælfwine. This layer comprising of Ælfwine and Tréowine is in turn framed by the 20th-century story of Lowdham and Jeremy, two members of the Notion Club who are experimenting with time travel and are telling the story of Ælfwine and Tréowine to their friends.

Layer upon layer upon layer, with connections in word and image between layers “coming through” or “glimpsed” as the characters frequently say — the layers create a palimpsest or a pattern of recurring elements, made up of history and myth, including Tolkien’s own mythology. Verlyn Flieger has pointed out that framing has thematic significance in NCP, and the framing of the King Sheave story in several layers of time creates a tightly woven pattern that is impossible to unravel completely in this short summary.  Obviously, I have more untangling work to do this summer.

* NCP is an unfinished text published by Christopher Tolkien in Sauron Defeated, volume 9 of The History of Middle-earth.

 

 

 

 

 

Tolkien Unbound entertainment at Kzoo

29 Friday Apr 2016

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Every year at the International Congress on Medieval Studies, the Tolkien at Kalamazoo group sponsors a reader’s theatre event and a musical entertainment. This year’s Tolkien Unbound session will take place off campus. If you’re going to Kalamazoo, here is the event information from organizer Brad Eden:

 

TOLKIEN UNBOUND

SATURDAY, MAY 14, 2-5 P.M.

CONNABLE RECITAL HALL, FINE ARTS BUILDING

KALAMAZOO COLLEGE

(5 minutes from Bernhard Hall)

 

Reader’s Theatre performance of

Tolkien’s Kullervo

AND

Maidens of Middle-earth VI: Mothers of the Half-Elven

New Song Cycle by Eileen Marie Moore

Song cycle:

Lúthien’s Lullaby (poem by Jane Ellen Louise Beal)

Idril Celebrindal (poem by Eileen Marie Moore)

Lost (poem by Anne Reaves)(story of Mithrellas, the Silvan elf-maid)

Elwing in Travail (poem by Candace Benefiel)

Celebrían–Moon’s Daughter (poem by James Vitullo)

Arwen Undomiel (poem by Edward L. Risden)

 

Directions from Bernhard Hall 

1)    follow W. Michigan Ave and take left onto Monroe St.

2)   follow Monroe St. and take right onto Academy St.

3)    follow Academy St. and take left onto Thompson St.

4)   Connable Recital Hall, Fine Arts Building, Kalamazoo College is at the corner of Academy and Thompson Sts.

For a Google Map of this route, go to https://goo.gl/maps/ehDXRgd4qHK2

Car rides will also be available from 1:15-1:45 from Bernhard Hall, and back again after the performance. Rides will be arranged at the Tolkien at Kalamazoo business meeting on Saturday, May 14, noon, Bernhard 212.

Tolkien conference season 2016

31 Sunday Jan 2016

Posted by in Calls for Papers, Conferences, Medieval, Medievalisms, Tolkien

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Here are some Tolkien conferences coming up in the spring and summer — prime conference season! I can’t claim to list every event that’s going on, so if you’d like to add something to the list, please let me know in the comments section. If you want to know about Tolkien-related events around the world, not necessarily just conferences, I’d suggest the public Facebook group International Tolkien Fellowship List of Events. Also, Troels Forchammer’s monthly Tolkien Transactions usually catches more items than I’m aware of. But here are the conferences that I do know about:

Popular Culture Association (PCA)

Popular Culture Association logo

Seattle, Washington
March 22 -25, 2016

The preliminary program, organized by Robin Reid, can be viewed here. The speakers include Martin Barker presenting on the World Hobbit Project; an academic editors’ roundtable discussion with Leslie Donovan, Janet Croft, Brad Eden, Janice Bogstad, and Martin Barker; and numerous other papers on adaptation, translation, reception, and more. The nice thing about the online PCA program is that you can dig down into each session and read the abstracts of all the papers. There are eight sessions in the Tolkien Studies area, another successful year for this new subject area at the PCA national conference.

 

13th Annual Tolkien in Vermont conference

Tolkien in Vermont conference

Burlington, Vermont
April 8 – 9, 2016

This year’s theme is “Tolkien and Popular Culture,” with keynote speaker Robin Reid. A program will be available on the Tolkien in Vermont website. This small conference, organized by Chris Vaccaro, is always a friendly mix of faculty, students, and independent scholars.

 

Tolkien’s Philosophy of Language

13th Seminar of the Deutsche Tolkien Gesellschaft (DTF)
The Friedrich Schiller University Jena and Walking Tree Publishers
May 6 – 8, 2016

A link to more conference information can be found here.

 

Tolkien at Kalamazoo

Kalamazoo campus swan pond

International Congress on Medieval Studies
Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo Michigan
May 12 – 15, 2016

I’ve already posted a schedule of sessions on Tolkien and medievalism as they appeared in the preliminary program. There are seven sessions dealing with Tolkien, mostly organized by Brad Eden and a few others. This year, one of the plenary speakers will be Jane Chance talking about “How we read J.R.R. Tolkien reading Grendel’s mother.” The ICMS is a huge conference, usually drawing around 3,000 participants in sessions on all aspects of the Middle Ages and medievalism.

 

Tolkien Among Scholars: 7th Unquendor Lustrum Conference 2016

Leiden University Centre for the Arts in Society and the Dutch Tolkien Society Unquendor.
June 18, 2016

The keynote speakers for this international conference will be Thomas M. Honegger and Paul Smith. The program will be posted on the conference website.

 

Tolkien Society Seminar 2016

Tolkien Society

Leeds, UK
July 3, 2016

The theme of this year’s seminar is “Life, Death, and Immortality,” and if you’re interested in giving a paper, there’s still time: March 25 is the deadline for submissions. You can find the Call for Papers and more information here. The Seminar takes place the day before the International Medieval Congress begins at Leeds University, where you’ll find more Tolkien sessions (see below).

 

International Medieval Congress

medieval

Leeds University
July 4 – 7, 2016

Dimitra Fimi has organized two sessions on Tolkien for this conference. Like Kalamazoo, the Leeds conference draws thousands of medievalists every year. The program will be posted on the conference website.

 

New York Tolkien Conference

cropped-logo-art.jpg

Baruch College, New York City
July 16, 2016

This conference, organized by Jessica Burke and Anthony Burdge, is back again after last year’s successful inaugural event. The special theme for this year’s conference is “The Inklings and Science,” with guests of honour Kristine Larsen and Jared Lobdell. The call for papers has not yet been posted, but keep checking the conference site for information as it becomes available.

 

Mythcon 47

Mythopoeic Society

Mythopoeic Society
San Antonio, Texas
August 5 – 8, 2016

The special theme for this year’s conference is “Faces of Mythology: Ancient, Medieval, and Modern.” The Scholar Guest of Honour is Andrew Lazo and the Author Guest of Honour, Midori Snyder. You can find a call for papers here; the deadline is May 1st to send proposals to Jason Fisher, the papers co-ordinator for this conference.

 

That’s my list for now. Clearly, the field of Tolkien Studies is thriving. I wish I had unlimited funds to travel to every one of these meetings!

 

 

Tolkien & medievalism at K’zoo 2016: sneak peek

23 Saturday Jan 2016

Posted by in Conferences, Medieval, Medievalisms, Old English, Tolkien

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The preview of the conference program for the 51st International Congress on Medieval Studies has now been posted. Although there may still be changes made to the program before the final version is published in February, I’m always eager to see what sessions have been accepted and to plan how I’m going to spend my days in Kalamazoo this year.

The conference runs from May 12 – 15 at Western Michigan University. Keep in mind that the following are excerpts from a preliminary program; for the final version and most accurate information, check out the published schedule when it comes online here.

I’ve highlighted sessions on Tolkien and on medievalism. Even with this narrowing down, you can see that it’s impossible to attend every panel that might be of interest.

Sessions on Tolkien

The conference always features two plenary addresses.  This year, one of those lectures will be delivered by Jane Chance, speaking on Tolkien.

Friday 8:30 a.m. Plenary Lecture:
How We Read J. R. R. Tolkien Reading Grendel’s Mother.  
Jane Chance (Rice Univ.)

Other sessions focusing on Tolkien:

Thursday 10:00 a.m.
Fathering, Fostering, Translating, and Creating in the Works of J. R. R. Tolkien
Session 11 Fetzer 1040
Sponsor: Organizer: History Dept., Texas A&M Univ.–Commerce Judy Ann Ford, Texas A&M Univ.–Commerce; Presider: Anne Reaves, Marian Univ.

  • Medieval Fostering in the First and Third Ages of Middle-earth: Elrond as Fóstri and Fóstr-son. Kristine Larsen, Central Connecticut State Univ.
  • A Stylistic Analysis of Fatherhood and Fostering in The Silmarillion. Robin Anne Reid, Texas A&M Univ.–Commerce
  • Tolkien’s Beowulf: A Translation of Scholar and Poet. Yvette Kisor, Ramapo College
  • Imagined: Tolkien in the Mind of God. Skyler King, College of the Desert

Thursday 1:30 p.m.
Tolkien and Beowulf
Session 58; Fetzer 1040
Sponsor: Tolkien at Kalamazoo
. Organizer: Brad Eden, Valparaiso Univ. Presider: Andrew Higgins, Independent Scholar

  • “A Tight Fitt”: Strategies of Condensation in The Lay of Beowulf. John R. Holmes, Franciscan Univ. of Steubenville
  • Tolkien’s “Freawaru and Ingeld”: A Love Story? Christopher T. Vaccaro, Univ. of Vermont
  • The Christian Singer in Tolkien’s Beowulf. Michael D. Miller, Aquinas College
  • Tolkien’s Beowulf: A Translation and Commentary as a Teaching Text. James L. Baugher, East Tennessee State Univ.

Thursday 3:30 p.m.
In Honor of Verlyn Flieger (A Roundtable)
Session 107; Fetzer 1040
Sponsor: Tolkien at Kalamazoo. Organizer: Brad Eden, Valparaiso Univ. Presider: John D. Rateliff, Independent Scholar

  • Tolkien’s “On Fairy-stories” as a theory of literature. Curtis Gruenler, Hope College
  • The Well and the Book: Flieger and Tolkien on “the Past in the Past”. Deborah Sabo, Univ. of Arkansas–Fayetteville/Arkansas Archeological Survey
  • So Many Wonders: Sir Gawain and the Green Knight according to Tolkien and Flieger. Amy Amendt-Raduege, Whatcom Community College
  • “Linguistic Ghosts”: Anglo-Saxon Poetry as Tolkien’s Tether between Past and Present. Kristine Larsen, Central Connecticut State Univ.
  • An Elf by Any Other Name: Naming, Language, and Loss in Tolkien’s Legendarium. Benjamin S. W. Barootes, McGill Univ.

Friday 10:00 a.m.
Tolkien and Invented Languages
Session 219; Bernhard 209
Sponsor: Tolkien at Kalamazoo. Organizer & Presider: Brad Eden, Valparaiso Univ.

  • From Goldogrin to Sindarin, or, How Ilkorin Supplanted the “Sweet Tongue of the Gnomes”. Eileen Marie Moore, Cleveland State Univ.
  • Early Explorers and Practicioners of a Shared “Secret Vice”. Andrew Higgins, Independent Scholar
  • “Art Words”: Tolkien’s “Secret Vice” Manuscripts and Radical Linguistic Experimentation. Dimitra Fimi, Cardiff Metropolitan Univ.
  • Tolkien’s Concept of “Native Language” and the English and Welsh Papers at the Bodleian Library.  Yoko Hemmi, Keio Univ.

Saturday 10:00 a.m.
Asterisk Tolkien: Filling Medieval Lacunae
Session 345; Fetzer 1060
Sponsor: Dept. of Religious Studies and Philosophy, The Hill School. Organizer and Presider: John Wm. Houghton, Hill School

  • The “Lost” Language of the Hobbits. Deidre Dawson, Independent Scholar
  • “To Recall Forgotten Gods from Their Twilight”: Tolkien, Machen, and Lovecraft. John D. Rateliff, Independent Scholar
  • “Backdreaming” Beowulf’s Scyld Scefing Legend. Anna Smol, Mount Saint Vincent Univ.
  • Bred in Mockery. Michael Wodzak, Viterbo Univ.

Saturday noon
Tolkien at Kalamazoo business meeting. Bernhard 212.

Saturday 2:00 – 5:00 p.m. Off-campus session sponsored by Tolkien at Kalamazoo:
Tolkien Unbound
Kalamazoo College, music recital hall, 2-5 p.m.  (Come to the business meeting to arrange transportation)

  • Readers’ theater performance of Tolkien’s Kalevala
  • Eileen Moore, Maidens of Middle-earth 6.

 

Other sessions on medievalism

Thursday 10 a.m.
Looking Back at the Middle Ages. Presider: Audrey Becker, Marygrove College. Session 35.

  • Discovering and Inventing Early Medieval Lincolnshire, 1710–1755. Dustin M. Frazier Wood, Bethany College
  • A Corruptly Nostalgic Crusade: Horace Walpole’s Medievalism of the Crusades in The Castle of Otranto. Rachel Landers, Univ. of Alabama–Birmingham
  • “Better than Anything Ancient”: Artifce, Authenticity, and William Morris’s Created Scandinavian Past. Mimi Ensley, Univ. of Notre Dame

Thursday 3:30 p.m.
Digitally Teaching the Middle Ages: Case Studies (A Poster Session)
Sponsor: Medieval Electronic Multimedia Organization (MEMO). Organizer: Carol L. Robinson, Kent State Univ.–Trumbull
. Presider:Pamela Clements, Siena College. Session 138.

  • Teaching with King’s Quest Part I
. Kevin A. Moberly, Old Dominion Univ.
  • Teaching with King’s Quest Part II
. Jessica Dambruch, Old Dominion Univ.
  • Game Theories and Teaching Medieval Literature. John McLaughlin, East Stroudsburg Univ.
  • Teaching with Lord of the Rings Online. Carol L. Robinson
  • Role-Playing Games and the Multimedia Wife of Bath Project. Daniel-Raymond Nadon, Kent State Univ.

Friday 1:30 p.m.
Medievalism and Labor (A Roundtable)
Sponsor: International Society for the Study of Medievalism. Organizer and Presider: Amy S. Kaufman, Middle Tennessee State Univ. Session 276.

  • Adjunct Serfs in a Feudal Academy?. Michael R. Evans, Delta College
  • Life in Another Castle: Medieval Studies and Game Design. Serina Patterson, Univ. of British Columbia
  • King’s Scab: Economic Chivalry and Immaterial Labor in the Age of the Sharing Economy. Brent Addison Moberly, Indiana Univ.–Bloomington, and Kevin A. Moberly, Old Dominion Univ.
  • Should I Put This on My C.V.? Medievalism and Academic Labor in Graduate School. Usha Vishnuvajjala, Indiana Univ.–Bloomington
  • Contractions and Expulsions of the Retro-medieval toward the Female Body. Carol L. Robinson, Kent State Univ.–Trumbull

Friday 3:30 p.m.
Medievalism and Anti-Semitism
Sponsor: International Society for the Study of Medievalism. Organizer: Amy S. Kaufman, Middle Tennessee State Univ. Presider:Martin B. Shichtman, Eastern Michigan Univ. Session 328.

  • Medieval Heritage and Nazi Rituals: Historical Pageants in the Upper Palatinate. Richard Utz, Georgia Institute of Technology
  • William Dudley Pelley: An American Nazi in King Arthur’s Court. Kevin J. Harty, La Salle Univ.
  • Medievalism in Contemporary American Anti-Semitism. Paul B. Sturtevant, Smithsonian Institution

Friday 3:30 p.m.
Premodern Rulers and Postmodern Viewers: Gender and Sex in Medieval Film and Television 
Sponsor: Royal Studies Journal. Organizer and Presider: Janice North, Univ of Arkansas-Fayetteville. Session 313.

  • Melusine, Magic, and Maternal Blood in The White Queen. Misty Urban, Muscatine Community College
  • “Men go to battle, women wage war”: Gender Politics in The White Queen (2013). Kavita Mudan Finn, Independent Scholar
  • A New Isabel for the Twenty-First Century. Emily S. Beck, College of Charleston
  • Queering Isabella: The “She-Wolf of France” in Film and Television. Michael R. Evans, Delta College

Friday 3:30 p.m.
Medieval Studies and Medievalism, Past and Present
Organizer: Christina M. Heckman, Augusta Univ. Presider: Christina Heckman. Session 295. [updated listing]

  • Gower among the Protestants: A Medieval Poet, Post-reform. F. Yeager, Univ. of West Florida
  • Church History and the Sound of Words in N. S. F. Grundtvig’s Brunanburh and Phoenix Ballads. Robert E. Bjork, Arizona State Univ.

Saturday 1:30 p.m.
A Session of Ice and Fire: Medievalism in the Game of Thrones Franchise
Sponsor: Tales after Tolkien Society Organizer: Helen Young, La Trobe Univ. Presider: Geoffrey B. Elliott, Oklahoma State Univ.–Stillwell. Session 417.

  • Forging and Reforging Valyrian Steel: The Role of Arthurian Sword Motifs in George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire. Alexandra Garner, Bowling Green State Univ.
  • Peaceweaving in Westeros. Carol Parrish Jamison, Armstrong State Univ.
  • Dragons, Alliances, Power, and Gold: Disruptor Beam’s Game of Thrones Ascent. Shiloh R. Carroll, Tennessee State Univ.

Saturday 1:30 p.m.
Childhood/Innocence in Victorian Medievalism
Organizer: Daniel Najork, Arizona State Univ.; Eileen A. Joy, BABEL Working Group Presider: Daniel Najork. Session 386.

  • Alice, Dream Visions, and Victorian Childhood. William Racicot, Independent Scholar
  • Victorian Medievalism and the Construction of the Innocent Male Body in the Poetry of Gerard Manley Hopkins. Cheryl Jaworski, Univ. of California–Santa Barbara
  • Medieval Fantasy and the Neo-Victorian Child in C. S. Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia Heather L. N. Hess, Univ. of Tennessee–Knoxville

Saturday 3:30 p.m.
In Fashions Reminiscent: The Overlapping Objects, Discourses, and Ideas of the Sixties and the Middle Ages
Sponsor: punctum books. Organizers & presiders: Geoffrey W. Gust, Stockton Univ.; John F. O’Hara, Stockton Univ.; Eileen A. Joy, BABEL Working Group
Geoffrey W. Gust, John F. O’Hara, and Eileen A. Joy. Session 465.

  • Chaucer in the Stoned Age. Candace Barrington, Central Connecticut State Univ.
  • Trees Again: Time Travel with Plants. Lara Farina, West Virginia Univ.
  • Medievalism and the End(s) of Empire in 1960s Science Fiction: Frank Herbert’s Dune and Ursula K. Le Guin’s The Left Hand of Darkness. Scott Wells, California State Univ.–Los Angeles
  • Sounds of Silence: Popular Existentialism and Medieval Autofiction. Christopher Jensen, Florida State Univ.

Sunday 10:30 a.m.
Fanfiction in Medieval Studies
Organizer: Anna Wilson, Univ. of Toronto Presider: Anna Wilson. Session 524.

  • Strange Attraction to Sacred Places: Reading Fannish Fantasies in a Copy of Mandevilles’s Travels. Alison Harper, Univ. of Rochester
  • Choose Your Own Arthur: Canon and Agency in Choice of Games’ Pendragon. Rebecca Slitt, Choice of Games, LLC
  • Code-Switching Media: Vernacular Medievalisms and the Queer Lives of Mulan. Jonathan Hsy, George Washington Univ.
  • Charlemagne Fanfiction and Collective Identity in Fourteenth-Century England. Elizabeth Williamsen, Minnesota State Univ.–Mankato

 

Let me know if I’ve missed any sessions on Tolkien or medievalism.

 

Eala! Unlock your word hoards!

30 Wednesday Sep 2015

Posted by in Medieval, Medievalisms, Old English, Old Norse, Publications, Tolkien

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I’ve just heard about a new project, the journal Eala, which will publish compositions in Old English and other medieval Germanic languages. The founding editor and editor-in-chief of Word Hoard Press, Richard Littauer, plans to publish the journal online and include original compositions in Old English, Old Norse, and the like, as well as translations.

I can’t help thinking that Tolkien would be pleased to see this kind of venture, as he was a proponent of writing in the alliterative verse styles of Old English and Old Norse, either in the original languages or in modern English. As readers of his recently published Beowulf know, Tolkien was adept at composing in Old English – see his prose story “Sellic Spell” in that volume as an example. Tom Shippey has written about the difficulties of counting just how many poems and fragments Tolkien wrote in alliterative meter in both modern and Old English; in his essay “Tolkien as a Writer of Alliterative Poetry” in the book Tolkien’s Poetry, Shippey counts 22 compositions in modern English alliterative meter plus “The Homecoming”; another nine complete poems and five fragments in Old English, and that’s not including modern English poems imitating Old Norse alliterative style. In other words, Tolkien wrote a lot of alliterative verse.

Although Tolkien did write in other verse forms besides alliterative meter, he believed that alliterative verse was a natural form for English speakers and advocated its use – but who was listening? Lately, though, I’ve seen signs of interest in bringing medieval poetry more in contact with modern writers. Jane Chance, for example, is hosting an “Original Medievalistic Poetry Reading and Open Mic” at next year’s International Congress on Medieval Studies in Kalamazoo, Michigan. I’ll have to check it out next May in the hopes of hearing some alliterative compositions. And here’s another sign of interest from a couple of years ago: Modern Poets on Viking Poetry: A Cultural Translation Project resulted in the publication of poems in modern English, which can be downloaded here.

These last two are projects that highlight the influence of medieval poetry on modern writers, but to write “correct” alliterative verse in a medieval language like Old English is another matter entirely. I’m looking forward to seeing what shows up in Eala.

Kalamazoo past and future

28 Sunday Jun 2015

Posted by in Conferences, Medieval, Medievalisms, Tolkien

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I’ve been away for some time now on conference and research trips — more posts to come on those in the next few days. My last post over a month ago listed Tolkien sessions in Kalamazoo at the International Congress on Medieval Studies, which has  come and gone. Happily, I realize there’s no need this year for me to summarize the Tolkien sessions or to compile accounts of various other presentations, as I’ve done in previous years. Instead, you can read the excellent Tolkien at Kalamazoo Round-Up by Dr. Andrew Higgins on his blog, Dr. Wotan’s Musings.

In addition, #Kzoo2015 hit the blogosphere from all directions, and if you want a taste of the many different topics that were presented and discussed, take a look at Jonathan Hsy’s #Kzoo2015 Blogroll, a feast of information that includes “links to blog postings and transcripts of individual paper presentations … archives of tweets, public notes from sessions, Prezi and YouTube presentations … and an alliterative poem.”

The organizers of ICMS waste no time in deciding on which sessions will be allowed for the following year. You can already take a look at the Sneak Preview of sessions for 2016. Sessions specifically dealing with Tolkien are the following:

The Tolkien at Kalamazoo group, organized by Brad Eden, has been allowed to sponsor three sessions.

  • Tolkien and Beowulf
  • Tolkien and Invented Languages
  • A roundtable in honor of Verlyn Flieger

The History Department at Texas A&M University – Commerce is sponsoring one session, organized by Judy Ann Ford:

  • Fathers, Sons, and Fosterage in the Works of J. R. R. Tolkien

The Department of Religious Studies & Philosophy at The Hill School is sponsoring one session, organized by John Wm. Houghton:

  • Asterisk Tolkien: Filling Medieval Lacunae

Even with these three sponsors, the number of Tolkien sessions has decreased in the last two years — not from lack of interest (the Tolkien at Kalamazoo sessions are always extremely well attended) but as a result of a deliberate decision by the ICMS organizers, who have limited most sponsoring groups (although not all, which is puzzling in itself) to 3 or 4 sessions. For many years, the Tolkien at Kalamazoo group sponsored up to eight sessions per year, but that kind of thriving scholarly growth is being pruned back by the Congress organizers. Too bad, but of course, it’s their Congress, and they must have their reasons, though I think some sponsors would like to see more transparency in the decision-making.

K’zoo 2015 sessions on Tolkien and medievalisms

10 Sunday May 2015

Posted by in Conferences, Medieval, Medievalisms, Tolkien

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It’s that time of year again — planning for the International Congress on Medieval Studies, with its 500-plus sessions, at Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo.  Impossible to attend every session of interest, but in having to make decisions about which presentations to go to, I like to pull out a few possibilities. Here I have all the sessions that deal with Tolkien and then some that cover the broad topic of medievalisms. Of course, you should check the official program for the authoritative schedule and to double check times and rooms.

Tolkien sessions first of all:

Thursday 10 a.m. 
Session 33, Bernhard 204
Tolkien as Translator and Translated
Sponsor: History Dept., Texas A&M Univ.–Commerce
Organizer and presider: Judy Ann Ford, Texas A&M Univ.–Commerce

–Tolkien’s Beowulf and the “Correcting Style.” Dean Easton, Independent Scholar
—Sir Orfeo, the Classical Sources, and the Story of Beren and Lúthien. Sandra Hartl, Otto-Friedrich-Univ. Bamberg
–Translator and Language Change: On J. R. R. Tolkien’s Translation of Sir
Gawain and the Green Knight.  Maria Volkonskaya, Higher School of Economics, National Research Univ.

Thursday 1:30 p.m. 
Session 49, Valley II, Eicher 202
Christopher Tolkien as Medieval Scholar (A Roundtable)
Organizer: Douglas A. Anderson, Independent Scholar
Presider: John Wm. Houghton, Hill School
A roundtable discussion with Douglas A. Anderson; John D. Rateliff, Independent
Scholar; Brad Eden, Valparaiso Univ.; and Brent Landon Johnson, Signum Univ.

Thursday 3:30 p.m. 
Session 127, Schneider 2355
Tolkien and Victorian Medievalism
Sponsor: Tolkien at Kalamazoo
Organizer: Brad Eden, Valparaiso Univ.
Presider: Amy Amendt-Raduege, Whatcom Community College

–J. R. R. Tolkien on the Origin of Stories: The Pardoner’s Tale Lectures and Nineteenth-Century Folklore Scholarship
. Sharin Schroeder, National Taipei Univ. of Technology
–Maps and Landscape in William Morris and J. R. R. Tolkien. 
Amanda Giebfried, St. Louis Univ.
–Tolkien’s Victorian Fairy-Story Beowulf .
Jane Chance, Rice Univ.

Thursday 7 p.m. 
Session 155, Fetzer 1045
Tolkien’s Beowulf (A Readers’ Theater Performance) and Maidens of Middle-earth
V, “Turin’s Women”
Organizer: Brad Eden, Valparaiso Univ.
Presider: Thom Foy, Univ. of Michigan-Dearborn
–Tolkien’s Beowulf
Thom Foy; Andrew Higgins, Cardiff Metropolitan Univ.; Jewell Morrow,
Independent Scholar; Deidre Dawson, Independent Scholar; Mark Lachniet,
Independent Scholar; Richard West, Independent Scholar; Jane Beal,
SanctuaryPoet.net; Brad Eden
–Maidens of Middle-earth V: “Turin’s Women”
Eileen Marie Moore, Cleveland State Univ

Saturday noon.  Business Meeting, Tolkien at Kalamazoo. Bernhard 158

Sunday 8:30 a.m.   
Session 525. Schneider 1120
Tolkien as Linguist and Medievalist
Sponsor: Tolkien at Kalamazoo
Organizer and presider: Brad Eden, Valparaiso Univ.

–The First Red Book: An Exploration of Tolkien’s Exeter College Essay Book
Andrew Higgins, Cardiff Metropolitan Univ.
–Inter-Elvish Miscommunication and the Fall of Gondolin. Eileen Marie Moore, Cleveland State Univ.
–A Scholar of the Old School: Tolkien’s Editing of Medieval Manuscripts. John D. Rateliff, Independent Scholar
–Immram Roverandom. Kris Swank, Pima Community College

Sunday 10:30 a.m. 
Session 549. Fetzer 1055
Tolkien’s Beowulf
Sponsor: Tolkien at Kalamazoo
Organizer: Brad Eden, Valparaiso Univ.
Presider: Christopher Vaccaro, Univ. of Vermont

–“That does not attract me”: Lang./Lit. and the Structure of Tolkien’s Beowulf Commentary. John R. Holmes, Franciscan Univ. of Steubenville
–Can a Geat Be a Knight? Tolkien’s Use of Chivalric Terminology in His Translation of Beowulf. Brian McFadden, Texas Tech Univ.
–The Weird Word Wyrd
. Amy Amendt-Raduege, Whatcom Community College
—Beowulf Reimagined: Coming of Age in Tolkien’s Sellic spell. Amber Dunai, Texas A&M Univ.

Sessions or papers on medievalism:

Plenary lecture: Saturday 8:30 a.m.
The Notion of the Middle Ages: Our Middle Ages, Ourselves
Richard Utz
East Ballroom, Bernhard Cente

Thursday 10 a.m. Session 22
Looking Back at the Middle Ages
Presider: Geoffrey B. Elliott, Oklahoma State Univ.–Stillwater
–Abraham Wheelock and West Saxon Genealogy: Old English Rhythmical Prose in 1643/44. Patrick V. Day, Florida State Univ.
–Martin Sarmiento: A Medievalist at the Court of the Spanish Bourbon Kings. Maria Willstedt, Hamilton College
–Ghost of the Oak Gall: Scholarly Inheritance, Antiquarian Time, and Manuscript Cataloguing in the Medievalist Fiction of M. R. James. Patrick J. Murphy, Miami Univ.

Thursday 1:30 Session 95
Modernizing the Medieval for a New Generation: Medievalism in Children’s and Young Adult Literature
Organizer: Alexandra Garner, Bowling Green State Univ. Presider: Alexandra Garner
–“Minstrels get about and so do students”: The Role of Emotional Attachment and Historical Accuracy in the Impact of Young Adult Fiction. Esther Bernstein, Graduate Center, CUNY
–What in the World Is Wattpad?: Examining the Platform of Merlin’s Gold, The Camelot Code, and Other Offerings for Young Readers. Christina Francis, Bloomsburg Univ. of Pennsylvania
–Otherworld Boys and Modern Girls: The Medieval Irish Fairy Lover in Young Adult Fiction. Joanne Findon, Trent Univ.
–“Metaphorical Feudalisms”: Land, Obligations, and Power in the Young Adult Fiction of Tamora Pierce and Patricia A. McKillip. Amelia A. Rutledge, George Mason Univ.

Friday 10:00 a.m.  Session 214
False Friends: “Translation,” “Adaptation,” or “Creative Interpretation” of the Medieval Text?
Sponsor: Organizer: Presider:
eth press
 Chris Piuma, Univ. of Toronto, and David Hadbawnik, Univ. at Buffalo David Hadbawnik
–The Nonce Taxonomies of Translation and Mary Jo Bang’s Inferno. Lisa Ampleman, Univ. of Cincinnati
–The Well of Anachronism: Experimental Translation, Medievalism, and Gender in Contemporary Poetics. Shannon Maguire, Wilfrid Laurier Univ.
–Return to Sender: Re-Flemishing Chaucer’s Flemish Tales in Verhalen voor Canterbury. Jonathan Hsy, George Washington Univ.
–“The harlot is talkative and wandering”: Conduct Literature, Medbh McGuckian, and the Postcolonial Subject. Katharine W. Jager, Univ. of Houston-Downtown

Friday 10:00 a.m. Session 216
Quantum Medievalisms (A Roundtable)
Sponsor: Organizer: Presider:
postmedieval: a journal of medieval cultural studies
Eileen Joy, BABEL Working Group Angela R. Bennett Segler, New York Univ.
–Schroedinger’s Woman. Tara Mendola, New York Univ.
–The Piers Plowman Uncertainty Principle. James Eric Ensley, North Carolina State Univ.
–Bedetimematter. Christopher Roman, Kent State Univ.–Tuscarawas
–Quantum Memory and Medieval Poetics of Forgetting. Jenny Boyar, Univ. of Rochester
–Quantum Queerness. Karma Lochrie, Indiana Univ.–Bloomington

Friday 10:00 a.m.
Session 221
The Neomedieval Image
Sponsor: Organizer: Presider:
Medieval Electronic Multimedia Organization (MEMO) Carol L. Robinson, Kent State Univ.–Trumbull
Pamela Clements, Siena College
–A Digital Caliphate of Their Own: The Paradox of New Media and Neomedievalism in the New Islamic State. Kevin A. Moberly, Old Dominion Univ., and Brent Addison Moberly, Indiana Univ.–Bloomington
–Gesturing the Neomedieval Image and “Medievalizing” the Gesture. Carol L. Robinson
–Remix Culture and the Neomedieval Videogame. Michael Sarabia, Univ. of Iowa
–(Digital) Geography and the Making of Myth. Lesley A. Coote, Univ. of Hull

Friday 1:30 p.m. Session 259
Critical Mediations (A Roundtable)
Sponsor: Organizer: Presider:
International Society for the Study of Medievalism Amy S. Kaufman, Middle Tennessee State Univ. Amy S. Kaufman
–Le Roman de Jubal Sackett: Louis L’Amour reads Chrétien de Troyes. Cory James Rushton, St. Francis Xavier Univ.
–“What if your future was the past?”: Temporality, Gender and the “Isms” of
Outlander. Leah Haught, Georgia Institute of Technology
–Knighthood and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: Identity and Posthuman Medievalism in Sons of Anarchy. Valerie B. Johnson, Georgia Institute of Technology
–Studying Medieval Disabilities in the Post-Modern World. Wendy J. Turner, Georgia Regents Univ.
–Gothic Aesthetics. Dina Khapaeva, Georgia Institute of Technology

Friday 3:30
. Session 314
Political Medievalisms
Sponsor: Organizer: Presider:
International Society for the Study of Medievalism Amy S. Kaufman, Middle Tennessee State Univ. Amy S. Kaufman
–“D’Aliénor d’Aquitaine au bûcher de Montségur”: Medievalism and Identity in the Right-Wing Populism of the Ligue du Midi. Michael R. Evans, Central Michigan Univ.
–Blaming William of Ockham: The Far-Right’s Critique of Medieval Nominalism
Daniel Wollenberg, Univ. of Tampa
–Crusades, Templars, and Cyberjihad: Political Medievalisms in Social Media
Andrew B. R. Elliott, Univ. of Lincoln

Saturday 10:00 a.m. Session 370
Metaphysical Medievalisms
Sponsor: International Society for the Study of Medievalism Organizer: Amy S. Kaufman, Middle Tennessee State Univ. Presider: Carol L. Robinson, Kent State Univ.–Trumbull
–Medieval Elements in Hawthorne’s “Young Goodman Brown” William Racicot, Independent Scholar
–The Grail, American Fascism, and William Dudley Pelley. Kevin J. Harty, La Salle Univ.
–“Miracle of the Meat”: The Relationship of Medieval Eucharistic Miracles to Eucharistic Miracles in Contemporary Native American Novels. Rebecca Fullan, Graduate Center, CUNY
–The Post-Medieval Reception of Heretical Movements: From Arnold of Brescia to Fra Dolcino. Riccardo Facchini, Univ. Europea di Roma

Saturday 1:30  
Session 442. Bernhard 158
From Frodo to Fidelma: Medievalisms in Popular Genres (A Roundtable)
Sponsor: Tales after Tolkien Society
Organizer: Helen Young, Univ. of Sydney
Presider: Geoffrey B. Elliott, Oklahoma State Univ.–Stillwater
–Black in Sherwood: Race and Ethnicity in Robin Hood Media. Kris Swank, Pima Community College
–Hedgehogs and Tomb Raiders in King Arthur’s Court: The Influence of
Malory in Adventure Games. Serina Patterson, Univ. of British Columbia
–The Zombie Apocalypse in the Classroom and Medieval Plague. John Marino, Maryville Univ.
–Crimes and Conspiracies in Town and Court: Embodying Late Medieval Life. Candace Robb, Independent Scholar
–Found Footage: The Popular Credibility of the Grimms’ Tales. Thomas R. Leek, Univ. of Wisconsin–Stevens Point
–Arthuriana for Children: Narrative Integrity and the Medieval in Gerald
Morris’s Squires Tales. Alexandra Garner, Bowling Green State Univ.
–Medievalism and the Popular Romance Novel. Geneva Diamond, Albany State Univ.

Saturday 1:30
Medieval Mind of C. S. Lewis: Sources, Influences, Revisions, Scholarship
Sponsor: Organizer: Presider:C. S. Lewis Society, Purdue Univ.; Center for the Study of C. S. Lewis and Friends, Taylor Univ. Joe Ricke, Taylor Univ.

–Ransom as Pilgrim: A Reflection of Dante’s Commedia in Out of the Silent Planet Marsha Daigle-Williamson, Spring Arbor Univ.
–Walking beneath Medieval Skies: C. S. Lewis’s Challenge to Modern Minds. Kristine Larsen, Central Connecticut State Univ.
–The Medieval Sources and Inspiration for C. S. Lewis’s Understanding of Self and Society. Hannah Oliver Depp, Politics and Prose Bookstore/American Univ.
–Bridging the Gap between Medieval and Modern Science: The Middle Way of C. S. Lewis. Dennis Fisher, Independent Scholar

Saturday 3:30
.Session 462
Women of the Medieval World/Medieval Women of the World
Sponsor: Organizer: Presider:
Society for Medieval Feminist Scholarship (SMFS) Seokyung Han, Binghamton Univ.
Sally Livingston, Ohio Wesleyan Univ.
–Non-Uppity Women Poets of al-Andalus in Their Apartment
Doaa Omran, Univ. of New Mexico
–On the Re-establishment of Gender Roles in Medieval Korea
Seokyung Han
–Same-Sex Intimacies in an Ethiopian Hagiography: The Queer Relations of the Ethiopian Orthodox Female Saint Walatta Petros. Wendy Laura Belcher, Princeton Univ.
–Medieval Feminisms and Antipodean Medievalisms. Elie Crookes, Univ. of Wollongong

Saturday 3:30. Session 496
Teaching Medieval in a General Education Context (A Roundtable)
Organizer: Alison Locke Perchuk, California State Univ.–Channel Islands Presider: Amy Caldwell, California State Univ.–Channel Islands
–Art History. Peter Scott Brown, Univ. of North Florida
–Medieval English Literature. Andrea Harbin, SUNY–Cortland
–Medievalisms and Popular Culture. A. Keith Kelly, Georgia Gwinnett College
–Astronomy. Kristine Larsen, Central Connecticut State Univ.
–Vernacular Languages. Marilyn Lawrence, New York Univ.
–Religion. Heidi Marx-Wolf, Univ. of Manitoba
–History. Susan Taylor, Univ. of Houston–Victoria

Saturday 3:30  
Session 501. Bernhard 158
Martin and More: Genre Medievalisms
Sponsor: Tales after Tolkien Society
Organizer: Helen Young, Univ. of Sydney
Presider: Stephanie Amsel, Southern Methodist Univ.
–Medievalism, Feminism, and “Realism” in Game of Thrones. Kavita Mudan Finn, Southern New Hampshire Univ.
–Save the Cheerleader, Save the World: Yesterday’s Heroism Today. Valerie Dawn Hampton, Western Michigan Univ./Univ. of Florida
–Detectives in the Middle Ages? The (Exceptionally) Popular Genre of Medievalist Crime Fiction. Anne McKendry, Univ. of Melbourne
–White Hats for White Plumes: The Western as Arthurian Romance
Reimagined. Geoffrey B. Elliott, Oklahoma State Univ.–Stillwater

And here is another chance to attend the astrolabe session by Tolkien scholar / astronomer Kristine Larsen:

Friday 9:30 p.m.
A Hands-On Introduction to Astrolabes (A Workshop)
Organizer: Kristine Larsen, Central Connecticut State Univ.A hands-on workshop on the basic use of a medieval astrolabe, with examples taken from Chaucer’s Treatise on the Astrolabe. Each of the first forty attendees will take home a free cardboard astrolabe.

Tolkien conference season 2015

04 Wednesday Feb 2015

Posted by in Calls for Papers, Conferences, Medievalisms, Tolkien

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It’s time to start organizing my travel to various conferences this spring and summer. I wish I could attend all of these meetings, but I’ll be fortunate enough to go to a couple of them at least. My list focuses on North American conferences because I know those best, but please let me know in the comments if there are others. I hope my list will demonstrate the healthy state of academic Tolkien Studies and maybe entice you to go to one of these events — if you’re not already booking your tickets. And while there will be plenty of professional scholars at these conferences,  most of these events draw a lively mix of academics, independent scholars, writers, artists, fans of all kinds.

The first meeting will be held in a few weeks – not exactly springtime where I live, but still it does kick off the conference season:

There and Back Again: Tolkien in 2015 OSU Tolkien 2015: There and Back Again Conference, Feb 20-21, 2015
The Ohio State University.
February 20-21, 2015

This is the second annual Popular Culture and the Deep Past event sponsored by the Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies at Ohio State U.  According to the event website: “this will be a full-fledged conference, itself nested in a broader ‘carnival’ of popular and traditional cultural events and activities.”  Sounds like there will be something for everyone.

Popular Culture/American Culture Association National Conference
Popular Culture Association logo
New Orleans Marriott
April 1-4, 2015

This is a massive conference that draws scholars from a huge variety of fields. The newly established Tolkien Studies area, organized by Robin Reid, is sponsoring eight sessions plus a business meeting for a second year in a row.  The final program should be posted soon on the website.

12th annual Tolkien in Vermont conference
Tolkien in Vermont conference
University of Vermont
Burlington, VT
April 10-11, 2015

This year’s theme is medieval narrative verse, with Michael Drout as the keynote speaker. According to the conference organizer, Chris Vaccaro, a program will be posted soon on the website. This is usually a small and friendly conference attended by faculty, students, and the general public, with an open mic night on Friday followed by a day of presentations on Saturday.

International Congress on Medieval Studies 
Kalamazoo campus swan pond
University of Western Michigan
Kalamazoo, MI
May  14-17, 2015

This annual conference draws thousands of medievalists every year, but it also includes anyone interested in the scholarly study of Tolkien (not always the same as a medievalist).  The Tolkien at Kalamazoo group sponsors as many sessions as are allowed by the Congress organizers, and other sponsoring groups have sessions on Tolkien or on medievalisms as well.  You can search through the conference program  for what interests you.

New York City Tolkien Conference
New York City Tolkien ConferenceBaruch College
New York
June 13, 2015

The call for papers is on the site, with a deadline for proposals of April 7, 2015.  The keynote speaker will be Janet Brennan Croft and musical guest of honour, John DiBartolo.

Mythopoeic Society Conference / Mythcon 46
Mythopoeic Society
Hotel Elegante
Colorado Springs, Colorado
July 31-August 3, 2015

The special theme is the Arthurian Mythos.  I expect that more details about the program will appear on the website soon. This conference is usually a nice combination of serious academic papers and fun social events, readings, and more.

International Medieval Congress 
IMC 2015 poster
University of Leeds
July 6-9, 2015

This is the largest conference on medieval studies in Europe. A search through the program found three sessions on Tolkien.

Update February 12: Dr. Dimitra Fimi, who has organized some of these sessions, has more details about sessions on Tolkien, medievalism, fantasy, Arthurian tradition and more on her blog.

And looking ahead towards the end of the summer,  there is always
The Tolkien Society’s Oxonmoot
Tolkien Society
September 10-13, 2015.
St. Anthony’s  College, Oxford

And here are a couple of other conferences that focus on medievalism and that could very well end up sponsoring sessions on Tolkien:

The Middle Ages in the Modern World (MAMO)
June 29 – July 2, 2015
University of Lincoln, Lincoln UK

Update Feb. 12:  The provisional programme is now available. One session on Tolkien and lots of other good panels on various medievalism topics.

International Conference on Medievalism
This conference usually takes place in the fall.  I don’t see any information on the website yet about the next meeting.

I realize on looking over this list that it is heavily skewed towards Tolkien as a medievalist. If there are any other conferences you feel people should know about, please feel free to add them in the comments. It would also be interesting to know about other Tolkien conferences beyond North America and the UK.

Update Feb. 12:  Thanks to Marcel Aubron Bülles  here is another conference program:

German Tolkien Society
University of Aachen
May 1-3, 2015