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IMC 2021: Sessions

Session 206: Terminological Tensions: Reconsidering Key Categories of Late Antique and Early Medieval Research, I

Monday 5 July 2021, 14.15-15.45

Sponsor:Department of History, Syracuse University, New York / Medieval Studies Program, McIntire Department of Art, University of Virginia
Organiser:Eric M. Ramírez-Weaver, McIntire Department of Art, University of Virginia
Moderator/Chair:Albrecht Diem, Department of History, Syracuse University, New York
Paper 206-aCorrectio and Its Different Modes: Theological, Moral, Scientific, and Economic
(Language: English)
Giles E. M. Gasper, Department of History, Durham University
Index terms: Historiography - Medieval, Learning (The Classical Inheritance)
Paper 206-bLooking Like Louis: Deconstructing Carolingian Classicism
(Language: English)
Eric M. Ramírez-Weaver, McIntire Department of Art, University of Virginia
Index terms: Historiography - Medieval, Language and Literature - Latin
Paper 206-cNaturae mirabor opus, 'Ecology without Nature', and the Tensions Therein
(Language: English)
Danielle Joyner, Department of Art & Art History Lawrence University Wisconsin
Index terms: Historiography - Modern Scholarship, Learning (The Classical Inheritance)
Abstract

The interdisciplinary nature of medieval studies has opened novel avenues for inquiry and complicated traditional narratives, as scholars find themselves encountering and pressuring key terms across disciplinary divides. Many of them have no direct relation to the language of our sources. As placeholders with complex histories themselves they offer useful generalizations and abstractions, but carry the danger of obfuscating diversity or nuance, transporting ideology, directing questions toward hackneyed answers, and inadvertently privileging certain research traditions over others. The papers shed light on the genesis and history several key categories of research, reflect on their hermeneutic power, and experiment with alternatives.