Annual Meeting, Tempe, 2011: Call for Papers. Deadline for submission is 15 October 2010.

Click Here for the Proposal Submissions Website

The annual meeting of the Medieval Academy of America will be held jointly with that of MAP (the Medieval Association of the Pacific) at the Chaparral Suites Hotel (http://chaparralsuites.com/) in Scottsdale, Arizona, 14-16 April 2011. It will be hosted by ACMRS (Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies) at Arizona State University (ASU), Tempe.

The Program Committee invites proposals for papers on all topics and in all disciplines and periods of medieval studies. Given the Academy’s tradition of suggesting possible areas of investigation, the Committee also offers the following for your consideration:

1. Fiefs, feudal institutions, and property holding
2. Testaments and testamentary acts, lay and clerical
3. Liturgical reform and innovation
4. The crafting and creation of liturgical lives and offices
5. Reliquaries and their fates
6. Color and color theory in art and architecture
7. Translation of scriptural and devotional works: patrons and audiences
8. Universities and their involvement in secular politics
9. Representative assemblies, lay and clerical
10. Periodization and the Middle Ages: beginnings and endings
11. The study of the Middle Ages from the 17th through the 20th century
12. The Medieval Mediterranean
13. Ballads and balladry
14. The Pope and the Church in Literary and Artistic Representations
15. Holy Women: Power and Influence in Medieval Europe
16. Musica as Mediatrix between the Mortal and the Immortal
17. Medical Texts: Authors, Readership, Uses
18. The Professionalization of Medicine in the Medieval Period
19. Chronicles and Chroniclers in Medieval Europe
20. The Exile in Medieval Literature and Art
21. Time, Remembrance, and Its Representations
22. Innovations in Scientific Thought and Inquiry
23. Animals and the Animalistic
24. The Garden, Gardening, and Plants
25. Conduct and Behavior in the Middle Ages: Pro Forma and Explicit Guides
26. Politics and the Peasantry
27. The Social Functions of Urban Confraternities
28. Masters and Apprentices
29. The Medieval Labor Market
30. The Domestic Economy
31. The Family as a Moral Unit
32. New Perspectives on Medieval Agriculture
33. Maidservants and Singlewomen

Any member of the Medieval Academy, except those who presented papers at the annual meetings of the Medieval Academy in 2009 and 2010, and any member of MAP may submit a proposal. Please do not submit more than one proposal.

Sessions usually consist of three papers of thirty minutes each, and proposals should be geared to this length. The Committee may choose a different format for some sessions after the proposals have been reviewed. We shall try to develop sessions that (1) address subjects of interest to a wide range of medievalists and (2) invite scholars from different disciplines and periods into dialogue with one another. We seek proposals for innovative papers and sessions and hope to see, wherever possible, cross-disciplinary participation in a broad range of topics and of periods.

Selection procedure. Proposals will be evaluated for promise of quality and significance of topic. The Committee will make final decisions by 15 September 2010. Notification of acceptance or regrets will be sent shortly thereafter.

Submissions. Proposals should be submitted online at http://cf.itergateway.org/medacad/conference/ which will be available from 15 January 2010 to 15 October 2010. Note that your statement of Academy or MAP membership (or statement that your specialty would not normally involve membership in either organization) must be made at the end of your abstract.

If you wish to submit a hard-copy proposal instead, please send two copies to the Committee Chair, Robert E. Bjork, Director, ACMRS, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ 85287-4402. The proposal must consist of two parts: (1) a cover sheet containing the proposer’s name, professional status and affiliation, postal address, home and office telephone numbers, fax number (if available), e-mail address (if available), and paper title; (2) a second sheet containing the proposer’s name, paper title, 250-word abstract, statement of Academy or MAP membership (or statement that your specialty would not normally involve membership in either organization), and audio-visual equipment needs. If the proposer will be at a different address when decisions are announced in September 2010, that address should be included. Please DO NOT send proposals to the Academy office.

Session proposals. The Committee will consider proposals for entire sessions. Please consult with the Committee Chair before preparing a proposal. Session proposals require the same information as individual paper proposals; abstracts for the papers in proposed sessions will be evaluated by the Committee.

Audio-visual equipment. Requests for audio-visual equipment must be made with proposals.

Graduate Student Prizes. The Medieval Academy will award up to seven prizes of $300 each to graduate students for papers judged meritorious by the local Committee. To be eligible for an award graduate students must, of course, be members of the Medieval Academy and, once their proposed papers have been accepted for inclusion in the program, must inform the committee by 10 January that they qualify and wish to be considered.

Program Committee. Robert E. Bjork, ACMRS (Chair); William F. Gentrup, ACMRS; Carl Berkhout, English, University of Arizona, UA; Albrecht Classen, German Studies, UA; Roger Dahood, English, UA (MAP representative); Cynthia White, Classics, UA; Alyce Jordan, Art History, Northern Arizona University; Karen Bollermann, English, ASU; Monica Green, History, ASU; Richard Newhauser, English, ASU; Catherine Saucier, Music, ASU; Corine Schleif, Art History, ASU; Juliann Vitullo, Italian, ASU; Rosalynn Voaden, English, ASU; Chauncey Wood, Adjunct Professor, ACMRS.

Local Arrangements Committee. Audrey Walters, ACMRS (Chair); Robert E. Bjork, ACMRS; William F. Gentrup, ACMRS; Emilie Roy, ACMRS.