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SPRING 2008
In the Spring 2008 semester, the Medieval Studies Certificate Program
offers the following courses.
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MSCP
70100
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Introduction
to Medieval Studies
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Friday, 11:45 a.m.- 1:45
p.m. Room TBA, 3 credits
[91702]
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Professor Gordon Whatley
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The
seminar will be structured around three units of 3-4 weeks apiece, each
devoted to a "rich" text (or cluster of texts) from,
respectively, history, literature, and the visual arts (music, philosophy
and science are beyond my competence, but are not excluded from potential
areas that students might explore).
The first two units will focus on, respectively, one or more narrative
histories of the First Crusade (1097-1100) and Chretien de Troyes’ classic
narrative fiction, the romance of fin’amors (“courtly love”), Lancelot
(Chevalier de la charette).
In these units, via traditional and electronic library research, we will
sample various issues of interdisciplinary inquiry, such as
textuality/manuscript contexts, “authorship” and sources, genre and
rhetoric, medieval and modern reception, and some of the ever-shifting
theories of interpretation in modern historiography and literary
scholarship.
The visual arts this semester will be represented by the splendid set of
frescoes of the Legend of the True Cross painted by Piero della Francesca
in the church of Saint
Francis in Arezzo,
Italy, ca. 1460.
Recently restored after years of neglect, these paintings introduce
students to a complex of medievalist concerns (e.g., hagiography,
iconography, biblical culture, liturgy, relics, ecclesiastical patronage of
art, the Franciscans, etc.) as well as the concept of “the Renaissance” in
art against the background of this intrinsically medieval legend with its
fusion of the Old and New Testaments, Empire and Church, violence and the
sacred.
Students will have the opportunity to produce (in a final, fourth unit) a
short paper further developing a research topic broached during the course.
Some class time will be set aside for short presentations by medievalist
faculty from various disciplines.
Information: Gordon Whatley
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MSCP
80500
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The
Culture of Saints in Medieval Art
& Society
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Tuesday, 6:30 –
8:30 p.m., Room TBA,
3 credits [91703]
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Professors Cynthia Hahn (Art
History) & Thomas Head (History)
Cross listed with ART 83000 & HIST
70600
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Using
interdisciplinary and comparative approaches, we will examine the cult of
the saints in medieval Europe.
As respectively an art historian and a social
historian, we will particularly examine the interplay of images and
architecture, on the one hand, with texts and social practice, on the
other.
We will begin with an introduction to methodology in the research of
medieval hagiography in a cross-disciplinary manner. We will then explore such topics as the
shrines of martyrs and early medieval saints, the place of relics and
reliquaries in the cult of the saints, hagiographic narratives both visual
and textual, canonization of the saints, and the impact of royal status and
gender on concepts of sanctity.
Emphasis will be placed on students’ research projects, which will be
presented in preliminary form for group discussion in the last weeks of the
semester.
For more information, please contact either: Cynthia Hahn (chahn@hunter.cuny.edu) or Thomas
Head (thead@hunter.cuny.edu).
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ART
73000
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Topics
In Medieval Art
and Architecture: The Medieval Mediterranean
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Thursday, 11:45 a.m. –
1:45 p.m., Room 3421., 3 credits [91906]
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Professor Ball
Open to Art History students only,
permission of EO required for all others
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The
medieval Mediterranean was a lively hub of trade surrounded
by varying cultures throughout the period: the Byzantines in the East, the
Fatimids in Egypt,
the Normans of Sicily, the
Umayyads in Spain,
and later the Italian kingdoms such as Venice
and Genoa.
Out of this mix came Christianity, the crucial introduction of books (as
opposed to scrolls) and the progression toward literate society. In
addition, many art forms, such as icons, whose impact went well beyond the Mediterranean,
appeared.
The Mediterranean also enabled the further spread of
Islam itself along with its visual culture.
This class will take a critical look at the idea of a
pan-Mediterranean visual culture springing out of a time when the entire
region from the Levant to Spain
was under Byzantine control, through the beginnings of the Renaissance,
when the Mediterranean hosted nearly ten different
cultures. Portraiture, dress and textiles, icon painting, calligraphy are
just a few art forms that become shared across the Mediterranean
despite differences in religion, language, and government.
The effects of the Crusades and also colonization, particularly by the
Venetians, on Mediterranean visual culture will be discussed, as will the
legacy of this culture in the Italian Renaissance.
Three (3) auditors permitted.
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C L
80101
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Dante:
Purgatory
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Monday, 3:30 –
6:10 p.m.,NYU, Room TBA,
4 credits [91678]
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Professor Freccero
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Information:
italian.dept@nyu.edu
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C L
80102
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Dante & Medieval Thought
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Tuesday, 3:30-6:10 p.m.,
NYU Room TBA, 4 credits [91679]
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Professor Ardizzone
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Dante’s
minor works and, in particular, Vita
Nova, Convivio, and De vulgari eloquentia, read in light
of the philosophical-theological debate of the time. Focus is on
intellectual history, medieval theory of knowledge, intelligence, and
speculation from the Pseudo-Dyonisius to Albert
the Great, St. Thomas Aquinas, and St.
Bonaventure.
Information: italian.dept@nyu.edu
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HIST
78900
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The
Jews of Muslim Lands: From Muhammad through the Middle Ages
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Thursday, 4:15
-6:15 p.m., Room TBA,
3 credits [91756]
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Professor
Gerber
Open to History Students only, permission
of the EO and instructor required for all others.
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This
course will explore the major issues of Jewish life under Islam in Medieval
times.
It will include consideration of such topics as: the legal status of the
Jews under Islam, religious and cultural developments in Jewish life,
sectarianism and dissent, economic roles of the Jews, Muslim-Jewish
relations and the efflorescence of Jewish community and culture in Ummayad Spain,
Abbasid Iraq,
Fatimid Egypt
and Ottoman Turkey.
Texts:
Benjamin of Tudela, in ed. Adler,
Medieval Jewish Travelers
Cohen, Mark, Under Crescent and Cross
Frank, Daniel, ed. The Jews of Medieval Islam
Gerber, Jane, The Jews of Spain
Lassner, J. Abridgement of Goitein’s Mediterranean
Society
Lewis, B. The Jews of Islam
Reif, S. The World of the Cairo
Geniza
Scheindlin, R. Wine, Women and Death
Stillman, N.The Jews of Muslim Lands
Articles:
On Reserve articles by: Bat Ye’Or, Mark Cohen, Yefim
Shirmann, S.D. Goitein,
Gerson Cohen, Norman Roth, M. Ben-Sasson
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Past schedules:
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Fall 2007; Spring 2007; Fall 2006; Spring 2006; Fall 2005; Spring 2005;Fall 2004;Spring 2004;Fall 2003;
Spring 2003; Fall 2002;
Spring 2002; Fall 2001; Spring 2001
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