Regions and Regional Identity in the Middle Ages

The annual meeting of the Medieval Academy will be held 4-6 April 2013, in downtown Knoxville, hosted by the University of Tennessee-Knoxville, the University of Tennessee Marco Institute for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, and the Sewanee Medieval Colloquium.

The Program Committee invites proposals for papers on all topics and in all disciplines and periods of medieval studies. Any member of the Medieval Academy may submit a paper proposal, excepting those who presented papers at the annual meetings of the Medieval Academy in 2011 and 2012; others may submit proposals as well, but must become members in order to present papers at the meeting. Special consideration can be given to individuals whose specialty would not normally involve membership in the Academy.

Sessions usually consist of three 25-minute papers, and proposals should be geared to that length. The Program Committee may choose a different format for some sessions after the proposals have been reviewed. Session organizers may wish to propose different formats for their sessions, subject to Program Committee approval.

The Location. Located along the Tennessee River and in the foothills of the Great Smoky Mountains, Knoxville offers one of the most picturesque settings in the United States and is consistently named one of the most livable cities in America. Easily accessible from nearby Tyson-McGhee airport, Knoxville is also a day's drive from nearly 75% of the nation's population. The downtown area, where our conference hotels will be located, is in the midst of an architectural, cultural, and culinary renaissance. Conference participants will be able easily to walk to dozens of restaurants and pubs, a variety of art galleries, two historic theaters, the East Tennessee History Center, and several historical landmarks and buildings. Those who wish to stay an extra day or two will have the opportunity to travel further afield to see major attractions such as the world-famous Museum of Appalachia, the dizzying array of family themes parks (and pancake houses!) in Pigeon Forge and Gatlinburg, and of course, Smoky Mountain National Park, the most visited national park in America.

Themes. Because of our location in Appalachia, one of the nation's most distinctive regional cultures, we have selected as our theme for the MAA meeting, "Regions and Regional Identity in the Middle Ages." Sessions will address a variety of topics, many of them well outside the conference theme, but we hope to stress the importance of a sense of place, family, and locality in as many presentations as possible. We are seeking, therefore, innovative proposals for papers and sessions, and we hope to see significant cross-disciplinary participation as well. For both the commissioned and the open sessions, we are looking for the broadest possible range of proposals of topics and of time periods, within and across all the disciplines.

Selection procedure. Papers will be evaluated for promise of quality and significance of topic. Session organizers make an initial selection of papers and submit a plan to the Program Committee, which makes final decisions by 15 September 2012. Notification of acceptance or rejection will take place shortly thereafter.

Submissions. Proposals should be submitted to Jay Rubenstein, preferably by e-mail to jrubens1@utk.edu, or, on paper in two copies, to:

Jay Rubenstein
University of Tennessee
Department of History
6th Floor, Dunford Hall
Knoxville, TN 37996

The deadline is 1 June 2012.
Please do not send proposals to session organizers or to the Academy office.

The proposal must have two parts: (1) a cover sheet containing the proposer's name, statement of current status of Academy membership, professional status, 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, session for which the paper should be considered, paper title, 250-word abstract, and audio-visual equipment requirements. If the proposer will be at a different address when decisions are announced in September, that address should be included.

Topics. The Program Committee solicits papers for the sessions listed below. For information about a specific session, contact the session organizer.

Plenary Events:
The program will include three plenary speakers and at least one plenary session.

Presidential Address: Maryanne Kowaleski (Joseph Fitzpatrick S. J. Distinguished Professor, Fordham University)

First Plenary Speaker: Christopher De Hamel (Gaylord Donnelley Fellow Librarian, Corpus Christi College, Cambridge)

Fellows' Speaker: Jan Ziolkowski (Arthur Kingsley Porter Professor of Medieval Latin, Harvard University and Director of the Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection)

CARA Plenary Session on Digitized Manuscripts and Intellectual Property
Sponsored by the Annual Marco Manuscript Workshop
Organizer, Abigail Firey (University of Kentucky)

Sessions:

1. Militant Piety in Late Antiquity: Papers in Honor of the Memory of Thomas Sizgorich
Organizer, Jay Rubenstein (University of Tennessee, Knoxville)

2. Militant Piety in Medieval History: Papers in Honor of the Memory of Thomas Sizgorich
Organizer, Jay Rubenstein (University of Tennessee, Knoxville)

3. Sainthood and Regional Identity
Organizer, Susan J. Ridyard (Sewanee, the University of the South)

4. Maps and Mapping: Cities and Regions
Organizer, Lynn Ramey (Vanderbilt University)

5. Unity and Regionalism in the Medieval Mediterranean
Organizer, Thomas E. Burman (University of Tennessee, Knoxville)

6. Italy and the Mediterranean
Organizer, William Caferro (Vanderbilt University)

7. Trade between Region and Hinterland
Organizer, Susan J. Ridyard (Sewanee, the University of the South)

8. Regional and Vernacular Literature and Translations: Local Voices, (Trans)National Issues
Organizer, Matthew Giancarlo (University of Kentucky)

9. Family and the Land
Organizer, Kathryn Salzer (Pennsylvania State University)

10. Erogenous Zones
Organizer, Lynn Ramey (Vanderbilt University)

11. Beyond Borders: Kingdoms and Communities off the Map
Organizer, Irven Resnick (University of Tennessee, Chattanooga)

12. Resounding Spaces: Defining Communities and Geographies through Song
Organizer: Rachel Golden (University of Tennessee, Knoxville)

13. North vs. South in Old and Middle English Literature
Organizer, Matthew Giancarlo (University of Kentucky)

14. Milestones and Millstones in the Study of Old English Literature: The Most Significant - or Misguided - Works of Criticism
Organizer, Roy Liuzza (University of Tennessee, Knoxville)

15. Drama in Medieval England
Organizer, Matthew Irvin (Sewanee, the University of the South)

16. Greek East and Latin West
Organizer, William Caferro (Vanderbilt University)

17. Medieval Marketplace: Theory and Practice
Organizer, William Caferro (Vanderbilt University)

18. Economic Interaction in the Low Countries
Organizer, Kathryn Salzer (Pennsylvania State University)

19. Social and Political Interaction in the Low Countries
Organizer, Kathryn Salzer (Pennsylvania State University)

20. Science and Religion in Conflict
Organizer, Irven Resnick (University of Tennessee, Chattanooga)

21. Latin Translations of Vernacular Literature
Organizer, Thomas E. Burman (University of Tennessee, Knoxville)

22. Medicine and Spirituality
Organizer, Mary Dzon (University of Tennessee, Knoxville)

23. Latin Devotional Literatures
Organizer, Mary Dzon (University of Tennessee, Knoxville)

24. The Reception of the Apocrypha
Organizer, Mary Dzon (University of Tennessee, Knoxville)

25. Rumor and Infamy in Political Culture
Organizer, Jay Rubenstein (University of Tennessee, Knoxville)

26. Archaeology and Region
Organizer, Kathryn Salzer (Pennsylvania State University)

27. Depictions of the Liberal Arts
Organizer, Laura E. Cochrane (Middle Tennessee State University)

28. Carolingian Manuscript Culture
Organizer, Laura E. Cochrane (Middle Tennessee State University)

29. The New Constitutionalism Revisited: Documents, Texts, Cultures
Organizer, Matthew Giancarlo (University of Kentucky)

30. Saints, Sinners, and Inquisition
Organizer, Abigail Firey (University of Kentucky)

31. Landscapes and Seasons of the Medieval World: Pearsall and Salter at 40
Organizer, Laura Howes (University of Tennessee, Knoxville)

32. Ecocriticism and Its Discontents
Organizer, Laura Howes (University of Tennessee, Knoxville)

33. Peasants and the Natural World
Organizer, Kathryn Salzer (Pennsylvania State University)

34. Networks of Monasteries and Religious Orders
Organizer, Susan J. Ridyard (Sewanee, the University of the South)

35. The Millennium: Fresh Views of the End of Time
Organizer, Jay Rubenstein (University of Tennessee, Knoxville)

36. Preaching and Public Religious Practice
Organizer, Jay Rubenstein (University of Tennessee, Knoxville)

37. Bodies and Borders
Organizer, Irven Resnick (University of Tennessee, Chattanooga)

38. Women before the Inquisition: A Persecuted Sex?
Organizers, Abigail Firey (University of Kentucky) and Susan J. Ridyard (Sewanee, the University of the South)

39. Gender, Family, and Place: Romancing the Home
Organizer, Matthew Giancarlo (University of Kentucky)

40. "Latin, Greek, Arabic, and Hebrew: Cosmopolitan Language and Regionalism in the Middle Ages"
Organizer, Thomas E. Burman (University of Tennessee, Knoxville)

41. Holy Land(s) and Medieval Jews
Organizer, Irven Resnick (University of Tennessee, Chattanooga)

42. Regional Traits in Illuminated Manuscripts: Style and Iconography
Organizer, Amy Neff (University of Tennessee, Knoxville)

Other topics. The Program Committee welcomes submissions on other topics and will organize additional sessions to accommodate the best submissions.

Session proposals. The Program Committee will consider proposals for entire sessions if their subject matter does not conflict with that of other sessions. Please consult with the Program Committee chair before preparing a proposal. Session proposals require the same information as individual paper proposals; abstracts for the papers in the proposed session will be evaluated by the Program Committee.

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

Graduate Student Prizes. The Medieval Academy will award a prize of $500 to the best graduate student paper given at the conference. The Academy will also award travel reimbursements of up to $500 each to graduate students for papers judged meritorious by the local committee. To be eligible for these awards, 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 submit complete papers to the Program Committee by 10 January 2013.

Program Committee. The Program Committee consists of:

Jay Rubenstein (Chair, University of Tennessee, Knoxville)
Thomas E. Burman (University of Tennessee, Knoxville)
William Caferro (Vanderbilt University)
Laura E. Cochrane (Middle Tennessee State University)
Mary Dzon (University of Tennessee, Knoxville)
Abigail Firey (University of Kentucky)
Matthew Giancarlo (University of Kentucky)
Laura Howes (University of Tennessee, Knoxville)
Lynn Ramey (Vanderbilt University)
Irven Resnick (University of Tennessee, Chattanooga)
Susan J. Ridyard (Sewanee, the University of the South)
Kathryn Salzer (Pennsylvania State University)

Local Arrangements Committee. The Local Arrangements Committee consists of:

Heather Hirschfeld (University of Tennessee, Knoxville)
Laura Howes (University of Tennessee, Knoxville)
Gregor Kalas (University of Tennessee, Knoxville)
Katherine Kong (University of Tennessee, Knoxville)