University of Calgary

Abstract

Medieval Studies at the University of Calgary is a field spread out over several faculties, specifically Humanities, Social Sciences, Arts, and Communication and Culture. There is one multidisciplinary program that draws on courses offered by most of these faculties, a Minor in Medieval, Renaissance and Reformation Studies, with an anchor course in Humanities. Since students do not have to declare a Minor, enrolments are modest. There is no interdisciplinary M.A., but efforts are under way to fit such a program into a generic interdisciplinary M.A.. There are, however, significant opportunities for studying the medieval period and for writing an Honours, M.A. and (the odd) Ph.D. thesis within the traditional disciplines. Moreover, several graduates, especially from History and English, have pursued advanced degrees in Canada (Toronto), the U.S. (Notre Dame, Santa Barbara) and Britain (Oxford). Precisely because it is not a regular discipline, Medieval Studies has not been affected by systemic cutbacks. In addition to the specialists on hand, there have been recent appointments in this area in several departments, but that departmental presence and strength usually depends on just one person. Outside this structure, there is a flourishing Philology Research Group with an impressive range of activities. It was initiated by Ken Brown (French, Italian and Spanish Languages) four years ago and has been successful in attracting funding from the Faculty of Humanities, the university, and SSHRC. Its focus has been on textual editing, including text-encoding, palaeography, codicology and printing, with scholars from the U.S., Europe and Australia teaching workshops in their specialties. The Group has a community outreach program involving high school students, funded by the Delmas Foundation, and publishes its own series of occasional papers. Most recently, a beginning has been made in establishing a Medieval and Renaissance Cultural Studies Research Group with gender as its focus.