The Byzness, 21st November 2023
Oxford University Byzantine Society
THE OXFORD UNIVERSITY BYZANTINE SOCIETY
The Byzness, 21st November 2023
====
1. NEWS AND EVENTS
2. CALLS FOR PAPERS
3.
JOBS AND SCHOLARSHIP OPPORTUNITIES
====
1. NEWS AND EVENTS
Online Lecture - 'Language Care and Community: The Fashioning of Middle Armenian into a Courtly Vernacular'
The Mary Jaharis Center for Byzantine Art and Culture and the Mashtots Professor of Armenian Studies at Harvard University are pleased to announce the next lecture in the 2023–2024 East of Byzantium lecture series.
Tuesday, December 5, 2023 | 12:00 PM (EST, UTC -5) | Zoom
Language Care and Community: The Fashioning of Middle Armenian into a Courtly Vernacular
Michael Pifer, University of Michigan
The medieval vernacular of Middle Armenian was fashioned by many communities, beginning perhaps with the court of the Kingdom of Armenia in Cilicia, in Sis, in the late twelfth and early thirteenth centuries. Here a cohort of nobles, priests, and physicians collectively translated, composed, commissioned, and studied a wide array of texts, subtly aligning the status of their "rustic" vernacular into a companion of stately power. Yet although the last Armenian kingdom would fall to the Mamluks in 1375, Middle Armenian did not die with it. Instead, the language continued to travel and circulate in unlikely places. This talk takes a selective and comparative look at two of the communities that formed around this unruly and unstandardized tongue, before and after the fall of its kingdom. It argues that while these communities were different, a shared ethos of language care, or an attentiveness that shapes the social and epistemic uses of language in a particular time and place, can be teased out in each.
Michael Pifer is Assistant Professor of Armenian Language & Literature at the University of Michigan. Dr. Pifer is a specialist in Armenian cultural production with an emphasis on the development of vernacular Armenian literature during the medieval period. His work focuses on how Armenian literature developed alongside neighboring literary traditions within shared spaces. His interests turn around questions of multilingualism, mixed-script writing, and the ways in which premodern poets attempted to accommodate certain forms of cultural difference within their compositions. By decentering monolingual approaches to literary history, his research aims to contribute to knowledge about cross-cultural dialogism across the literary landscapes of premodern Armenia and its adjacent regions. He is the author of Kindred Voices: A Literary History of Medieval Anatolia (Yale University Press, 2021) and a coeditor of An Armenian Mediterranean: Words and Worlds in Motion (Palgrave Macmillan, 2018).
Advance registration required. Register: https://eastofbyzantium.org/upcoming-events/
Contact Brandie Ratliff (mjc...@hchc.edu), Director, Mary Jaharis Center for Byzantine Art and Culture with any questions.
2. CALLS FOR PAPERS
Round Table Proposals for the 25th International Congress of Byzantine Studies
If you would like to submit a proposal for a Round Table for the 25th International Congress of Byzantine Studies to be held in Vienna August 24-29, 2026 through the US national committee, please email the proposal directly to leonora...@wisc.edu. The US national committee can submit up to 10 proposals by December 31st, 2023. So far, Leonora Neville has received 6 and expects two more. If she ends up with more than 10 proposals, the US national committee (consisting of Leonora Neville, Cecily Hilsdale, Andrea Achi, and Benjamin Anderson) will ask some of the organizers to submit through different national committees. To give them time to do this, they ask that you get your proposals to them by December 1, or at minimum let them know to expect one. For further guidelines and instructions, see below.
Following the online meeting of the Organizing Committee of the 25th International
Congress of Byzantine Studies -Vienna 2026 with the members of the AIEB Bureau on 16 March 2023, we would like to inform you about the preliminary profile and structure of the Congress program and to appeal to all National Committees to send us their proposals for Round Tables by 31 December 2023. The call for Free Communications will be sent in spring 2025. You may find below the main theme of the Congress, the themes of six Plenary Sessions, as well as the timetable and procedures for Round Tables, to be confirmed and approved at the Inter Congress meeting in Athens on 12 April 2024.
INFORMATION ON THE PROFILE AND STRUCTURE OF THE 25th CONGRESS OF BYZANTINE STUDIES-
Vienna 2026
Date:
The 25th International Congress of Byzantine Studies will be held on 24 to 29 August 2026 in Vienna, Austria.
Main Theme:
“Byzantium beyond Byzantium”, “Byzance au-delà de Byzance”, “Το Βυζάντιο πέρα από το Βυζάντιο”
General Rule:
Scholars can participate in no more than two sessions throughout the Congress. (i.e., as speaker in
two sessions, or as speaker in one session plus as convener, or as convener in two sessions).
Plenary Sessions:
There will be six Plenary Sessions. The list of Plenary Session themes and speakers will be
approved at the Inter-Congress meeting in Athens on 12 April 2024. National Committees will be informed about the details shortly before the meeting. The themes for Plenary Sessions are:
1. Byzantium lost and found
2. Romanitas beyond Byzantium. Diffusion and impact of ideas of Rome in a „post-Roman”
world
3. The beasts, the crops and the bones. Biological perspectives on the Byzantine world
4. Byzantine Diversities
5. Reading Byzantine literature across the centuries
6. Byzantium in Central Europe
Round Tables
General rules:
1. Round Tables must be proposed through the National Committee of the proposer. There is
also the option of joint proposals by more than one National Committee.
2. Round Tables are allocated 90 minutes. They should consist of no fewer than four and no
more than six speakers, plus the convener(s), in order to ensure adequate time for
discussion.
3. The professional affiliation of the speakers should represent at least two countries. We
particularly encourage the inclusion of young researchers.
4. We strongly encourage those who propose Round Tables to follow the Congress main
theme.
5. The most important criterion for accepting a Round Table proposal will be its innovative
scholarly contribution.
6. The number of proposals, including joint proposals by each National Committee is limited
to ten.
7. Proposals should include a title, an abstract of 250 words, 5 key words, the
names of the convener(s) and speakers as well as the name of the person
sending the proposal, his/her affiliated institution and his/her mail address.
8. Proposals should be written in English or French.
Timetable:
- The deadline for submission of Round Table proposals by National Committees to
the Organizing Committee is 31 December 2023. Any Round Table proposal sent
after the deadline will not be accepted. The proposals should be sent to
program....@univie.ac.at.
- Conveners of Round Tables will be informed about the decision of the Program
Committee (in accordance with the Bureau of the AIEB) in mid-February 2024.
Proposed Round Tables will either be accepted or rejected or the option of an
Organized Session will be offered.
- Conveners of accepted Round Tables will be asked to confirm their participation
and the organization of their Round Tables by 31 March 2024.
- The list of Round Tables will be presented at the Inter-Congress meeting in Athens
on 12 April 2024.
Call for Submissions - Central & Eastern European Affairs Review, Issue 2: Borders and Boundaries
As a neighbourhood of countries, the geopolitical entity of Central and Eastern Europe bears a deceptively simple name for a region historically marked by flux. The map of Central and Eastern Europe, from a long durée approach, seems to be continually morphing into entirely new structures – featuring states that seem to burst into existence and, just as quickly, melt away. Bounded by both the imaginary and tangible political borders of both Western Europe and Russia, the CEE countries comprise a region that is internally characterised by complexity and division in its own right. Constantly redefining, transgressing, and redrawing its own cultural, political and historical limits – the region’s boundaries are today, as they have always been, a subject of fervent debate.
Central & Eastern European Affairs Review, a student-run publication based in Cambridge, is seeking to invite contemplation and re-evaluation of the lines and distinctions of the region for its second issue, "Borders and Boundaries". We welcome articles that praise and critique the structure of the region, that examine how these lines have been transgressed, and discuss how global and regional influences have dictated how these boundaries have been formed. The final issue will divide articles broadly into three sections: Culture, History, & Society; Economy; Politics & International Relations.
We are looking for submissions of up to 2000 words, in line with our general submission guidelines and our style guide. Both completed pieces and idea pitches are welcome.
To submit please email us at ceeaffai...@gmail.com. The deadline for submission is December 13th 2023.
In the subject line, please put a concise topic of the submission and the section(s) it is intended for, e.g. ‘Submission_Serbia’s EU Future_Politics & International Relations’. In the body of the email, please indicate the section you are submitting to, as well as your name and affiliated academic institution. If you are pitching an idea for a prospective piece, please also include a short overview of what your piece is intended to be about, including the issues covered and the specific perspective taken.
43rd Canadian Conference of Medieval Art Historians
The 43rd Canadian Conference of Medieval Art Historians will be hosted by Concordia University’s Department of Art History on March 15-16, 2024. Papers in English or French are invited on any topic relating to the art, architecture, and visual/material culture of the Middle Ages or its post-medieval revivals.
Please submit a short abstract (250 words) and one-page c.v. to ccma...@gmail.com by January 12, 2024. Scholars at every stage of their careers are encouraged to submit proposals.
Connecting Stucco in the Mediterranean (c. 300 BCE - 1200 CE): Methodological Approaches and the State of Research
Bilkent University, Ankara, 16th-18th May 2024.
The use of plaster reliefs (stuccoes) as architectural decoration is a well-known phenomenon in the Mediterranean, with roots already in ancient Egyptian architecture. However, it has been mainly studied within the boundaries of specific disciplines and chronological specialisations. While this allowed scholars to recognise the relationship of stucco with specific architectural traditions and technologies, it did not allow to spot long-term trends and cross-cultural interactions. This is due to the lack of coordination of scholarship on the study of stucco, which appears to develop at different speeds and aim
at different goals depending on the field of study. For example, in the field of Islamic art and archaeology, stucco has mainly been studied in terms of stylistic and iconographic aspects in order to spot cultural exchanges within the Islamicate world; the technological aspect has only recently started to be addressed with archaeometric analyses. At the same time, research on Western Medieval stuccoes benefitted from a more holistic approach, which started to answer the changes in iconography, style, and technologies from the Late Antique to the Early Medieval period. However, the last comprehensive publications on the subject date to the early 2000s and little has been done since then, especially on the
archaeometric analyses and their interpretation. The study of stucco makers, their legal and social status have been analysed for Roman stucco and partially for the Western Medieval world, while it is largely missing for the other fields of study on stucco in the period of interest here. The knowledge of Byzantine stucco is still in its infancy, lacking archaeometric analysis and not going beyond the single case studies, except for a limited number of studies. Despite this dispersed character of research on stucco, many important studies on this material have been produced in the recent decades and the academic community has had multiple occasions to discuss stucco at various conferences and workshops. Therefore, we feel it is time to connect these efforts and address common questions that can help to see long-term phenomena and cross-cultural exchanges in
the Mediterranean.
We encourage papers submission on the following (but not exclusively) topics:
1. Technology and makers: what do we know about the technology of stucco production and
how it differed in various regions and throughout time? Did technological advances spread from one region to another? Who were the stucco workers? What was their place in past societies, and how did their status change through time?
2. Patterns of transmission: to what extent did stucco workshops, styles, iconographic motifs, and formal features overcome geographical, political, and confessional boundaries? How knowledge about stucco-making was transmitted? What was the relationship between stucco produced in the Mediterranean with stucco traditions of other regions such as the wider Iranian world?
3. Perception by past societies: What was the perception of stucco by past societies? How did people perceive it in relation to marble and other media? Was it perceived as a material worthy of preservation? Was it considered a cheap material?
4. Stucco and modern discipline boundaries: does stucco production fit modern boundaries of academic discourse? For example, do we have “Byzantine” and “Islamic” stucco production? How does it relate to other materials (marble, limestone, wood), and what do we know about workshops? Did stuccoist work alongside stone sculptors, whitewashers, and/or painters?
5. The state of studies: What is the place of research on stucco in modern academia? What are the practices related to excavations, displays, publishing etc.? Does it have a place on its own, or is it seen as a part of studies on sculpture or architectural decoration? What are the
methodological approaches used to date and study stucco?
We encourage an in-person presence to facilitate the discussion and dissemination of knowledge, even though the conference will be available in hybrid form. Papers of approximately 20 minutes are welcome. We also invite posters on specific case-studies.
The language of the conference is English.
Please submit abstracts of no more than 300 words by Wednesday 31st January 2024 to:
connecti...@gmail.com. Applicants will be notified of selection by Thursday 29th February 2024. For posters, please send an abstract of the topic of no more than 250 words by Wednesday 28th February 2024. Applicants will be notified of selection by Sunday 31st March 2024.
If you need a letter by the Organising Committee for visa purposes, please state it in your application. For any questions please contact: connecti...@gmail.com.
Publication of the conference proceedings is planned.
3. JOBS AND SCHOLARSHIP OPPORTUNITIES
The Department of Classics at the University of Georgia invites applications for a full-time tenure-track Assistant Professor in Data Analytics and Pedagogy in Classics with an anticipated start date of August 1, 2024.
Candidates should be prepared to teach classes in data collection, quantitative analysis, visualization, and AI learning based on data sets of archaeological, material, and/or literary evidence, with a focus on methodologies and pedagogy. We welcome applicants whose research spans any gamut of the classical to early modern eras, and applicants with expertise in any languages in the Mediterranean spectrum. Familiarity with economic history and its cultural contexts is preferred. Candidates must have a Ph.D. in Classics or a related discipline by time of appointment.
The successful candidate is expected to maintain an active research agenda, teach undergraduate and graduate courses (with a 2-2 teaching load), and contribute to departmental governance.
To apply, please submit dossiers containing a cover letter, cv, contact information for three references, and a writing sample (20 pages maximum). Applications should be submitted at https://www.ugajobsearch.com/postings/343145. Reference providers will be sent an email through the UGAJobs system with instructions on how to submit their letters of recommendation. Review of applications will begin on January 8, 2024 and continue until the position is filled.
Research Fellowship for Mapping Eastern Europe
Mapping Eastern Europe is inviting applications for a three-month remote fellowship with its project
(https://mappingeasterneurope.princeton.edu), which is an open-access digital platform that
focuses on the history, art, and culture of Eastern Europe between the 13th and 17th centuries.
The fellow will assist with research and writing about the medieval and early modern visual
culture of the northern Danube regions OR the Ottoman presence in Eastern Europe.
The successful candidate will research and write 3 case studies on key monuments and objects,
and 2 historical and/or thematic overviews that will then be published on the Mapping Eastern
Europe website (either in longform or video format).
With this opportunity, we aim to raise awareness about the historical and artistic complexities of
the region. We are equally interested in both topics (the regions to the north of the Danube River
and the Ottoman presence in Eastern Europe) as they are areas that we would like to see better
explored and represented on Mapping Eastern Europe.
The successful applicant should hold a PhD and be an art historian with a specialty in the
medieval and/or early modern visual culture of Eastern Europe. Applicants may be of any
nationality. The fellow would need to have a solid knowledge of English.
The timeline for this work is somewhat flexible but a start date at the beginning of March 2024
would be ideal. There is an honorarium of $2,000–$3,000 for this position, which is tied to the
North of Byzantium initiative (www.northofbyzantium.org) and will be confirmed upon
acceptance of the fellowship.
To apply, please send in a single .pdf a letter of interest with details about your research and its
significance, your skills, and proposed contributions (no more than 2 pages); a CV; and the
names of two referees who may be contacted to provide support letters, if needed, to
northofb...@gmail.com by January 10, 2024. Please include in the email subject line
“Application: 2024 Mapping Research Fellowship”.
-----------------
Alexander Sherborne
DPhil Candidate, Faculty of History
President, Oxford University Byzantine Society
http://oxfordbyzantinesociety.wordpress.com