Submitter:
Email:
Type: Call for Papers
State:
Nation:
Date: --
Seigneurie, a group for the study of lordship, the nobility, and chivalry, invites paper proposals for two sessions at the International Medieval Congress in Kalamazoo, MI, May 13-16, 2010.



Session 1: Transitions of Power



The transfer of power from one lord or ruler to another, even simply across generations, was often a fraught moment for noble families and lordships. This session seeks to uncover commonalities and contrasts in this difficult and recurrent stage by bringing together scholars working on different regions, eras, and disciplines. Papers might address such topics as:



· Strategies employed to ease the peaceful transference of power

· Disputes over succession

· The composition and activities of regencies

· Responsibilities and activities of guardians

· The role that gender played in transitions of power



Please submit one-page abstracts for a 20-minute paper and contact information (name, email, and affiliation) to Katie Sjursen of Wheaton College via email (ksjursen@gmail.com) before September 15, 2009.





Session 2: Contestations of Chivalry



The scholarship of recent years makes it ever more clear that the values of chivalry were under constant tension, as clerics, kings, and knights themselves worked to revive, reform, or otherwise influence them. As scholars continue to debate just how meaningful chivalry was in practice, we must take into account the many examples of contemporaries who attempted, by invoking chivalric ideals, to influence the priorities and the behavior of knights. Papers might explore such topics as:



· Ecclesiastical and literary critiques of chivalry, the knightly class, or specific activities like tournaments

· Disputes with the nobility itself as to what constituted proper chivalric behavior

· The relative importance placed by writers of chivalric manuals on different elements of the concept

· Institutions, like orders of knighthood, which attempted to promote specific interpretations of correct chivalric behavior

· Critical depictions of chivalry or knights in visual art



Please submit one-page abstracts for a 20-minute paper and contact information (name, email, and affiliation) to Anne Romine of St. Louis University via email (aromine@slu.edu) before September 15, 2009.





For more information about Seigneurie, or for correspondence by post rather than electronic mail, please contact Donald Fleming, History Department, Hiram College, Hiram OH 44234 (Flemingdf@Hiram.edu).