The Irish Sea Cultural Province: Crossroads of Medieval Literature and Languages
FAIN: FV-50353-12
CSU, Bakersfiled (Bakersfield, CA 93311-1022)
Charles William MacQuarrie (Project Director: March 2012 to November 2014)
A four-week seminar in Britain for sixteen school teachers to explore the cultural, literary, and linguistic diversity of the British Isles in the Middle Ages.
The purpose of this four-week NEH summer seminar for school teachers is to provide participants with an enriched appreciation for the linguistic and cultural confluence which characterizes the British Isles (the Irish Sea cultural province) in the Middle Ages. While early British literature and culture is sometimes thought to be exclusively Anglo-Saxon, the entire region was, in fact, rich in cultural and linguistic diversity. In this seminar we will focus on the extent and the significance of this linguistic, cultural, and physical multiplicity as we explore conflict and resolution among Briton, Saxon, Gaelic, Norse, and Latinate culture. There will be brief introductions to the languages and manuscripts of the medieval texts we will be reading, but all the texts, except the Middle English Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, will be read in translation.