44th Annual Medieval and Renaissance Forum
The Mystical, the Supernatural, and All Things Unexplained in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance
Keene State College
Keene, NH, USA
Friday and Saturday April 12-13, 2024
Call for Papers and Sessions
We are delighted to announce that the 44th Medieval and Renaissance Forum will take place in person on Friday, April 12 and Saturday April 13, 2024 at Keene State College in Keene, New Hampshire. The theme of this year’s conference, the sixth and last dedicated to the senses, is The Mystical, the Supernatural, and All Things Unexplained in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance. As always, we also welcome papers on any and every topic related to the Middle Ages or the Renaissance as well as papers on medievalism. We plan to hold the 44th Annual Medieval and Renaissance Forum in person with a limited number of virtual presentations.
We welcome abstracts (one page or less) from faculty, students, and independent scholars. If you are an undergraduate student, we ask that you obtain a faculty member’s approval and sponsorship.
Graduate students are eligible for consideration for the South Wind Graduate Student Paper Award upon submission of their essays by April 1, 2024. The winner of the South Wind Graduate Student Paper Award will win $100 to be used for registration and/or travel expenses to the 45th Annual Medieval and Renaissance Forum (travel expenses including but not limited to transportation to and from the conference and accommodations while in Keene). The winner of the South Wind Graduate Student Paper Award will be announced at lunch on Friday, April 12, 2024.
Please submit abstracts and full contact information.
2024 Keynote
This year’s keynote speaker is Nahir Otaño Gracia, Assistant Professor of English at the University of New Mexico, who will speak about “Whiteness, Borders, and the Otherworld: Yvain in the Global North Atlantic.”
Dr. Otaño Gracia has published a number of articles on literature from the Global North Atlantic, including “Towards a Decentered Global North Atlantic,” the winner of the MLA’s article prize in critical race studies (Literature Compass 2019), “Gawain, Race, and the Borders in The Turke and Sir Gawain” (Exemplaria 2022), “Presenting Kin(g)ship in Medieval Irish Literature” (Enarratio 2018), and “Vikings of the Round Table” (Comitatus 2016).
Her co-edited volume of essays, Women’s Lives: Self-Representation, Reception, and Appropriation in the Middle Ages, was published in 2023, and she is currently working on her monograph, The Other Faces of Arthur: Medieval Arthurian Texts from the Global North Atlantic.
Dr. Otaño Gracia is also an activist medievalist working to create a more inclusive medieval studies. The article “Constructing Prejudice in the Middle Ages and the Repercussions of Racism Today,” co-written with Daniel Armenti, appeared in Medieval Feminist Forum’s special issue on Microaggressions, Harassment, and Abuse—Medieval and Modern, and her essays “On hidden scars and the passive voice” (Ecocide), “Lost in Our Field” and “Welcome to a New Reality! Reflections on the Medieval Academy of America’s Panel” discuss the ways that medieval studies has begun to diversify the field and the ways it has fallen short.
Dr. Otaño Gracia also helped create the Medieval Academy of America’s Belle Da Costa Greene award to be given annually to a medievalist of color for their research.
- Abstract deadline: January 15, 2024
- Presenters and early registration: March 15, 2024
As always, we look forward to greeting returning and first-time participants to Keene in April!