Virtual Symposium

"Teaching the Literatures and Cultures of the Global Middle Ages"
April 24, 2021 1 PM

Registration Link: Middle Ages

Dr. Geraldine Heng (University of Texas at Austin)

Sometime around the year 1000 of the Common Era, archeologists tell us that an expedition of people from Greenland and Iceland took advantage of climate change and crossed the Atlantic Ocean to North America. There, they proceeded to build a settlement at L'Anse aux Meadows in Newfoundland, erected a complex of houses, smelted iron for tools and weapons, repaired ships, slept, socialized, threw away their trash, wove cloth, and did single-needle knitting. The presence of what might have been a child's toy hints that a new generation may even have been born there. Beyond that, the archeological record is silent. What these northern Europeans saw in the Americas, why they wanted to be there, what happened in their encounters with native peoples: for cultural details of that kind, we must turn to two literary-historical accounts in Old Norse known as the Vinland Sagas. From North America to Africa, from Islamic civilizations to the Eurasian steppe, from the Mediterranean to South, Southeast, and East Asia, "Teaching the Literatures and Cultures of the Global Middle Ages" will offer ideas, texts, and guidelines for those who want to explore the worlds of early globalism with their colleagues and students.