Courses

Instructor: Will Hasty

In this online course, you will learn about technological innovations and the basic physical principles underlying them (e.g., force, work, and energy) in the cultural domains of power generation, agriculture, sacred spaces, warfare, and textiles and how these innovations interacted with belief- and value systems to shape the European Middle Ages.

Instructor: Karen Taliaferro

Multidisciplinary exploration of Great Books written in the medieval Western world. During this period Christianity moved from being proscribed and persecuted to being the established religion of Western nations. The core texts of the era grapple with many of the questions which arose from that transformation. Authors to be considered include Augustine, Boethius, Alfarabi, Averroes, Maimonides, Aquinas, Dante, Petrarch, Chaucer, Julian of Norwich and Luther, among others.

Instructor: Stephan Kory

The course explores the cultural, economic, and literary heights of the Tang Dynasty (618–907 CE), a period widely recognized as the peak of classical Chinese civilization.

Instructor: Richard Wang

Introduction to Chinese culture with emphasis on its philosophy, language, society, art, and people as a whole. All readings are in English.

Instructor: Richard Wang

Overview of Chinese martial arts fiction from earliest times to the present day. Discusses the literary pleasure of watching violence, the relationship between violence and the law, gender ambiguity of woman warriors, the imperial and (trans)national order of martial arts narrative, and the moral and physical economy of vengeance.

Instructor: Jodi Miller

This class examines the history of France through the theme of “medievalisms” with a focus on particular historical events that have formed and transformed the nation state, its mentality and its cultural production. Special attention will be given to the ways in which the French medieval period has been received, and to how this reception has influenced the political, intellectual, religious, social, and artistic currents that have marked France and its image from the medieval period to the present. Taught in English, with readings and assignments in French for students specializing in French.

Instructor: Mary Watt

This course will trace the history of Italian exploration, taking students from the legendary voyages of Aeneas to the age of Atlantic expansion, following the journeys of figures such as Julius Caesar, Marco Polo, the Vivaldi Brothers, Christopher Columbus, Amerigo Vespucci, John Cabot, and Giovanni da Verrazzano. Along the way, students will examine not only the voyages themselves, but also the stories that transformed these voyagers into national heroes, while reshaping the known world in the cultural imagination of Europe. Through chronicles, letters, maps, travel narratives, and visual materials, the course will explore how discovery is narrated, remembered, and mythologized.

Instructor: Tom Vozar

William Shakespeare, whose plays remain among the most widely read and performed throughout the world, and John Milton, the author of the epic poem Paradise Lost, stand as central figures of the English canon, distinguished both by their powers of literary expression and by the depth of their engagement with enduring philosophical questions. Beginning with Milton’s own reading of Shakespeare, this course examines the works of these two writers in relation to one another and to the historical context of early modern England. In considering their writings—including drama, poetry, and prose—we will explore questions of virtue and temptation, freedom and authority, religion and politics, and the relationship between literary form and ideas.

Instructor: Florin Curta

Medieval Spain

Instructor: Sarra Tlili

Humanity on Trial centers on the Ikhwān al-Ṣafāʾ’s tenth-century fable, The Case of the Animals versus Man Before the King of the Jinn, in which animals challenge human claims of superiority and accuse humans of exploitation. The course asks who we are in relation to other animals and whether human differences justify human rule over or use of them. Drawing on religious studies, philosophy, animal studies, and ethology, students examine competing understandings of animal cognition, moral status, justice, and human responsibility. They situate the fable within the cosmopolitan intellectual world of medieval Iraq and place Qur’anic and Islamic perspectives in dialogue with Western ethics and contemporary scientific evidence. The course culminates in a twenty-first-century mock trial that reopens the animals’ case in light of modern conditions.

Instructor: Jodi Miller

Ce cours interroge la ruse, la tromperie et la farce dans la littérature française du Moyen Âge à la Renaissance, ainsi que les figures qui incarnent ces thèmes. Nous étudierons ces thèmes et leurs grandes figures dans des textes médiévaux tels que le Roman de Renart, l’œuvre de Marie de France et les fabliaux, ainsi que dans des textes plus tardifs tels que La Farce de maître Pathelin,l’œuvre de Rabelais et l’Heptaméron de Marguerite de Navarre. Les questions qui guideront notre analyse seront les suivantes : quelles valeurs chaque terme met-il en jeu ? Quel rôle jouent les figures rusées dans la société d’où proviennent leurs textes ? Le cours se déroulera en français et comprendra au moins une présentation orale ainsi qu’un projet de recherche final.

Instructor: Eric Esteban

Read in English translation Murasaki Shikibu’s The Tale of Genji, the eleventh-century masterpiece of Japanese literature. Wander palace corridors as you get lost in reverie and exquisite longing. Get invested in aristocratic intrigues and the karmic consequences of past sins. Indulge in learning the finer details of calligraphy and incense. Search for what Virginia Woolf described in her 1925 review of Genji for Vogue as “something different, something finer, something withheld.” In this class, we will explore the literary features and historical circumstances that built the text’s reputation as the world’s first novel. Course materials will be augmented by additional study of Genji’s influence on Japanese literature, poetry, painting, and dramatic arts in the medieval and early modern periods, as well as its surprising appearances in contemporary culture. No knowledge of the Japanese language or prior familiarity with the history and culture of Japan is necessary, but JPT3500 Japanese Culture is recommended.