So I mean, what's stopping us from making it Medievalism Studies?

I mean, hell, even Greenblatt's beloved Poggio was just looking for something earlier to cosplay.
The fact that the humanists grabbed earlier medieval sources for art and script wasn't an oopsie. It was "earlier than Arthur."
If you have a young Edward III literally setting up a joust where everyone dresses as Arthurian characters in order to kick off what he hopes will be a genuine real-life chivalric order of the Round Table (we got the Garter instead. best laid plans, etc) you have cosplay.
And it keeps going. They're editing Chaucer and Langland, etc by the 16thc, and continuously if you consider scribal interventions. And they keep editing Chaucer.
The legal side invents a Middle Ages almost continuously, and pretty self-consciously, as they go, and it gets reinvented and enshrined in colonial law by the 18th (but the theorization begins as early as the 16th).
The Victorians go absolutely bonkers reinventing the Middle Ages and throw BANANAS bank at it, building or renovating nearly TEN THOUSAND churches in 'gothic' style w/in a span of decades, and take that penchant global too.
(and ofc every sort of art and fashion imaginable. They really fall HARDDD for medieval. Tolkien's sort of an apotheosis of this really, right down to colonial roots.)
And allllll the document editing and cataloguing that kicks off in the 19thc, w/o which we'd have SHITE access to the records, the records that "make" Medieval Studies as it is today.
Related mess happens over in lang/lit ofc, as they try getting sciency w/language, invent philology, and eventually try to be Very Serious Really about literature. All medieval. No Fun Here.
All the while merrily declaring what was and was not medieval out of whole cloth.
So, I mean, why not make it Medievalism Studies. Throw the emphasize on the making and remaking. The desire for medieval. The contingent. The slipping. The revision.
We can launch a con. Crafting the Middle Ages. We run the usual scholarly sessions. We also run sessions w/histfic writers and heritage professionals. Bc it's medievalism allllla way down. Like Dr*goncon but for medievalists. All of us.

More from Education

I held back from commenting overnight to chew it over, but I am still saddened by comments during a presentation I attended yesterday by Prof @trishgreenhalgh & @CIHR_IMHA.

The topic was “LongCovid, Myalgic Encephalomyelitis & More”.
I quote from memory.
1/n
#MECFS #LongCovid


The bulk of Prof @Trishgreenhalgh’s presentation was on the importance of recognising LongCovid patient’s symptoms, and pathways for patients which recognised their condition as real. So far so good.

She was asked about “Post Exertional Malaise”... 2/n

PEM has been reported by many patients, and is the hallmark symptom of ME/CFS, leading many to query whether LongCovid and ME/CFS are similar or have overlapping mechanisms.

@Trishgreenhalgh acknowledged the new @NiceComms advice for LongCovid was planned to complement... 3/n

the ME/CFS guidelines, acknowledging some similarities.

Then it all went wrong.
@TrishGreenhalgh noted the changes to the @NiceComms guidance for ME/CFS, removing support for Graded Exercise Therapy / Cognitive Behavioural Therapy. She noted there is a big debate about this. 4/n

That is correct: The BMJ published Prof Lynne Turner Stokes’ column criticising the change (Prof Turner-Stokes is a key proponent of GET/CBT, and I suspect is known to Prof @TrishGreenhalgh).

https://t.co/0enH8TFPoe

However Prof Greenhalgh then went off-piste.

5/n

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The article is, at heart, deeply weird, even essentialist. Here, for example, is the claim that proposing climate engineering is a "man" thing. Also a "man" thing: attempting to get distance from a topic, approaching it in a disinterested fashion.


Also a "man" thing—physical courage. (I guess, not quite: physical courage "co-constitutes" masculinist glaciology along with nationalism and colonialism.)


There's criticism of a New York Times article that talks about glaciology adventures, which makes a similar point.


At the heart of this chunk is the claim that glaciology excludes women because of a narrative of scientific objectivity and physical adventure. This is a strong claim! It's not enough to say, hey, sure, sounds good. Is it true?