Dear colleagues,
As you know. the Medieval Academy will celebrate its centennial in 2025. There’s a lot to celebrate!
1) 100th Annual Meeting: The commemorations will kick off at the Annual Meeting in March, with hundreds of papers, panels, and roundtables, four plenaries, celebratory gatherings, and even a few surprises. We’ll be commemorating our history, of course, but also celebrating you: honoring your scholarship by acknowleding everyone in attendance who has ever been awarded an MAA grant, won a publication prize, been elected to the Fellows, or presented at the Annual Meeting; and acknowledging with gratitude the efforts of everyone who has ever served in our governance or on one of our committees. Join us in Cambridge, Massachusetts in March as we commemorate our past, celebrate our present, and imagine our future. The program and registration will be available in a few months.
2) Centennial Grants: Thanks to the anonymous Matching Challenge donor and your generous contributions, the Centennial Committee has awarded twenty-one grants of $5,000 each to projects across North America. Watch your email for an event near you!
Arkansas: The Plays of Hrotsvitha of Gandersheim: Bringing the Medieval to Arkansas, University of Arkansas // Two Headed Repertory
California: Summer Institute for Late Medieval Polyphony, University of California, Berkeley
Georgia: Medieval on my Mind: The Past, Present, and Future of Medieval Manuscripts in the Deep South, University of Georgia
Illinois: Cartooning the Medieval: Comics, Narrative Art, and New Audiences for Medieval Studies, Newberry Library
Illinois: Medievalists Design Games, University of Chicago
Indiana: The Bayeux Tapestry from Scratch, Indiana University
Louisiana: Medievalists of Northern Louisiana, Grambling State University
Massachusetts: Art in an Early Global World at WAM: A Digital Resource, College of the Holy Cross
Michigan: 2025 Mostly Medieval Theatre Festival “Book of Silence” Adaptation Premiere, Western Michigan University
Minnesota: Virtual Medieval Books in the Schools, University of Minnesota
New Jersey/ DC: The Middle Ages for Educators Open Access Resource (OAR) Sweet Sixteen Playoffs, Independent Scholar/Princeton University
New Mexico: The Interconnected Middle Ages, University of New Mexico
New York: Medieval Drama in Brooklyn and in Toronto, Brooklyn College/CUNY Graduate Center
North Carolina: Vagantes Conference on Medieval Studies 2025, University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill and Duke University
Ohio: Mothers and Sisters of the Veil, Trobár Medieval, Cleveland
Oklahoma: Inaugural Manuscripts Lecture Series, Oklahoma State University
Texas: Space City Medievalism, University of Houston
Virginia: Public Medieval: A Workshop for Graduate Students, ECRs, and Underemployed Medievalists, Virginia Tech
Washington: Medieval Joy Event and Undergraduate Conference, Seattle University
Puerto Rico: Jornadas caribeñas de estudios medievales: dedicadas a la Dra. Isabel Gutierrez del Arroyo (Caribbean Conferences on Medieval Studies: In Memory of Dr. Isabel Guitierrez del Arroyo), University of Puerto Rico, Rio Piedras Campus
Ontario: York Plays 2025, University of Toronto
3) Speculum: Special issues of our journal will commemorate the MAA’s centennial (forthcoming, January 2025) and the 100th volume of Speculum (titled Speculations, to be published in January 2026). We congratulate Editor Katherine Jansen and her staff on a spectacular five-year tenure even as she looks forward to her retirement next year. We will welcome a new Editor in the summer of 2025 (more on that soon).
4) Centennial Speakers’ Series: In collaboration with CARA, the Fellows have established a Centennial lecture series that will bring senior medievalists to campuses across North America. Click here to arrange a visit to your campus or city!
5) Online programming: We will be greatly expanding our online programming in 2025 and beyond, offering author conversations, open discussion forums, podcasts, administrative workshops, skills training, and other programs. Watch your email for more information!
6) Long-term planning: As we begin our second century, we are carefully and comprehensively analyzing all MAA programs and policies in order to ensure that all of our programming and procedures are efficient, sustainable, productive, mission-driven, and in keeping with our values statement: “The Medieval Academy of America is a scholarly community committed to deepening, broadening, and sharing knowledge of the medieval past in an inclusive and equitable way.”
I look forward to celebrating with you!
– Lisa
Lisa Fagin Davis
Executive Director
LFD@TheMedievalAcademy.org
