CFP: Between Constantines: Representations and Manifestations of an Empire, The History Faculty, University of Oxford, 4 - 5 March 2011

CFP: Between Constantines: Representations and Manifestations of an Empire, The History Faculty, University of Oxford, 4 - 5 March 2011

Source: The Oxford Byzantine Society.

The Oxford Byzantine Society is pleased to announce that its annual graduate conference will be held in March 2011. The society is now accepting abstracts for papers to be presented at this event. 

This year's conference - entitled Between Constantines: representations and manifestations of an empire - seeks to explore the different ages of Byzantium. What were the political, social, cultural and economic strategies that defined different periods in the existence of the empire? How do we interpret the narratives, materials and structures of the momentous and the everyday in the empire's long history? 

In order to approach the subject from as many angles as possible, we welcome papers from graduate students in all fields related to Byzantium, including, but not limited to: History, Archaeology, Language and Literature, Theology and Art History. 

Possible themes for papers might include: 

• Diplomacy and foreign relations
• Religious and cultural exchange
• The Byzantine thought world
• Art and architecture
• Trade and travel
• Language and literature
• War and defence
• The urban and rural existences
• Nomads
• Geography and topography

As the title suggests, the temporal scope of the conference is envisaged to stretch from the rise of Constantine to the fall of Constantinople. Within this rough time frame, we encourage papers dealing with the Byzantine world as well as those surrounding regions which had direct interactions with it, including the Near and Middle East, the Mediterranean, the Balkans and Eastern Europe, the Eurasian Steppe and Transcaucasia. 

Final papers will be 20 minutes in length, followed by 10 minutes of discussion. This year we will be accepting papers in English and French, however, given the likely composition of the audience, presentations in English are strongly recommended. 

Abstracts of no more than 250 words should be submitted to byzantine.society@gmail.com by 5pm on Monday 18 January 2011. Please include a few lines about your research interests. Successful applicants will be notified by Monday 24 January 2011. 

Subject to funding, the OBS hopes to offer subsidised accommodation for visiting speakers, as it did last year. More information will be available in early 2011. We regret that we are unable to cover travel expenses to and from Oxford, but we encourage all participants to apply to their home institutions for travel grants. 

Abstracts are due on Monday 18 January 2011

For more information, please e-mail  : byzantine.society@gmail.com

Oxford Medieval Graduate Conference

CALL FOR PAPERS

 

 

Aspects and Approaches

Lincoln College, Oxford, 16th – 17th April 2010

Medium Ævum will host the sixth Oxford Medieval Graduate Conference. This conference is aimed at early career scholars and graduate students. A volume of proceedings comprising selected papers will appear in the Medium Ævum Monographs Series. Contributions are welcomed from diverse fields of research such as history of art and architecture, history, theology, philosophy, anthropology, literature and history of ideas.
Papers will be 20 minutes or less. Please email 250-word abstracts (text only, no attachments please) to oxgradconf@gmail.com by 5th January 2010.
Suggested topics might include:

• Misunderstanding; Miscommunication; Misinterpretation; Misattribution; Mistranslation
• Scribal error; Mismatch (image vs. text); Retractions; Textual variance
• Factual error; Received error
• Personification of error
• Mistaken identity
• Political mistake
• False confessions; Lying
• Confusion; Deception
• Knightly errance
• Theological error; Spiritual error
• Scientific error
• Disharmony/Discord
• Medievalism; Early Modern and later (mis)corrections
• Epistemology; Logic
• Crime and misdemeanour

The conference fee is expected to be in the region of £25 (twenty-five pounds). We hope to organize a conference banquet in Lincoln's lovely hall on the Friday night and will provide details of this as soon as they are available.

Source:http://www.medieval.ox.ac.uk/omgc.html

GENDER AND CLASS IN BYZANTINE SOCIETY: XVITH BIENNIAL CONFERENCE

GENDER AND CLASS IN BYZANTINE SOCIETY: XVITH BIENNIAL CONFERENCE
16-18 April 2010
University of New England
The Australian Association for Byzantine Studies calls for papers for its XVIth Biennial Conference. The conference is being held in honour of Professor John Melville-Jones and the theme will be 'Gender and Class in Byzantine Society'.
Plenary speakers:
Dr Tom Brown, Reader, School of History, Classics and Archaeology, The University of Edinburgh
Professor John Melville-Jones, Classics and Ancient History, University of Western Australia
Dr Shaun Tougher, Senior Lecturer in Ancient History, Cardiff University (to be confirmed)
Gender and class were key social indicators in Byzantine society, as in many others. However, masculine and feminine roles were not always clearly defined, while eunuchs made up a 'third gender'. Social status was also in a state of flux, as much linked to patronage networks as to wealth, as the Empire came under a series of external and internal pressures. This fluidity applied in ecclesiastical as much as in secular spheres. We welcome papers on all aspects of the theme of gender and/or class from the 4th to the 15th centuries, from the Greek East to the westernmost reaches of the Byzantine Empire.
Contributors are invited to interpret the theme broadly and we welcome submissions from all fields. Both scholars with academic affiliation and working independently, as well as postgraduate students, are encouraged to apply.
Registration is now open: download and post the registration form or register online.
The Conference will be held 16-18 April 2010 at the University of New England in Armidale, New South Wales, Australia.
Please submit abstracts of up to 500 words for 30-minute papers (including 10 minutes of questions) by 1 April to:
Associate Professor Lynda Garland
School of Humanities
University of New England
Armidale
New South Wales 2351
tel +61 2 6773 3236
fax +61 2 6773 3520
PLENARY SPEAKERS
Dr Tom Brown, Reader, School of History, Classics and Archaeology, The University of Edinburgh
The View from the Provinces: Gender and Society in Byzantine Italy from Justinian to Robert Guiscard
After working as a Research Fellow at Dumbarton Oaks and Birmingham, Tom Brown taught medieval studies at the Australian National University in Canberra for two and a half years. Since 1980 he has taught medieval history at the University of Edinburgh, where he is now Reader. He was the founding editor of the journal Early Medieval Europe. Among his many publications he is perhaps best known for the book Gentlemen and Officers: Imperial Administration and Aristocratic Power in Byzantine Italy 554-800 (London, 1984). His most recent publications include 'The Role of Arianism in Ostrogothic Italy: The Evidence from Ravenna' in The Ostrogoths from the Migration Period to the Sixth Century: An Ethnographic Perspective (Boydell Press, 2007), 'Byzantine Italy, 680-876' in J. Shepard (ed.), The Cambridge History of the Byzantine Empire  (Cambridge, 2008 and 'Lombard Religious Policy in the Late Sixth and Seventh Centuries: The Roman Dimension' in Giorgio Ausenda, Paolo Delogu and Chris Wickham (eds), The Langobards (Boydell, 2009).

Professor John Melville-Jones, Classics and Ancient History, University of Western Australia
The Deplorable Life and Disgusting Death of Andronicus I Comnenus
Professor John Melville-Jones (FRNS, FAHA) is the Winthrop Professor in Classics and Ancient History at the University of Western Australia. Over the course of a distinguished career spanning five decades, he has made a major contribution to Byzantine Studies in Australia. His research specialisations are in the areas of Greek numismatics and the history of the later Byzantine empire, particularly its relations with Venice. He was President of the Australian Association for Byzantine Studies from 2000 until 2005.
For his outstanding work in these areas he has received two Greek awards: the Aristotle Award (1999) and the Onassis Foundation Senior Visiting Scholar (2002). In 2009 he worked in the State Archives in Venice as a guest of the Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation, collecting material which documents the relationship between Venice and Constantinople in the 15th century.
A patron of the Perth Numismatic Society, he has published a variety of material relating to ancient Greek and Latin texts which provide information about coinage and its use in the ancient world. He will soon publish the second of two volumes of collected sources documenting the Venetian occupation of Thessalonica in 1423-1430. Some of his most recent publications are:
J.R. Melville-Jones and D. Gilliland Wright, The Greek Corespondence of Bartolomeo Minio, Dispacci from Nauplion (1479-1483) (Padova: Unipress, 2008)
J.R. Melville-Jones, Testimonia Numaria Volume II (London: Spink, 2007)
J.R. Melville-Jones, 'Venetian History and Patrician Chroniclers' in Chronicling History: Chroniclers and Historians in Medieval and Renaissance Italy, (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2007).

Dr Shaun Tougher, Senior Lecturer in Ancient History, Cardiff University (to be confirmed)


source: http://home.vicnet.net.au/~byzaus/conferences/16th2010/