Interdisciplinary Seminar

The Interdisciplinary seminar is at the heart of the program and is the liveliest part of the Master.  Since the academic year 2013-2014, this seminar unites all the Master’s students and professors from various disciplines.  Together and using a common theme, they try to show the contribution of each discipline to medieval studies.

During the first semester, about six work sessions are organized around a chosen theme.  In Fall 2013, the theme was “Travel and Travelers in the Middle Ages”: whether it be real or imaginary voyages, for pious or commercial purposes, autobiographical narratives or not…  In Fall 2014, the central theme was “Tensions and Harmonies” and for the Winter Semester, “Forgeries”: fake documents, fake money, or even counterfeiting and falsification in the metaphorical sense of false pretenses or hypocrisy.  For the academic year 2015-2016, we worked on “Urban Life” in all of its manifestations: archeology, literature, history…  For 2016-2017, our theme was “The Border” to commemorate our first seminar with the students of the Mittelalterzentrum in Freiburg im Breisgau.  Our meetings continued in November 2017, when our MEMI students went to Freiburg for a joint seminar about “Man and Animal”.  Starting in September 2018, our meetings with Freiburg included the medievalists in Basel and were part of the European Campus program "Seed-Money".

During the second semester, in addition to the normal sessions, the Master program goes abroad for one week.  It is an opportunity to meet students and professors of another university, as well as a way to discover a medieval city.  We went to Oxford in 2014 (for a joint seminar about Medieval Forgeries with students of the Master program Medieval Studies), to Ghent and Bruges in 2015, and to Barcelona in 2016.  In 2017, participants of the Master went to Germany (Magdeburg, Quedlinburg, Wittenberg, and Berlin), in the spring of 2018, MEMI students spent three days in Milan!

Syllabus for Winter Semester 2019

The seminar takes place on Fridays from 9:00-12:00 on the dates and locations indicated below.

January 25, 2019 (Palais Universitaire, room 120)

James Hirstein (Literature, Strasbourg), Presentation of the Humanist Library of Sélestat: History and Inventory

February 1, 2019 (MISHA, Table ronde)

Work session for students (1.25 hours)

Lecture by Cédric Giraud (Historical Sciences Department at the University of Lorraine): “The History of Spirituality, challenges and methods” concerning a volume of Pléiade in preparation: Anthologie de textes spirituels traduits de latin en français d'Anselme de Laon à la devotio moderna, Paris, 2018

March 8, 2019 (MISHA, Table ronde)

One-day Conference “The Liturgy at the intersection of art and social practices”, co-organized by Laura Albeiro, Carola Hertel and Christian Meyer

March 19, 2019 guided tour of the Museum Unterlinden in Colmar, co-organized by Elisabeth Clementz and Pantxika Paepe (museum curator).

March 22, 2019 (MISHA, Table ronde)

Work session for students

April 26-27, 2019 tour and workshop at the Humanist Library in Sélestat as part of the tri-national European Campus project with the medievalists from Freiburg and Basel.

Events outside of the program (for more information, check the calendar)

March 11-22, 2019: Colloquium on “The Honor of the Alsatians” organized by Elisabeth Clementz and Olivier Richard

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