Fall 2006 Graduate Courses - Medieval Institute, University of Notre Dame

715 Hesburgh Library, University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, IN 46556-5629, Telephone: (574) 631-6603, Facsimile: (574) 631-8644, Email: medinst@nd.edu

Fall 2007: Graduate Courses

Introduction to Medieval Studies - 13755 - MI 60001 - 01
Thomas F. X. Noble
5:00 pm - 5:50 pm M

A one-credit-hour course designed to introduce students to the basic bibliographies, handbooks, and research tools in medieval studies. Professors from various disciplines will participate.

Introduction to Christian Latin - 14904 - MI 60003 - 01
Martin W. Bloomer
11:45 am - 1:00 pm MW

This course has two goals: to improve the student's all-around facility in dealing with Latin texts and to introduce the student to the varieties of Christian Latin texts and basic resources that aid in their study. Exposure to texts will be provided through common readings that will advance in the course of the semester from the less to the more demanding and will include Latin versions of Scripture, exegesis, homiletic, texts dealing with religious life, formal theological texts, and Christian Latin poetry. Philological study of these texts will be supplemented by regular exercises in Latin composition.

Introduction to Old English - 13759 - MI 60110 - 01
Katherine O'Brien O'Keeffe
9:30 am - 10:45 am TR

Training in reading the Old English language, and study of the literature written in Old English.

The Vercilli Book - 18436 - MI 60121 - 01
Tom Hall
5:00 pm - 6:15 pm TR

Close analysis of the anthology known as the Vercelli Book, including the "The Dream of the Rood" and two poems ascribed to Cynewulf, "The Fates of the Apostles" and "Elene".

Canterbury Tales - 18271 - MI 60142 - 01
Dolores W. Frese
12:30 pm - 1:45 pm TR

A study of the Canterbury Tales read in the original middle English. Chaucer's comic genius will shape the approach to the text, which has been carefully constituted by its author as a virtual anthology of medieval fictional forms-everything from bawdy stories to saints' lives engaged Chaucer's most mature imaginative energies in this, his last great work. The class will work its way toward an appreciation of the kaleidoscopic subtleties involved in his poetic shaping of this wide, deep, and humanely envisioned text-world.

Introduction to Middle English Manuscript Studies: Authors, Scribes & Readers - 18268 - MI 60199 - 01
Kathryn E. Kerby-Fulton
3:00 pm - 5:30 pm W

An examination of the culture of the book in late Medieval England.

Founders of the Middle Ages - 17611 - MI 60322 - 01
Stephen E. Gersh
12:30 pm - 1:45 pm TR

One of the difficulties of studying medieval philosophy arises from the need to read, along with the medieval philosophers themselves, the various ancient sources on which they depend. Everybody knows that Plato and Aristotle enjoy a special status among these sources. It is also widely known that the philosophy of these Greek writers was transmitted to the medieval world through certain less well-known writers of late antiquity who sometimes overwhelmed what they were transmitting with their own thoughts and commentaries. This course is aimed at introducing the student to the three most important of these late ancient intermediaries: Augustine, Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite, and Boethius. In the first half of the semester we will learn something of these writers themselves by reading some of Augustine's early dialogues, extracts from the Dionysian corpus, and Boethius' Consolation of Philosophy and theological tractates. After the mid-semester break, the focus will shift to the medieval readings of these works: for example, in Eriugena, Anselm of Canterbury, Thierry of Chartres, Albert the Great, Meister Eckhart, and Nicholas of Cusa. Language requirement: Latin desirable but not necessary. Written requirement: one final essay (20 pp).

Deconstruction and Exegesis - 17613 - MI 60362 - 01
Stephen E. Gersh
TR 02:00-03:15

The aim of this course will be to compare and contrast what one might loosely term ancient (medieval, early modern) and post-modern approaches to the reading of texts, following the twin approaches of theoretical exposition and practical application (neither of which can be sustained without the intervention of the other). It will be necessary to rely on concrete examples of the ancient and contemporary methods. The examples in the first half of the semester will be Augustine's On Christian Teaching and Literal Interpretation of Genesis and Derrida's Of Grammatology, Writing and Difference, and Dissemination. This double reading will put us in a position to take as our examples Augustine's Confessions and Derrida's Circonfession in the second half of the semester. Certain questions--which can sometimes but not always be answered in the conventional sense--will persist during our readings. These will include: What is philosophy? What is literature? What is the relation between philosophy and exegesis? What is the relation between literature and exegesis? What is the relation between philosophy and literature? Language requirement: Latin and/or French desirable but not necessary. Written requirement: one final essay (20 pages) either a) on one of the texts or authors studied in the course, or b) applying the methodologies discussed to another philosophical or literary text of your choice.

History of the Philosophy of Science to 1750 - 17989 - MI 60366 - 01
Lynn S. Joy
9:30 am - 10:45 am TR

This seminar begins by examining four conceptions of science: those of Plato, Aristotle, Epicurus, and Chrysippus. It then considers how the natural philosophies developed by their ancient traditions were transformed by medieval and modern thinkers, who significantly revised the goals of previous scientific inquiry. Among the moderns, we will focus on Descartes, Boyle, and Newton.

Jews & Christians thru History - 15190 - MI 60410 - 01
Michael A. Signer
3:30 pm - 4:45 pm TR

In the closing days of the II Vatican Council Nostra Aetate (Declaration on non-Christian Religions) reversed a negative attitude of the Catholic Church toward Judaism and the Jewish people. This remarkable change promoted "dialogue" with Jews, and positive changes in the ways in which Judaism was presented in Liturgy and Catechesis. Reactions from the Jewish communities were diverse: from rejection to welcoming. This course will explore a number of issues which emerge from the history of Christian thought and theology: How did a negative image of Judaism develop within Christianity? In what ways did these unfavorable teachings contribute toward violence against the Jews? What is the relationship between Christian anti-Jewish teachings and Antisemitism? Is there any correspondence to Christian hostility within Judaism? In what ways have Jewish authors reacted to Christian tradition? We shall also want to construct a more positive theology for the future. How can Jews and Christians develop religious responses to modernity? In what senses can a study of Judaism by Christians, or Christianity by Jews, help either community to understand itself better? How can Christians and Jews develop a theology of "the other" which is not triumphalist,

Eucharist in High Medieval Religion - 18480 - MI 60466 - 01
Joseph P. Wawrykow
1:30 pm - 2:45 pm MW

The eucharist stands at the heart of western European Christianity in the high middle ages. The insistence of church officials on regular reception of the eucharist; the numerous scholastic treatments of the theoretical issues associated with the eucharist; the recourse by spiritual authors, especially women, to the eucharist to express their most profound religious and devotional insights; the pointed reference to the Christ eucharistically-present to establish Christian identity and to distinguish the members of Christ from others, both within and outside of western Europe; the development of new rituals focused on aspects of the eucharist; the burgeoning of artistic representations of eucharistic themes-all testify to the centrality of the eucharist in medieval theological and religious consciousness. Through the close reading of representative texts by a wide variety of 13th-century authors, and, the study of the different kinds of 'eucharistic' art, this course examines the uses made of the eucharist by a broad spectrum of high medieval Christians. A special concern of the course is the relation between eucharistic doctrine and religious practice-to what extent have teachings about transubstantiation and real presence shaped religious expression? How has religious experience itself occasioned the refinement of these doctrines?

Women Mystics in the Monastic Tradition - 18411 - MI 60480 - 01
TBA
9:35 am - 12:35 pm F

The mystical experience of monastic women during the High Middle Ages has often been characterized as visionary, affective, and Eucharistic (as opposed to imageless, intellectual, and scriptural)-a characterization that has served to separate widely the mysticism of these women from their male counterparts (e.g., Bernard of Clairvaux, Meister Eckhart). More recent studies of the lectio divina and the art of memory (Mary Carruthers), of convent artwork (Jeffrey Hamburger), on religious imagination and visualization (Barbara Newman, Margaret Miles), and on the philosophical relationship between the icon and the Eucharist (Jean-Luc Marion) encourages a new reading of the writings of monastic women mystics to find in them the expression of a powerful synthesis of scriptural meditation and Eucharistic reception.

Mysticism and Morality - 18476 - MI 60481 - 01
David A. Clairmont
3:00 pm - 4:15 pm MW

Is mysticism (variously described as the presence of God, a direct experience of God, a consciousness of God, or pure love of God) the culmination of the moral life or its true beginning? To what extent should our moral decisions be guided by our personal experiences of the divine? Given the frequent appeals that thoughtful Christians make to the judgments of conscience, how if at all can we distinguish between the true voice of God in the human heart and self-consoling delusion? Are those who claim to have had, and write sweetly about, an "experience" of God real guides to be trusted by the Christian community or are they dangerous spiritual individualists who threaten the coherent moral witness of the Church? How, if at all, are we to reconcile the teachings of Christian mystical writers with the sacramental life of the Church and the cultivation of Christian virtue? Is a life of intense asceticism, or even an explicitly Christian faith, necessary for mystical knowledge? We will examine these and other questions in the four parts of the course: (1) Maps of the Soul (through a comparison of Augustine's Confessions and Teresa of Avila's Interior Castle), (2) Reasons of the Soul (through a comparison of Bonaventure's Journey of the Mind into God and Marguerite Porete's Mirror of Simple Souls), (3) Loves of the Soul (through a comparison of Catherine of Siena's Dialogue and Ignatius of Loyola's Spiritual Exercises, and (4) Questions of the Soul (through a comparison of Simone Weil's Waiting for God and The Dark Night of the Soul by John of the Cross). Course requirements include two class presentations and a final paper comparing two of the authors examined during the semester.

Lyric and Narrative in Medieval French Literature - 18192 - MI 60535 - 01
Maureen B. Boulton
3:30 pm - 6:15 pm W

A study of narrative transformations of the themes of the courtly lyric in the 13th and 14th centuries.

Imitation and Intertexuality in the Renaissance - 18193 - MI 60539 - 01
Jo Ann Della Neva
3:30 pm - 6:00 pm M

This course will survey a variety of texts (originally written in Latin, Italian or French) on the question of imitation in the Renaissance. Additionally, we will read a number of modern critics who have discussed Renaissance imitative practices as well as modern theorists who have touched on the notions of intertextuality and influence in fields beyond the Renaissance. Students will be encouraged to develop their own personal project on imitative theory and practice in the literature of the language they study. Taught in English.

Dante I - 15551 - MI 60552 - 01
Chiara Sbordoni
3:00 pm - 4:15 pm MW

Many have considered Dante's Comedy to be the greatest poetic achievement in Western literature. It is also perhaps the most perfect synthesis of medieval culture, and the most powerful expression of what even today remains the foundation of the Catholic understanding of human nature, the world, and God. This course is an in-depth study, over two semesters, of the entire Comedy, in its historical, philosophical, and literary context, with selected readings from the minor works (e.g., Vita Nuova, Convivio, De vulgari eloquentia). Lectures and discussion will be in English; the text will be read in the original, but all who can follow with the help of a facing-page translation are welcome.

Dante: Poet and Intellectual - 18194 - MI 60560 - 01
TBA
3:30 pm - 6:00 pm T

A close analysis of the works of Dante.

Medieval German Literature - 15402 - MI 60680 - 01
Albert K. Wimmer
3:00 pm - 4:15 pm MW

This course constitutes a survey of German literature from its beginnings during Germanic times until the 16th century. Ideas, issues and topics are discussed in such a way that their continuity can be seen throughout the centuries. Lectures and discussions are in German, but individual students' language abilities are taken into consideration. Readings include modern German selections from major medieval authors and works such as Hildebrandslied, Rolandslied, Nibelungenlied, Iwein, Parzival, Tristan, courtly lyric poetry, the German mystics, secular and religious medieval drama, Der Ackermann aus B?hmen, and the beast epic Reineke Fuchs. Class discussions and brief presentations in German by students on the selections are intended as an opportunity for stimulating exchange and formal use of German.

Late Antique/Early Christian Art - 18111 - MI 60720 - 01
Charles E. Barber
12:30 pm - 1:45 pm TR

Art in Late Antiquity has traditionally been characterized as an art in decline, but this judgment is relative, relying on standards formulated for art of other periods. Challenging this assumption, we will examine the distinct and powerful transformations within the visual culture of the period between the third and sixth centuries AD. This period witnesses the mutation of the institutions of the Roman Empire into those of the Christian Byzantine Empire. Parallel to these social changes we can identify the emergence of a Christian art that defines our basic assumptions about the role of art in a Christian society. The fundamental change in religious identity that was the basis for this development had a direct impact upon the visual material that survives from this period. This course examines the underlying conditions that made images so central to cultural identity at this period.

Gothic Art - 18117 - MI 60724 - 01
Danielle B. Joyner
10:40 am - 11:30 am MWF

This course studies Gothic monuments -- who commissioned and made them and how they functioned for different audiences. Among others we consider the following questions: what motives fueled large architectural enterprises? What was their cultural, political, and social significance to women and men, to the laity and clergy, and to viewers from different social classes? How did imagery convey complex theological messages to this varied audience? How did architectural or public images differ from the portable private works of art which became increasingly popular in the late Gothic period?

15th-Century Italian Renaissance Art - 18119 - MI 60725 - 01
Charles M. Rosenberg
11:00 am - 12:15 pm TR

This course traces the development of painting in Northern Europe (France, Germany, and Flanders) from approximately 1300 to 1500. Special attention is given to the art of Jan Van Eyck, Rogier van der Weyden, Heironymous Bosch, and Albrecht Dürer. Through the consideration of the history of manuscript and oil painting and the graphic media, students will be introduced to the special wedding of nature, art, and spirituality that defines the achievement of the Northern Renaissance.

Virtue and Politics - 18439 - MI 60805 - 01
Mary M. Keys
12:15 pm - 2:45 pm M

This course examines the interrelationship between ethics and politics through the conceptual lens of the virtues and vices. Each semester in which this course is offered the focus will be on a particular virtuie or set of virtues as well as on specific classic texts and contemporary works in political theory and related disciplines such as philosophy, theology, literature, and history. Students will be expected to participate regularly and well in seminar discussions, to give at least one oral presentation, and to write a final paper.

Proseminar: High Middle Ages - 18403 - MI 63202 - 01
John H. Van Engen
6:30 pm - 9:00 pm T

This course is designed to introduce students to major topics under discussion in the history of the high and later middle ages, roughly the years 1100-1400. Among the topics to be treated, with the historians now at work on them, are: law, government and literacy; the church as an institutional and cultural force; social class and mobility as economic realities and cultural images; the university in society and culture; and the cultivation of the human person in literary sensibility and religious devotion. Most of the course will consist of intensive secondary readings, with regular written reports, occasional primary readings, and a major bibliographical paper at the end.

The Scientific Revolution - 17994 - MI 63284 - 01
Robert D. Goulding
9:00 am - 11:30 am W

In this course we explore the complicated relationship between the European universities of the fifteenth to seventeenth centuries and the rise of new natural philosophies, technologies and experimental practices in the same period. We will examine such subjects as: natural philosophy and natural history; the use of mathematics as an explanatory tool; astronomy and optics; classical scholarship and natural knowledge. In all these areas, revolutionary changes occurred over the period we are studying. As well as familiarizing ourselves with the standard literature on these "revolutions," we shall, in each case, explore the contested role of the universities, principally Oxford, Cambridge and Paris, but also the German and Northern Italian schools. Our goal is to understand the creative tension between the practitioners, crasftsmen and philosophers, on whom historians of the "Scientific Revolution" traditionally focus, and the institutions of higher learning in their midst.

Evagrius Ponticus: Monastic Philosopher - 18479 - MI 63422 - 01
Robin Darling Young
9:00 am - 11:30 am M

A student of Gregory Nazianzus and participant in the ecumenical council of 381 (Constantinople), Evagrius was a brilliant thinker, scriptural interpreter and practitioner of philosophical therapeia. He left the city for self-imposed exile, first to Jerusalem, gaining the company of the learned monastics Melania and Rufinus, then to the Nile delta where he absorbed the traditions of intellectual monastics such as Macarius the Great and Macarius the Egyptian. There he became a teacher of the philosophy and practical exercises of Christian monasticism, giving oral instruction and writing "sentences," exegetical works, letters and treatises that both limn a comprehensive account of the world, the human being and the relationship of both to metaphysics. The seminar will attend both to the "spiritual exercises" of Evagrius and to his interpretive philosophy as found in, e.g., the letter Ad Melaniam and the Kephalaia Gnostika.

Seminar: Topics in Medieval Art - 18123 - MI 63750 - 01
Danielle B. Joyner
3:00 pm - 4:15 pm MW

The subject of this seminar will vary from year to year. The Fall 2007 edition is: "Visualizing Time in the Middle Ages" What is time? Does it exist? When did it begin? Will it end? What happens then? These and other questions form the heart of medieval discussions about time. Over the course of 1000 years, many definitions of time competed against each other, and a vast and complex tradition of medieval images and objects grappled with this open-ended topic. This class will undertake a multi-media exploration of how time was considered, measured, manipulated and represented in the Middle Ages. To provide the interdisciplinary approach necessary for this topic, primary sources in translation along with literary, theological and historical studies will supplement the medieval and art historical scholarship.

MI 66020 Directed Readings (for Graduate Students)
Various Instructors
By arrangement

Offers graduate students a possibility, normally in their second or third year, to work closely with a professor in preparing a topic mutually agreed upon. Student and professor must sign a form that records the readings.

MI 67001 2nd-Year Research Tutorial I
Various Instructors
By arrangement

An intensive program of reading in primary sources (preponderantly in the original language) and scholarly literature with a view to identifying a worthwhile, original research project, for completion in the following semester,

77001 Field Examination Preparation
Thomas Noble
By arrangement

Offers students a possibility, normally in their second or third year, to work closely with a professor in preparing for one of their field examinations.

77002 Dissertation Proposal Preparation
Various instructors
By arrangement

Offers students the opportunity to work with their adviser in preparing their dissertation proposal.

88001 Research and Dissertation
Various instructors
By arrangement

Independent research and writing on an approved subject under the direction of a faculty member.

88002 Nonresident Dissertation Research
Various instructors
By arrangement

Required of nonresident graduate students who are completing their theses in absentia and who wish to retain their degree status.