Spring 2008 Undergraduate 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

Spring 2008: Undergraduate Courses

MI 20001--The World of the Middle Ages
M W 1:55 - 2:45 pm
Thomas F. X. Noble

The Middle Ages have been praised and reviled, romanticized and fantasized. The spectacular popularity of Harry Potter, The Lord of the Rings, and Narnia have brought a revival of interest in and curiosity about the Middle Ages. But what were they like, these ten centuries between Rome and the Renaissance? In this course, we will explore major themes and issues in medieval civilization in an attempt to offer some basic answers to that question. We will have in view three kinds of people: rulers, lovers, and believers. But we will also study carefully those who wrote about those kinds of people. We will constantly ask how can we know about the Middle Ages, and what kinds of things can we know? We will consider major literary texts as both works of art and historical documents. We will explore various kinds of religious literature. We will try to understand the limits, boundaries, and achievements of philosophy and theology. Some lectures will incorporate medieval art so as to add a visual dimension to our explorations. This course will constitute an extended introduction to the dynamic and fascinating world of the Middle Ages.

MI 20183--The Devil in Literature
M W F 10:40 - 11:30 am
Julianne Bruneau

We will read Biblical, medieval, Renaissance and modern representations of the devil in story, verse, and drama to determine why a figure so little mentioned in the Bible became so popular in literature. We will explore how the devil is a useful or a problematic antagonist and what a culture gains or loses by fictionalizing him. Course requirements include regular attendance and participation, ten short papers, two examinations, an oral presentation, and one final essay.

MI 20184--Apocalyptic Literature
M W F 1:55 - 2:45 pm
Matthew Brown

A historical survey of Christian apocalyptic literature, from the medieval to the modern periods.

MI 20185--Arthurian Literature
T R 11:00 - 12:15 pm
Misty Schieberle

Knights, Lovers, Ladies, and Hags: Arthurian Literature and Identity

What character traits define King Arthur and his knights? How does one choose between the competing obligations that make up his identity as a lover, fighter, Briton, and Christian? This course examines the way that medieval identity is constructed in Arthurian literature. We will consider national identity, gender identity, class identity, and religious vs. secular identity. Questions driving the course will include what types of identity are possible for characters to adopt, how different types of identity and relationships to others are represented in Arthurian narratives, how social obligations compete with personal desires, and how the author may express social critique through representations of characters‚ struggles to define themselves. A major goal of the class is to consider how and to what end identity is constituted in Arthurian literature.

Requirements: Regular attendance and active participation in class discussion, a mid-term exam, a final exam, weekly journal entries, and five 3-page papers over the course of the semester. To make the course accessible to modern readers we will read medieval texts in translation and also follow Arthurian literature into modern English and American reinterpretations of the legends.

MI 20485--Encounters with the Sacred Word
T R 5:00 - 6:15P
Andrew Irving

If theology rests on the written Word of God (Dei Verbum 24), for Christians the primary site of encounter with the Sacred Word is not in the library, but in the worshipping Church. That is to say that in an important way Christian theology, and indeed tradition is founded upon the event of proclaiming and hearing the Scriptures in the context of worship. In this course we shall explore the theology and practice of the use of the Sacred Scriptures in Roman Catholic liturgy, by studying the historical roots (including patristic and medieval) of the practice known in contemporary liturgy. As with any human event, a number of simple questions may be posed of this encounter. What do we need in order to read the sacred Scriptures in Church? How do we read them? In what way is time of significance for the reading and the hearing of the sacred Word? Who is competent to read and to hear? Where is the Word to be read? And throughout the course we shall ask: what is the theological significance of this practice? The study of typology, the material culture of the sacred text, liturgical lectionaries and rubrics, homiletic practice, and sacramental theologies of the Word will lend us skills in answering these questions.

MI 20609--Reading and Writing Latin Prose
T R 12:30 - 1:45 pm
David Ladouceur

This second-year language course continues the review of grammar begun in CLLA 20003 and introduces students to stylistic analysis through close readings of Latin prose authors such as Cicero and the younger Pliny. A special feature of the course is that students learn to write classical Latin for themselves.

MI 28179--Celtic Heroic Literature
M W F 11:45 - 12:35 pm
Hugh Fogarty

An exciting introduction to Celtic literature and culture, this course introduces the thrilling sagas, breathtaking legends and prose tales of Ireland and Wales. Readings include battles, heroic deeds, feats of strength and daring and dilemmas faced by the warrior heroes of the Celts. Celtic Heroic Literature, which requires no previous knowledge of Irish or Welsh, studies the ideology, belief system and concerns of the ancient Celtic peoples as revealed in their saga literature. By examining the hero's function in society, students investigate the ideological concerns of a society undergoing profound social transformation and religious conversion to Christianity and the hero's role as a conduit for emotional and social distress. Among the heroes to be studied in depth are: Cu Chulainn, Lug, St. Patrick, and the king-heroes. Wisdom literature, archeological, and historical evidence will also be considered in this course. No prior knowledge of Irish required. All texts provided in English.

MI 20700--Introduction to Medieval Art
T R 12:30 - 1:45 pm
Danielle Joyner

This course will provide an introduction to the visual arts of the period ca. 300 CE to ca. 1400 CE. In the course of the semester we shall devote much time to considering the possibility of a history of Medieval Art, as the objects and practices of the Middle Ages will be shown to problematize our assumptions about the nature of art history. Working from individual objects and texts we will construct a series of narratives that will attend to the varieties of artistic practices available to the Middle Ages. From these it will be shown that art was a vital, complex, lucid and formative element in the societies and cultures, both secular and sacred, which shaped this period.

MI 20703--Introduction to Early Christian and Byzantine Art
M W 1:30 - 2:45 pm
Charles Barber

This course will introduce students to the visual arts of the period ca. AD 200 to ca. AD 1600. Our work will take us from the first fashioning of an identifiable Christian art through to the remarkable poetics of Late Byzantine painting. In so doing, the student will be introduced to the full array of issues that arise around the question of there being a Christian art. Working from individual objects and texts, we will construct a variety of narratives that will reveal a vital, complex, and rich culture that, in a continuing tradition, has done so much to shape the visual imagination of Christianity.

MI 22001--The World of the Middle Ages: Tutorial
Friday, various times
Various instructors

Discussion section accompanying MI 20001.

MI 30210--Late Antiquity
M W F 10:40 - 11:30 am
Thomas F. X. Noble

This course will explore the transformation of the Roman World from about 300 to 600 AD. We will ask: was the "fall" of the Roman Empire a civilizational catastrophe? Or was it a slow, messy process blending continuity and change? Or was Late Antiquity itself a dynamic and creative period? Our emphasis will fall on: The changing shape of Roman public life; the barbarians and their relations with Rome; the emergence of the Catholic Church; the triumph of Christian culture; literature, art, and architecture in the late imperial world. There will be a mid-term and a final. Students will write either one term paper or a series of shorter papers. Readings will emphasize primary sources.

MI 30231 Medieval Spain: Land of Three Religions
T R 9:30 - 10:45
Olivia Remie Constable

This lecture course will cover the history of medieval Spain from the Visigothic period (6th to the 7th centuries) until the time of Ferdinand and Isabella (15th century). The main focus of the course will be the interaction (both congenial and confrontational) of the three religious groups resident in the Iberian Peninsula: Christians, Jews, and Muslims. The course will proceed roughly chronologically, with pauses to consider particular topics in social, intellectual, and economic history. Interspersed with lectures, discussion sessions will concentrate on close readings of primary texts and consideration of some of the historiographical problems peculiar to Spanish history. There will be several short papers, a midterm, and a final exam.

MI 30234--Late Medieval and Early Modern Ireland
T R 2:00 - 3:15 pm
Rory Rapple

This course offers new perspectives on the struggle for mastery in Ireland from 1470 to 1660. Though keeping in mind the traditional view of the "English reconquest" (decades of rebellion, dispossession, and plantation until, in the aftermath of Cromwell, all Ireland was finally subjected to English rule) this course will take a different approach. By investigating a range of primary sources from the period, students will explore the interactions between the three different models of conquest: (1) descendants of the old Norman colonists (e.g., Fitzgeralds and Butlers) seeking to finish the job; (2) Tudor reform (inspired by Renaissance optimism), by which the English attempted to establish rule by means of legal, social, and cultural assimilation; and (3) unabashed exploitation by English private entrepreneurs on the make. The most important effect of these "contending conquests" was the way they shaped the diverse responses of the native Irish, ranging from accommodation and assimilation to outright rebellion and national war.

MI 30235--Medieval Middle East
T R 11:00 - 12:15 pm
Paul Cobb

This course offers a survey of Middle Eastern history from the rise of Islam in the seventh century CE until the rise of Mongol successor polities in the fifteenth century. The course is structured to cover political and cultural developments and their relationship with broader changes in society during the formative centuries of Islamic civilization. Specific topics include: the career of the Prophet Muhammad and the origins of the earliest Muslim polity; the creation and breakup of the Islamic unitary state (the Caliphate); the impact of Turkish migrations on the Middle East; social practices surrounding the transmission of learning in the Middle Ages; the diversity of approaches to Muslim piety and their social and political expression; popular culture; non-Muslims in Islamic society; the creation of the medieval Islamic "international" cultural order. Among the more important themes will be long-term cultural and social continuities with the Islamic and ancient Near East, and concepts of religious and political authority.

MI 30287--The Catholic Reformation
M W 9:35 - 10:25 am
Brad Gregory

This course will examine some of the main historical realities, theological developments, and traditions of spirituality within Roman Catholicism c. 1450-c. 1700, the period of Catholic reform both before and after the emergence of the Protestant Reformation. The class format will be two lectures plus one discussion-based tutorial section per week, the latter based on the reading of primary sources in translation. Major topics to be discussed include the character of the late medieval church and reforming efforts within it (e.g., the Observantine movement, Christian humanism); Roman Catholic response to the Protestant Reformation, including the Roman Inquisition; the revival of existing and emergence of new religious orders (especially the Society of Jesus); the Council of Trent and its implementation among the clergy and laity; Catholic missionary activity in Asia and the Americas; post-Tridentine Catholic art and scholarship; the relationship between the Church and European states in the 16th and 17th centuries; Jansenism; and the flowering of Catholic spirituality in the 17th century.

MI 30301 01 Ancient & Medieval Philosophy
T R 5:00 - 6:15 pm
Stephen Dumont

MI 30301 02 Ancient & Medieval Philosophy
M W 1:30 - 2:45 am
Alfred Freddoso

This course will concentrate on major figures and persistent themes. A balance will be sought between scope and depth, the latter ensured by a close reading of selected texts.

MI 30404--Christianity in the Middle East
T R 3:30 - 4:45 pm
Joseph Amar

The spread of Christianity from Palestine to the West is well-documented. Less well-known is the development of Christianity in the lands of its origin, the Middle East. This course introduces students to the largely untold story of Christianity that expresses itself in the native Aramaic language and culture of the Semitic East. Topics include: The origins of the indigenous Christian churches of Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, Armenia, Iraq, and Iran; The development of these traditions will be viewed in relation to western/European forms of Christianity that have come to dominate and that are viewed as "mainstream" and "normative." The course concludes with an assessment of the impact of religious "fundamentalisms," the diaspora of Middle Eastern Christians throughout Europe and the United States, and the contemporary state of Christianity in the Middle East.

MI 30477--Reading the Qur'an
M W 11:45 - 1:00 pm
Gabriel Reynolds

To Muslims the Qur'an is the uncreated, eternal Word of God. As Jesus Christ is to Christians, the Qur'an to Muslims is the fullest expression of God's mercy and concern for humanity. It is both the source of complete spiritual wisdom and the constitution for a more perfect society. In the present course we will encounter this revered text with the following goals: To examine the history of the Qur'an's composition and reception; to explore the major themes of the Qur'an; to discuss new theories on and debates over the Qur'an, and, finally, to research the Qur'an's statements on issues of contemporary interest, especially sex, politics and war.

MI 30500--Survey of Spanish Literature I
T R 11:00 - 12:15 pm
Encarnacion Juarez-Almendros

A survey of Spanish literature through 1700. Readings of selected texts in prose, poetry, and theater from the medieval, Renaissance, and baroque periods.

MI 30530--Survey of French Literature I
M W 3:00 - 4:15 am
Jo Ann Della Neva

Reading of selections and complete works of outstanding French authors from major genres and periods. Students are expected to have already taken ROFR 30310.

MI 30610--Latin History-Writing
T R 2:00 - 3:15 pm
Sabine MacCormack

This third-year course builds on CLLA 20003 and CLLA 20004, and offers close reading of passages from the works of the historical writers Caesar and Sallust. Latin historiography is a sophisticated instrument for narrating past events, for showing how notions of cause and effect and change over time develop in historical thinking, and for indicating the relevance of the past to the present. The political and social conditions of Rome that informed the writings of Caesar and Sallust are discussed, and the compositional techniques of their works are examined. The course prepares students for advanced offerings in Latin literature, especially CLLA 40022, CLLA 40032, and CLLA 40052.

MI 30726--Northern Renaissance Art
T R 9:30 - 10:45 am
Charles Rosenberg

Open to all students. 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, Roger van der Weyden, Hieronymous Bosch, and Albrecht Durer. 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.

MI 30758--Kingdom, Empire, and Devotion: Art in Anglo-Saxon, Ottonian, and Romanesque Europe
T R 3:30 - 4:45 pm
Danielle Joyner

Although the Anglo-Saxon Kingdom and Ottonian Empire overlap in time during the 10th and 11th centuries, the images and objects produced by both cultures manifest the different political, social, and religious identities being deliberately constructed. By the mid-11th century, the Normans had invaded England, the Salian emperors had succeeded the Ottonians, and European art is more cohesively and problematically labeled as Romanesque. This class will examine Anglo-Saxon and Ottonian art as individual visual traditions and trace their impact on images, objects, and monuments of the more loosely defined Romanesque era.

MI 40028--Introduction to Meister Eckhart
T R 12:30 - 1:45 pm
Stephen Gersh

This course will attempt to introduce Eckhart's thought by reading a selection of his most important Latin works. This close textual study will demonstrate the extent to which Eckhart presents a possibly unique combination of extreme technical exactitude and exegetical flexibility and how, thanks to these skills he is able to develop a radically Neoplatonic (Dionysian) philosophy within the context of Augustinian readings and a methodology responsive to the demands of the Aristotelian or Scholastic traditions. Selections will be from works including the Exposition of Genesis, the Book of the Parables of Genesis, the Exposition of John, the Parisian Questions, the Prologue to the Tripartite Work, and the Prologue to the Work of Propositions. Although the works to be selected for study are available at least in German and sometimes also in French or English translations, a reading of knowledge of Latin is essential for this course. Requirements: regular translation exercises (written and oral) and one short oral presentation.

MI 40102--History of English Language
T R 3:30 - 4:45 pm
Thomas N. Hall

This course is designed to introduce students to the historical development of the English language, from its earliest recorded appearance to its current state as a world language.

MI 40142--The Canterbury Tales
T R 9:30 - 10:45 am
Dolores Frese

The Canterbury Tales are read in the original Middle English, with the twin goals of obtaining a deepened knowledge of the text-world contained within it along with how applications of contemporary critical practices can be used to produce new insights into the work.

MI 40180--Medieval Drama
T R 12:30 - 1:45 pm
Katherine Zieman

This class will exercise literary, theatrical, and religious imagination through readings, critical writing, discussion, and enactments of medieval dramatic texts. There also will be occasional viewings of filmed contemporary presentations of medieval plays. The goal of our individual and collective work aims at a deeper understanding and appreciation of what it was that medieval people meant to do when they "played" salvation history-altering, embellishing, at times "modernizing" and sometimes "deforming" the text of sacred scripture on which these pre-Renaissance dramas were based. In the course of the semester we will attend closely to the gradual, intricate movement from sacred liturgies to secular comedies, with special attention given to the relation of actors and audiences. In so doing, we will also observe and assess - theatrically and theologically - how the comic drama of everyday events and concerns has been subtly connected to the events of salvation history. We will also try to decide whether the development of farce, ribaldry, melodrama, and realism were a logical outgrowth of, or a deviation from, the original sacred traditions. All members of the class will take their occasional turn as producers and performers. In addition to periodic short written assignments of one to two pages, each student will submit a version of production notes and observations generated by the experience of serving as producer and/or actor in an extended scene or entire short drama. Everyone, including the teacher, will read with an open notebook: this informal reading journal will record ideas, thoughts, difficulties, insights, questions, frustrations, and illuminations that will serve simultaneously as a sourcebook for the papers and productions.

MI 40367--Medieval and Renaissance Platonism
T R 11:00 - 12:15 pm
Stephen Gersh

The course aims to study the transition between medieval and Renaissance philosophy with special reference to the Platonic tradition. In order to achieve this aim, we will focus on a small group of central figures and study some of their works in detail. Texts to be studied in whole or part will include Nicholas of Cusa: On Learned Ignorance, On the Beryl, On the Vision of God, Marsilio Ficino: Platonic Theology, On Love, On Plato's Phaedrus, and Giovanni Pico della Mirandola, On the Dignity of Man, On Being and Unity, Heptaplus. We will study not only the general question of the impact of Humanism on the scholastic method of the Middle Ages but also such more specific questions as the expansion of the "Platonic" corpus and the new viewpoints on the history of philosophy. Knowledge of Latin will be helpful but not essential (since all the above texts are available in English). Written requirement: one final paper of ca. 20 pp.

MI 40532--From Roland to the Holy Grail
T R 2:00 - 3:15 pm
Maureen Boulton

This is a survey of medieval French literature from 1100 to 1300, including the epic, the romance, drama, and poetry.

MI 40540--Renaissance Woman
M W 1:30 - 2:45 pm
Jo Ann Della Neva

This course is designed as an introduction to the study of women and literature of the Renaissance period in Europe. It considers the image of women in the writings of male authors as well as the work of female authors.

MI 40553--Dante II
T R 12:30 - 1:45 pm
Christian Moevs

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 in English; the text will be read in the original with facing-page translation. Students may take one semester or both, in either order.

MI 40561--Amor Infelici
T R 2:00 - 3:15 pm
Chiara Sbordoni

Conducted in Italian, this course explores various representations of unhappy and happy love in Medieval and Renaissance Italian literature, as they were shaped by six of the major Italian authors of those times, through a selection of texts of different genres: lyric poetry, short narrative, chivalrous epic, pastoral drama. The first part of the course will focus on stilnovistic poetic experiences in the late Duecento, Cavalcanti's destructive love and Dante's Vita Nuova and Rime, and on its ripest fruits: Boccaccio's realistic paintings of happy and unhappy loves in days fourth and fifth of the Decameron, and Petrarch's tireless identification of love and poetry in his Canzoniere. The second part, focused on Quattrocento Florence and central Italy, will present texts by Poliziano, Lorenzo de' Medici and Boiardo. The third part will concentrate on the Cinquecento: Michelangelo's Rime, Ariosto's Orlando Furioso, Tasso's Aminta. The discussion of the texts will be accompanied by forays into visual arts (painting and sculpture) and music.

MI 40632--Medieval Latin Survey
M W 1:30 - 2:45 pm
W. Martin Bloomer

This survey of medieval Latin texts emphasizes literary texts, but some attention will be given to more technical writing as well.

MI 43001--Seminar: The Pearl Poet
T R 12:30 - 1:45 pm
Dolores Frese

Close readings of the Arthurian romance of Gawain, Patience (the whimsical, pre-Pinnochio-and-Gepetto paraphrase of the story of Jonah and the whale), Cleanness (a series of homiletic reflections of great power, beauty, grim wit, and compassionate insight centered on varying conceptions of "purity"), and Pearl (the elegiac dream-vision that begins with the mourning father who has lost a young daughter, then moves with amazing grace from the garden where he grieves into a richly envisioned earthly paradise where he is astonished to re-encounter his lost "Pearl," who then leads him to the vision of a New Jerusalem whose post-apocalyptic landscape is populated exclusively by throngs of beautiful maidens).

MI 43342--Aquinas on Creation
M W 3:00 - 4:15 pm
Alfred Freddoso

An exploration of the central metaphysical questions involved in the claim that God creates the entities in the world ex nihilo, along with an examination of hermeneutical questions involved in the interpretation of Genesis 1. The main texts for the course will be the treatment of creation and of the work of the six days found in St. Thomas's Summa Theologiae, supplemented by the treatment of creation in Francisco Suarez's Disputationes Metaphysicae.

MI 43759--Seminar: Early Christian and Byzantine Art
M W 11:45 - 1:00 am
Charles Barber

The formation of Early Christian art has long dominated our discussions of the European art produced between ca. 200 and ca. 700 CE. This seminar will, however, explore the art of the existing pagan culture of this era and will consider its fate in the face of the expansive presence of Christianity. In particular, we will consider our assumptions regarding the implications of a change from religious to cultural significance for the material culture of late paganism. Topics to be considered will include: mythological sarcophagi and pagan burial; statues of the gods and the birth of the museum; domestic and divine portraits; silver and myth; illuminating the classics; neoplatonic aesthetics; erotica; Constantine's religion.

MI 46020--Directed Readings-Undergraduate
TBA
Various instructors

Offers advanced undergraduate students a possibility to work closely with a professor in preparing a topic mutually agreed upon.

MI 50783--Vocal Sacred Music I
T R 2:00 - 3:15 pm
Alexander Blachly

Vocal Sacred Music I is devoted primarily to Gregorian Chant, with somestudy toward the end of the semester of medieval polyphonic works basedon chant. The course will cover matters of liturgy, performance practice,musical forms, notation, and sources.

MI 58002--Senior Honors Thesis II-Writing
TBD
Various instructors

This course is part of a two-semester sequence open only to seniors in the Medieval Studies honors program who have completed MI 58001 successfully. Guided by a faculty adviser, students will use the research completed in the fall to write drafts and a final version of their senior honors thesis. Specific deadlines and requirements for the written stages of the thesis are available from the Director of Undergraduate Studies.