CALL FOR PAPERS
2023 AUSTRALIAN EARLY MEDIEVAL ASSOCIATION
THE NATURAL AND THE UNNATURAL IN THE EARLY MEDIEVAL WORLD
UNIVERSITY OF SYDNEY & ONLINE, 28-29 SEPTEMBER 2023
SUBMISSION DEADLINE: 15 JULY 2023
Confirmed Keynote Speakers:
• Dr Elizabeth Boyle (Maynooth University)
• Professor Roland Fletcher (The University of Sydney)
In the largely rural and agrarian landscape of the medieval world, fauna and flora were highly regarded, as is evidenced by the importance of agriculture, the popularity of bestiaries, and the legacy of the elder Pliny’s Naturalis historia. The dynamics of the natural environment and social life has become an increasingly important topic in scholarship in recent years as we grapple with the impact of climate change.
For most people in the early Middle Ages, a supernatural world existed alongside the natural one and interacted with it. Indeed, the presence of the unnatural, whether in terms of bizarre creatures or disease and other environmental disasters, was taken as proof of the impact of the supernatural on the natural world and fed into philosophical and religious discourse.
Potential themes include:
• Cosmology and astrology
• Climate and natural disasters
• Disease and medicines
• Technologies and superstitions
• Paganism and Christianity
• Biological cycles and human culture
• The natural and the supernatural
• Wilderness and domestication
• Life and the afterlife
• Daylight and darkness
• Monsters and totems
• Art and the imagination
Papers that focus on the dimensions of any or all of these worlds and their interplay in the early medieval period (c. 400 – 1100 CE), which either confirm or challenge this notion are invited to be presented at our annual conference to be held in September 2023 in hybrid mode.
Submissions may be in the form of individual papers of 20 minutes duration, themed panels of three 20-minute papers, or Round Tables of up to six shorter papers (total of one hour). All sessions will include time for questions and general discussion.
Please send proposals (150–200 words per paper), along with author’s name, paper/panel/RT title, and academic affiliation (if any) to conference@aema.net.au by 15 July 2023. Please also provide a note in your submission as to whether you intend on presenting in person or online.
Current AEMA graduate and ECR members (located outside of Sydney, Australia) are eligible to apply for a travel bursary up to the value of $300 AUD. For more details, or to apply for a bursary, please contact the AEMA committee at conference@aema.net.au.
Conference website: https://aema.org.au/conference/
For a copy of the call for papers, click here.
2023 Conference Convenors:
Ms Erica Steiner (University of Sydney)
Professor Daniel Anlezark (University of Sydney)
The AEMA Committee