The Leeds IMC CFP is out! As you know, I’m increasingly interested in the idea of “creative histories” – exploring creative, imaginative, unusual methods of producing history. That could mean new methodologies in writing history – I have been exploring auto-ethnography and fictive histories, but it could also mean using different writing techniques (a prose poem journal article?) or fundamentally different kinds of sources for writing history. It might also mean not writing at all – are your methods better served through the media of film, spoken word, painting, knitting, baking?
So, this is a CFP for a session on radically reimagining how we do medieval history. Contributions from other disciplines are warmly welcomed, but I do want to keep the session focused around history as a discipline, even if the whole point is how we can push those boundaries as far as possible! So if you wanted to write about your work with medieval drama I would love that, as long as you include an element of how it speaks to (challenges? interrupts? transforms?) the discipline of medieval history, which has oftentimes been resistant to playfulness in ways I would like to change. I hope you do, too.
If you’re interested, I’d like a 150-word abstract for a 15 to 20 minute thing – a conventional paper, or a reading, or a talk through your crafting projects! – to rachel.moss@northampton.ac.uk by 31 August (to give me time to read and respond before the session deadline of 30 September). Scholars at all levels of experience are welcome and I am not interested in your institutional affiliation. Come one, come all. Let’s make a creative mess together.
Rachel E. Moss 