Visible English: scribal practice, graphic culture, and identity

Centre for the Study of the Middle Ages Seminar series 2019/20 - Writing and Records

• Speaker: Professor Wendy Scase (Birmingham)
  

This talk questions the prevailing idea that medieval written English conveys identity by representing the sounds of regional and local dialects until the emergence of standard orthography in the fifteenth century. Using two examples of practice -- a twelfth-century Augustinian Canon and some fifteenth-century amateur scribes -- it argues that graphic culture provides scribes of English-language texts with additional, visual resources for identity-work.  

We welcome anyone who is at all interested in the research and concerns of the Centre for the Study of the Middle Ages. Each paper will be followed by a pause for refreshments, then questions. After that anyone who wishes will retire for more relaxed conversation, and then we take the speaker out for an early dinner. If you would like to join the speaker for dinner please let the convenor know (Naomi Standen, n.standen@bham.ac.uk) by the end of the Monday before the seminar.