CALL FOR PARTICIPANTS

Medievalist Toolkit Meeting:
a workshop for public scholarship countering far-right misinformation

May 4, 2019 at Columbia University
Submission deadline: March 31, 2019
Send abstracts and questions to: medievalisttoolkit@gmail.com

The Medievalist Toolkit is an initiative run by graduate students that addresses far-right misappropriations of the Middle Ages. To do so, we research extremist narratives, develop short responses to combat them, and solicit input from journalists and nonprofit professionals so that our research will be easily accessible for their work against the far-right. These responses will eventually be shared online with support from Columbia’s Medieval & Renaissance Studies Program and History in Action , funded by the American Historical Association and Mellon Foundation.

The toolkit has two goals: to be a resource for professionals working in journalism and nonprofit
organizations who encounter far-right talking points related to the Middle Ages, and to teach graduate
students how to produce public scholarship in consultation with these professionals.

We invite graduate students to join us by (1) identifying a far-right talking point involving a medieval
topic, and (2) writing a short response to address and dismantle it (approximately 1,000-1,500 words).

Participants will be invited to present their findings in a workshop at Columbia on May 4, in conversation with experts such as Sammy Rangel , the Executive Director of Life After Hate, and journalist Vegas Tenold, author of Everything You Love Will Burn: Inside the Rebirth of White Nationalism in America.

If you are interested in participating, please send the topic of your choice to medievalisttoolkit@gmail.com along with a brief abstract outlining your response.

Suggested topics include, but are not limited to:
– the myth and presumed superiority of a white/Christian Middle Ages
– the history of anti-Semitism
– the Crusades
– women’s agency and rights in the Middle Ages
– the misappropriation of popular symbols: the Knights Templar, Holy Roman Empire, etc.
– modern regimes and their fascinations with the medieval
– caliphal claims among modern extremist groups
– profiling a far-right spokesperson and dismantling their talking points

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