Research and teaching interests
My current research interests include Public Opinion in the Middle Ages; Preaching and Other dynamic forms of communication in the Middle Ages; Issues of war, holy war and peace from the era of the crusades to the present; Concepts of the other, fear, and the foreign in the Middle Ages; and Medievalism of C.S. Lewis, Henry Adams and others in 19th-20th century England and America.
History of England to 1700
The Middle Ages in Western Europe
World Systems East-West 1200-1600
1000 Years of War and Peace
Western Civilization to 1700
Topics: The Medieval Underworld: Criminals, Robin Hood, Witches, and Heretics
Vox Populi, Vox Dei: Public Opinion in the High Middle Ages (book
manuscript in progress)
The Worlds of Medieval Women, Co-Editor and
Contributor; West Virginia University Press, 1985.
Literary and Historical Perspectives of the Middle Ages,
Co-Editor, Contributor; West Virginia University Press, 1982.
Articles on “The Sermon,” “Fear and the
Foreigner,” and “Public Opinion and Popular Culture” in The Handbook of
Medieval Culture, ed. Albrecht Classen (Brepols, forthcoming 2014).
Reprint of most cited article, “Western Views
of the Origin of the Tartars: An Example of the Influence of Myth in the Second
half of the 13th Century,” Journal of Medieval and Renaissance
Studies 3 (1973): 115-36, in James D. Ryan, ed., Anthology of Key Articles
on Crusades and Related Topics (forthcoming, Brill, 2013).
“The Fall of Acre in 1291 in the Court of Public Opinion,” in John France, ed., The Falls of Acre (forthcoming, Brill, 2013).
“Issues of Humanity in the Rhetoric of
Crusade Preaching,” The Book of Nature and Humanity, ed. David Hawkes
and Richard G. Newhauser (Brepols 2013), 241-260.
“The Voice of the Poor and the Tin Ear of
Nineteenth-Century English Medievalism,” in Poverty and
Prosperity: the Rich and the Poor in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance,
eds. C Kosso and A. Scott (Brepols, 2012), 155-78.
“Origins of Medieval Public Opinion in the
Peace of God Movement,” in War and Peace: New Perspectives in European History and Literature, 700-1800,
eds. Nadia Margolis and Albrecht Classen (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 2011),
“From Spiritual Necessity to Instrument of
Torture: Water in the Middle Ages,” in The Nature
and Function of Water, Baths, Bathing, and Hygiene from Antiquity through the
Renaissance, eds. C. Kosso and A. Scott (Brill, 2009), 463-478.
Narnia: The Seven Heavens in the Imagination of C.S. Lewis by
Michael Ward: a Review Essay,” in Sehnsucht.
The C.S. Lewis Journal 2:1 (2008), 99-102.
“Reading the Middle Ages: the
Post-Modern Medievalism of C.S. Lewis,” in Sehnsucht.
The C.S. Lewis Journal 1.1(2007), 19-28.
“Religion and War in Europe: A
Millenialist Perspective, in Connections: European
Studies Annual Review 2(2006), 48-57.
“The Middle Ages in the Quest for National
Identity: England and France Compared,” in Connections:
European Studies Annual Review 1 (2005), 21-29.
Articles on “Cumis,”
“Marco Polo,” “Almaleigh,” and “William of Rubruck” in Encylopedia of Medieval Trade, Exploration and Discovery
in The Historian (1998), Speculum (1992).