California Medieval Seminar (Winter 2026)

Participation in the Seminar consists of group discussion of pre-circulated papers, typically drafts of articles, book chapters, or dissertation chapters (with complete apparatus). Two of the papers are ordinarily by emerging scholars (including PhD students) and the other two are by established scholars. We allocate one hour per paper and presenters should anticipate substantial, and substantive, feedback. Calls for presenters are circulated via e-mail from the Center approximately two months prior to each meeting and papers are accepted on a first-come basis.

Faculty, postdocs, and grad students from across California are welcome to participate. Register to attend in person or on Zoom by January 20 to receive the papers.

Register to attend in Royce 306
Register to attend via ZOOM

Email Events Manager Thi Nguyen (tnguyen@humnet.ucla.edu) if you are registering after January 20.

The papers will be discussed at the seminar in the following order:

• “When is a Document Lost? Interrogating Archival Silence in Early Medieval Italy,” Maya Maskarinec (University of Southern California)
• “Homo legum: The Making and Classification of Legal Experts in Montpellier, 1200-1380,” Shahrouz Khalifian (Mount Saint Mary’s University)
• “How Medieval Judaism Became a System: Dogma and Principles of Faith in Fifteenth-Century Sepharad,” Bénédicte Sère (Institut Universitaire de France / University of Paris-Nanterre / EHESS-Paris)
• “The Politics of Failure in late medieval Iceland,” Basil Arnould Price (State University of New York, Oneonta)

More information can be found here.