Getting Medieval on the Middle Ages


The first episode in my course on medieval history is up at Unauthorized.tv (History and Logos Channel)! The series will be for subscribers to the channel, but this episode is free to watch. Supporting materials will be posted on Medieval History 101: The Unauthorized Version. Come join me!

For my continuing adventures as a conservative in academia, see MedievalGate.

 For a full list of my video, podcast, and radio appearances, see Bear On Air.

Comments

  1. binks webelfJune 27, 2019 at 11:09 AM

    Enjoying the U.tv course, prof! And First Things just published:

    https://www.firstthings.com/article/2019/06/in-the-academic-sandbox
    IN THE ACADEMIC SANDBOX
    A SKIRMISH IN MEDIEVAL STUDIES.
    by Charlotte Allen
    June 2019

    ReplyDelete
  2. Johnny BJune 28, 2019 at 4:45 AM

    Congrats Prof. I'm looking forward to it and to see your work grow along with Unauthorized.

    ReplyDelete
  3. AnonymousJune 28, 2019 at 6:31 AM

    Thank you for your upload on unauthorized.tv . It has given me many points to reflect on and given me new reading material. Well done!

    ReplyDelete
  4. binks webelfJuly 5, 2019 at 10:45 AM

    Saw this, thought of you. Might you teach a future Tolkien course after the Medieval course at U.tv?

    https://catholicism.org/tolkien-and-reality.html
    Tolkien and Reality
    JUL 5, 2019 CHARLES A. COULOMBE

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Fencing BearJuly 5, 2019 at 11:03 AM

      I would love to! Have you checked out the blog for the course I teach at Chicago? https://tolkienmedievalandmodern.blogspot.com

      Delete
  5. BelovedNovember 9, 2020 at 10:36 AM

    Professor Brown,

    I resubscribed to UA.tv and I just finished the first episode of your Medieval History series. Thank you so much, it was a delightful hour and I look forward to the rest of the series.

    I must confess, having experienced things in my own life far more "marvelous" than what you cited, I'm open to the possibility that the marvelous events recorded in primary sources were faithful accounts of real events. Of course, no reasonable person can believe anything that hasn't been authorized.

    To misquote the Bard, "There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, Than are verified in your newspaper."

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. BelovedNovember 9, 2020 at 1:49 PM

      Episode 3 and the reports of monks going out into the wildernesd to seek God... I found that very intetesting.

      Delete
    2. Fencing BearNovember 9, 2020 at 1:54 PM

      I am so happy you are enjoying the videos! Be sure to check out the study guides, if you want to read further: https://unauthorizedmedievalhistory.blogspot.com/

      Delete

Post a Comment

Thank you for taking the time to respond to my blog post. I look forward to hearing what you think!

F.B.

Popular posts from this blog

Survive the Jive in Academia!

Image
I was very happy to join Tom Rowsell on Survive the Jive  for a conversation about my experience in academia as a Christian and the problem of getting inside the medieval mind. Which is harder: thinking like an academic or thinking like a medieval Christian?! Join us to find out! For a complete list of my video, radio, and podcast appearances, see Bear On Air .
Keep reading

Angels, Demons, Heaven, and Hell: On Christian “Mythology” and the Spiritual Life

Image
My comments for a conversation with Fr. Peter Funk, OSB, Prior of the Monastery of the Holy Cross, sponsored by the  Lumen Christi Institute Abstract : Many traditional Christian beliefs and teachings about spiritual realities have become unpalatable to modern sensibilities. Accounts of angelic visitations, demonic possessions, the stain of original sin, and the threat of eternal torment are today considered untrue or irrelevant by non-believers and even many Christians. Why were such “myths” so central to Christian belief and practice for so many centuries? Is there any value in understanding why ancient, medieval, and contemporary Christians believe in such things? Or does Christianity need to be demythologized in order to survive in a post-enlightenment age? In this conversation, Rachel Fulton Brown and Fr. Peter Funk, OSB, will consider the history of these “myths” and their relevance for contemporary spiritual practices. ***** How many of you believe in angels...
Keep reading

A few words of advice to Trigglypuff--and her teachers

Image
I would not want to be this young woman. By now, five months after the event she attended at the University of Massachusetts Amherst featuring a discussion with Christina Hoff Sommers, Steven Crowder, and Milo Yiannopoulos on the problems besetting university campuses with speech considered "triggering," she has become a favorite meme among those who see such concerns as at best mildly hysterical, at worst a symptom of the total breakdown of our national character (I paraphrase). Audiences at several of Milo's recent talks (which you can see here ) have made reference to her, imitating her arm gestures (which I am having a hard time ignoring on the gif as I am writing) and laughing at her expense. Milo, to his credit, has admonished them: "No, we love Trigglypuff! Trigglypuff is wonderful!," while insisting that it is not she, but those who have lied to her about what will make her happy that are to blame. "She is going to be miserable," he has said (a...
Keep reading

Reforming the Reformation: A Review

This is what I would have said back in January if I had had the time to finish the book then.  We're having a discussion about it here on campus this week , if you want to know more.   This is what I'll be saying, more or less. Comment on Brad S. Gregory, The Unintended Reformation: How a Religious Revolution Secularized Society (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2012). This is an intimidating book.  It is also a book that is very difficult to summarize.  Not only does it take on the whole of European history from the high Middle Ages to the present; it also critiques the very historiography upon which our narrative of European (and, by the by, American and, indeed, world) history has tended to depend.  Name something—anything—that you know about the development of the modern world and Prof. Gregory’s book will have something to say about it—and then it will show you how everything that you have ever believed about it is wrong.  The triump...
Keep reading

Talking Points: Three Cheers for White Men

Image
1. When white women (see Marie de France and Eleanor of Aquitaine) invented chivalry and courtly love , white men agreed that it was better for knights to spend their time protecting women rather than raping them, and even agreed to write songs for them rather than expecting them to want to have sex with them without being forced. 2. When white men who were celibate (see the canon lawyers and theologians of the twelfth century and thereafter) argued that marriage was a sacrament valid only if both the man and the woman consented , white men exerted themselves to become good husbands rather than expecting women to live as their slaves. 3. When white women (see Christine de Pizan, Mary Wollstonecraft, and the suffragettes) invented feminism , white men supported them (see John Stuart Mill) and even went so far as to vote (because only men could vote at the time) to let them vote, not to mention hiring them as workers and supporting their education. And before you start telling me a...
Keep reading