Francis (Buster) Whitfill

Reminder. We'll be accepting submissions for our panel on #satan in #earlymodern Europe until tomorrow. Come join us at #rensa26
#sin #demonicpacts

Greetings #earlymodern friends, the deadline for submissions for this #cfp on #satan, #sin, #demonicpacts has been extended to August 3! Come join us at @rsaorg.bsky.social's 2026 conference in San Francisco! #rensa26 More details on flyer or at tinyurl.com/76rw4cz7. Please spread the word!

I might try this down the road and might reach out on here if I have questions. Thank you for putting this idea out into the world

One of the things I think we inevitably run into when we study historical periods is that we face things with a 21st c. perspective. I often wonder how our scholarship would differ if we knew what it's like to wake up in the 16th c. & go about our daily lives. Clever way of confronting that :)

print | British Museum The Village Fair; in the centre a group eating at table, on left a procession to a church, on the right a fight, printed from four blocks on four sheets joined to form continuous frieze. 1535 Woodcut

I taught my students to build audio soundscapes today to use as a tool of historical analysis and I am having so much fun listening to their tracks and reading their thoughtful reflections. They used this woodcut by Sebald Beham as their visual inspiration: www.britishmuseum.org/collection/o...

Sounds like fun! I'm going to keep this in mind. Thank you for sharing. It's a really cool idea. Well done :)

I'm curious how you're doing your soundscapes. This sounds like a great project.

Greetings #earlymodern friends, the deadline for submissions for this #cfp on #satan, #sin, #demonicpacts has been extended to August 3! Come join us at @rsaorg.bsky.social's 2026 conference in San Francisco! #rensa26 More details on flyer or at tinyurl.com/76rw4cz7. Please spread the word!

A detail from an early modern print showing a young boy jumping over a skull while blowing soap bubbles. The scene is framed with a memento mori theme: Alles vergeht Gottes Wort besteht". The publication "Zwölff Geistliche Andachten" was published in 1693 (VD17 23:704497Y).

Why not start your week with blowing the perfect soap bubbles while running naked and jumping over a skull?

Now I'm going to spend my day thinking about how strenuous it would be. Would it be smooth and graceful or require a lot of strength and kick up wind and dust?

I suppose I've never thought if I flying people's feet dangle and at what angle. 🤔

Let's talk about the seduction of #satan in #earlymodern Europe. How are people drawn into acts of evil, demonic pacts, or sinful lives? What do these tales teach us about ourselves and society? Looking forward to hearing from you and chatting, both at #rensa2026 and beyond! #cfp #earlymodernsky

Detail from a mid-fifteenth-century Icelandic manuscript containing the opening of the Saga of Flores and Blankiflor. The text includes the name 'jakubs landi', i.e., Saint James' Land.

Here's another example of how the idea that James was buried in Compostela was part of the Nordic medieval worldview. This is the opening of the Saga of Flores and Blankiflor, which includes a pagan raid on Jakubs landi, which is to say Galicia.

[AM 489 4to, vol.II f.27v; courtesy of handrit.is]

Nashville Banner: Pregnant Mother in Tennessee Denied Care for Being Unmarried

Forget about what year it is. What century is it?

nashvillebanner.com/2025/07/20/d...

I learned a fun new word today:
ultracrepidarian

[uhl-truh-krep-i-dair-ee-uhn]

"Noting or pertaining to a person who criticizes, judges, or gives advice outside their area of expertise."

I’m reading a very dutiful, brilliant, thorough monograph by a scholar who built an illustrious career with such books- nothing too flashy, featuring reasoned arguments with other scholars, offering new readings, new information. It is what should bring success in academia and it’s slipping away

Saint Bernard de Menthon et le diable (Titivillus) Tours BM – ms. 2104, fol-149. Book of Hours, Use of Rome. France, c. 1510. Temptation of St. Bernard.

I was not aware that 1) there is a demon of typos called Titivillus or that 2) typos are held against scribes in heaven. Truly thought this was a drawing of me resisting the urge to send reels (I’m old) to my besties instead of writing that book review. medievalstudies.princeton.edu/event/the-de...

Last year I read about academia's hidden curriculum in "A Field Guide to Grad School." (@jessicacalarco.com) It was a good intro to a lot of things I didn't know coming in, but whew, I feel like I'm living the source material for a sequel at times 😅

Just a few days left to apply!!!

#RenSA26 #academicsky #earlymodern #religion #monkabulous #nuntastic #reformazing #16thC #17thC #18thC

Deadline extended until August 3!!!
#RenSA26 #earlymodern #skystorians #academicsky #16thC #17thC #18thC #nuntastic #reformazing #monkabulous

Worship in Transition: Liturgical Change, Continuity and Adaptation in Sixteenth-Century Europe Lille, France, September 15, 2025 - September 17, 2025 Of all the changes entailed by the European Reformations, it was the evolution of worship practices that most impacted the lives of all members of the community — from prince to peasant. Far from being unidirectional, religious policy was subjected to fits and starts; the religious identity of a territory might change through dynastic succession, military conquest, or even variations in preference of local church or municipal leaders. Responses to state-mandated change varied widely in pace, with both compliance and resistance manifesting through liturgical practice. Focusing on communal worship at ground level enables us to envisage the Reformation as a gradual process of transition from one faith to another (and sometimes back) as well as tracking evolutions within confessions as religious boundaries and identities settled progressively. The purpose of this conference is to encourage cross-disciplinary approaches to worship practices in the contexts of both inter-confessional and intra-confessional transitions in Europe during the long Reformation (1500-1650). Worship has recently come under renewed scholarly scrutiny as liturgical sources are mined for clues about how early modern faith and beliefs were forged, perceived and validated. Indeed, as worship was intensely communal and transcended the elite/popular and clergy/laity divides, it is generally understood that rituals are key to understanding the lived experience of religion.

Worship in Transition: Liturgical Change, Continuity and Adaptation in Sixteenth-Century Europe

Lille, France, September 15-17, 2025

Plenary Speakers: Professor Marjorie E. Plummer; Professor Magnus Williamson

#Skystorians #Reformazing

www.rensoc.org.uk/event/worshi...

Good morning, #earlymodern friends! I'm reposting my #cfp as we come into the final week of submissions. This panel will explore the topics of #satan #demonicpacts and #evil, particularly regarding those who unwittingly chose their fate. Join us at @rsaorg.bsky.social 's 2026 conference! #rensa26

Quo nomine vis vocari?

Hildegard is hot!

Thanks to those who have shared! Come talk about #earlymodern #Satan at #rensa26

Being the cosmic counterweight is a tough job, but someone's gotta do it!

I am in Spanish literature, but I'd love to have that in this panel!

Wide shot from the back of a crowd of hundreds facing the rotunda and listening to the speaker, on the University-Avenue side of the rotunda.

Hundreds of Charlottesvillians protested abusive Trump-administration interference in UVA, culminating in the ouster of President Jim Ryan. UVA Rotunda, July 4, 2025. Organized by Indivisible Charlottesville.

Beware the terrifying infernal locusts!

BL Add 11695; The 'Silos Apocalypse'; 1091-1109; Spain, N; f.133v

Sharing this #CFP "Gendered Power Dynamics & the Arts: Cultural Representations"
This panel invites abstracts exploring how global contemporary cultural production represents & critiques gendered & sexed power dynamics found in academic & artistic spaces. #gender #mla

mla.confex.com/mla/2026/web...