HISTORY 511B: Seminar on the Medieval Aristocracy

COURSE DESCRIPTION


 HONOR, LOVE AND VIOLENCE: THE MEDIEVAL ARISTOCRACY

    This course has two goals.  The first is to learn something about the lives, experiences, and values of the high medieval aristocracy.  The second is to learn the techniques of writing a history research paper.  Although there is a natural tension to these two goals, I hope to have come up with a balance between joint examination of primary and secondary materials relating to the topic of the high medieval aristocracy and individual pursuit of research.
    In addressing the first goal, we will examine several texts, both primary and secondary, in an effort to try to sort out both the image of the medieval aristocracy (as expressed, particularly, through literature) and the reality.  Indeed, this contrast between ideal and reality may well provide a useful starting point for individual research projects.  I also hope to offer a crash course in the use of particular sorts of medieval sources, particularly for those of you who have no experience with the Middle Ages.  So, after an overview of the aristocracy (Bouchard), we will move to look at four genres of primary sources: charters (Evergates), chronicles, laws, and literature (Yvain).  Then we will examine a modern historian's reconstruction of knightly society (Crouch).  As we read we will keep in mind two things: 1) methodology, or how the particular genre of source can be used by students to write research papers; and 2) content, or the themes that the readings suggest about medieval aristocratic life (including, but not limited to marriage and the family, loyalty and honor, violence and warfare, love and lust, and chivalry). Use this first month or so to help you arrive at the kinds of sources you like to use and the sorts of thematic question(s) you want to ask in your own research paper.
    To help you come to grips with the second goal, I have planned a staggered series of short assignments designed to get you started on a research project. These research assignments will include exercises in coming up with a topic, constructing a preliminary bibliography, criticizing a single secondary source, analyzing several secondary sources as a group, constructing a final bibliography, and producing a thesis paragraph and outline.  I will require that a polished first draft of the paper be turned in on April 10; we will spend the next two weeks in class revising these drafts with the help of our classmates.  I will ask you to prepare an oral report (5-10 minutes) outlining your paper and the ways in which you think it needs to be revised; we will then all spend some time on each paper making suggestions on revision, etc.  A revised draft will be due on Thursday May 4, by noon.  I realize that some of you may never have written research papers before. Do not worry. This course should provide you with the skills you need.
 

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