Director: Prof. Elina Gertsman

The Graduate Certificate in Global Medieval Studies offers an interdisciplinary approach to the study of the Middle Ages. Administered through the Department of Art History and Art with collaborative participation from Classics, English, Modern Languages and Literatures, and Music, the program provides graduate students with comprehensive, interdisciplinary training in medieval culture. The program is geared towards degree-seeking graduate students in any of the above-mentioned departments who wish to complete the certificate as a complement to their primary field of study. Enrollments are managed through standard departmental procedures in consultation with the program’s director. The program fosters collaboration between departments, and leverages established partnerships with the Cleveland Museum of Art and existing performance ensembles.

The program maintains flexibility to allow it to be easily adapted to existing program requirements across different departments, and is free for degree-seeking students from participating departments. The program advisor will approve relevant courses from ARTH, CLSC, ENGL, MUHI, etc. and foreign language courses as appropriate.

Core Requirements (15 credit hours):

– Three courses with a medieval focus completed in the student’s home department (9 credit hours), at least one of which must be a seminar
– Two courses with a medieval focus from other participating departments (6 credit hours)
– A final project in medieval studies: normally, an expanded seminar paper on a topic in medieval civilization, completed in any of the above courses; must be interdisciplinary; supervised by faculty from the student’s primary department with input from at least one faculty member from another participating department
– Demonstrated proficiency in one foreign language; PhD students strongly encouraged but not required to demonstrate proficiency in two

All courses must be at the 400+ level; independent studies with individual instructors are included. Students must maintain a 3.0 GPA.

A note on foreign languages: in order to achieve candidacy in the certificate, students must demonstrate a reading knowledge of at least one language other than English; this can be a classical language used in the Middle Ages (e.g. Latin, Hebrew, Greek, or Arabic), or a modern language such as French, German, Italian, or Spanish, in each case relevant to scholarship in the student’s area of research.  This requirement may be satisfied in one of three ways: by submitting  evidence of having completed a minimum of two semesters of college-level language study no later than two years before entering the program; by completing a minimum of two semesters of college-level language study during the course of the program (recommend three semesters for students based in Classics); or by taking an in-house language examination. Advanced classical language courses offered by Classics and DMLL relevant to Medieval Studies can satisfy one of the program’s core course requirements as well as the language requirement.

Each year, the Department of Art History and Art sponsors lectures by prominent scholars and curators of medieval and Byzantine art; for the list of recent and upcoming lectures, click here.

The Graduate Association for Medieval Studies (GAMS) organizes multiple events every semester; for more information, click here.

For more information, please contact the program’s director, Prof. Elina Gertsman at exg152@case.edu