Loving the past
Loving the past
Despite dramatic changes in the dynamics between medieval studies and medievalism, the medieval is still seen as the originary moment of medievalism, which is still regarded in turn as a screen for projecting various fantasies and desires about the past. Scholarly medieval studies are supposedly characterised by their dispassionate inquiries into the past. Yet medieval studies has a long and mixed history of affective relationships with the past it fosters: passion and professionalism often go hand in hand. This complex history makes it hard to distinguish medieval scholarship from the amateurism – the love for the past --that is often said to characterise medievalism as well as scholarly antiquarianism. Debates about the efficacy of affect as a mode of recover about the past lead to a discussion of two related terms: history and memory.
Keywords: amateurism, Walpole, Furnivall, memory, love, history, affect
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