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Medieval + Monsters Conference

Medieval + Monsters: 
MAM, MAMA, and IMA Joint Conference with The Newberry Library

October 17 & 18, 2025

Hosted @ Dominican University & the Newberry Library

Call for Papers

Individual abstracts of 250 words should be submitted to: Monsterconference2025@gmail.com

by April 18, 2025.  If you would like to be considered for graduate funding please note that on your application.
 
If you are graduate student, and/or would like to participate in an on-line session please note that in your proposal. Proposed panels are also accepted for consideration. Workshops panels will also be considered. 

Questions: Mickey Sweeney

Abstracts focused on medieval, or medievalism monstrous themes are welcome; this topic is broadly conceived to encourage colleagues from all relevant disciplines, such as art historians, linguists, literature, theologians, historians, history of science, and forms of medievalism etc., to apply. We also have an active group of graduate students & emerging scholars who are interested in developing online sessions, as well as in-person workshops in teaching the medieval through medievalism, gaming, etc. Please note on your abstract if you are interested in an in-person session or an online session and if you are proposing a graduate session/roundtable/traditional paper/session. 

Keynote Speaker

Maria Dahvana Headley will be our keynote speaker on Friday October 17, 2025.

With the new addition to our Conference, we are hoping to engage even more of our medieval and medievalism colleagues as the creative and the academic merge in Headely's works, most especially Beowulf and The Mere Wyf. We already have some wonderful abstracts, but we hope to engage an even more diverse number of fields to participate. Please share this call for papers and panels with your grad students and colleagues as we seek to build a supportive network for all.

New York Times Bestselling Author
Academy of American Poets Harold Morton Landon Translation Award
Joyce Carol Oates Prize Finalist
NPR Book of the Year 
 
 

Maria Dahvana Headley is the New York Times-bestselling, World Fantasy and Hugo Award-winning author of eight books, most recently Beowulf: A New Translation (FSG, 2020), which won the Harold Morton Landon Translation Prize from the Academy of American Poets, and The Mere Wife (FSG, 2018), a contemporary novel adaptation of Beowulf. Her full cast musical adaptation of The Aeneid, titled Vergil: a Mythological Musical, came out from Audible in 2023. She delivered the Tolkien Lecture on Fantasy Literature at Oxford in 2023, and has taught writing at Sarah Lawrence and Bennington, among many others. 

When asked by Slate about her use of contemporary slang in her Beowulf translation, Headley responded, “My whole career has been grabbing bits of folklore and repurposing them, and testing out different meters and repurposing them. That’s the writer I am. But in terms of using some of the more recent slang, I was really just interested in how much of the English language has been constructed out of slang always. That’s just the nature of the language. It’s a language that grabs culturally, jumps class."

The Jim Falls Paper Prize

The Jim Falls Paper Prize will be awarded to the best paper by a graduate student delivered at the 2025 joint meeting of (MAM), (MAMA), and the (IMA). The prize includes a monetary award of $100. 

Deadline: 15 September 2025.

Graduate students are encouraged to send a completed copy of the accepted paper (no more than 10 pages not including notes) along with their name, university institution, and graduate status to blantonv@umkc.edu

. Please include in the subject line: Jim Falls Graduate Prize.  The paper you submit should be the paper you intend to present at the conference. Please do not submit an entry if you have previously received this award.

See the previous winners of the Jim Falls Paper Prize.

Additional Information

Registration Information

Cost to register for the conference: 

• $100.00 for faculty & working professionals (includes membership to MAM for 2025)
• $75.00 retired/independent scholar (includes 2025 MAM Membership)
• Students: no charge
• Payment options coming 

Conference Sessions will be at Dominican University (River Forest, IL), the Newberry Library (Chicago, IL), and online. More to follow.

Graduate Student Travel Grants & Fees

Travel Information

Conference Publication Opportunities

For questions, please contact

Mickey Sweeney

 
Professor of English, Dominican University
Honors; Medieval & Renaissance Minor
President of the Medieval Association of the Midwest

Strength in Collaboration: Learn more about our publications and partnerships

This conference is all about the strength in collaboration and partnerships, we are looking to support all our colleagues in the future of their professions and research. Enarratio, MAM's journal & Essays in Medieval Studies, the journal for IMA, will be sharing the submissions for our mutual publications. Be sure to see our 2024 collections now available online. 

Newberry Library Center for Renaissance Studies

We are delighted to partner with the Center for Renaissance Studies and the Newberry, which is a public research library located in Chicago that houses a strong collection of medieval manuscripts, printed books, and other objects.  We are looking forward to a session, a workshop, and a tour of the library's Medieval and Renaissance collections. 

We are also grateful for the CARA grant that will support graduate attendance at this conference.

For questions, please contact:

Mickey Sweeney 

Professor of English
Honors; Director of the Medieval & Renaissance Minor
President of the Medieval Association of the Midwest

Dominican University

Strength in Collaboration: Learn a bit more about our publications and partnerships:

This conference is all about the strength in collaboration and partnerships. Enarratio, MAM's journal & Essys in Medieval Studies, will be sharing the submissions for our mutual publications. Be sure to see our 2024 collections now available online. 

NEWBERRY LIBRARY - Center for Renaissance Studies

We are delighted to partner with the Center for Renaissance Studies and the Newberry, which is a public research library located in Chicago that houses a strong collection of medieval manuscripts, printed books, and other objects.  We are looking forward to a session, a workshop, and a tour of the libraries Medieval and Renaissance collections. 

We are also grateful for the CARA grant that will support graduate attendance at this conference. 

    

The Monsters Conference is sponsored by CARA,  Dominican University,  The Newberry Library.

Other Great news: 

Welcome to our 2024 councilors:

Professor Molly Martin, Chair of English at University of Indianapolis

Lauren Calwell, Graduate Student at Ohio State

Emily Eikost, Graduate Student at Ohio State

Meg Morrow, Graduate Student at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Many thanks to their willingness to work with MAM as we look forward to our 2025 MAM led conference and begin to plan a Graduate Student online-conference.

Welcome to our New Co-ordinator of Conferences:

Tory Schendel -Vyvoda, Curator, Evansville African American Museum; Ph.D. student IDSVA; Adjunct Instructor, University of Evansville; Director, Lamasco Microgallery

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The office of the President is up for renewal in 2025 

Please contact Mickey Sweeney if you have any questions about the position.  Please contact our secretary Amity Reading if you would like to self-nominate, or nominate others (please be sure to have that person's consent).  The president is responsible for organizing and attending meetings in which the business of MAM is accomplished and maintaining continuity over the years of presidency.  It entails working closely with the Board to ensure that what MAM has undertaken to execute is done in a fair and thoughtful way.  In my experience, the job of president has included efforts to transition to a zoom friendly format, updating what needs modernizing to function more effectively, and the development of a plan for future success and stability.  This work is ongoing.  

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Join us at Kalamazoo 2025!

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IMC- LEEDS 2025

Join us at Leeds! 

2024 Conference

Excited about MAMA & MAM plus a welcome to MMHC members - September 23 is when the conference begins in Kansas City.

We would love to have you join us!

Enarratio 

Check out Enarratio (Volume 23, 2022) online at the Knowledge Bank of The Ohio State University!While you are there, you can page through the past issues all the way back to the first volume published in 1991!