The position is available for a period of 2 years (full time), with the possibility to be extended for a third year.

A postdoctoral research fellow is sought to work on any field of late medieval historiography as part of the comparative project ‘Narrative Hierarchies: Minor Characters in Byzantine and Medieval History Writing’ (grant nr. 324754, Research Council of Norway).

Project Description

The project aims to explore medieval power and gender relations in historiographical narrative. In medieval histories, kings, emperors, and other elite men typically occupy more prominent roles than labourers, women, eunuchs, slaves, soldiers, and foreigners. The unevenness with which attention, space, and importance are distributed between different types of characters produces hierarchies within these narratives. This research project sets out to analyse these narrative hierarchies, with a particular focus on non-elite and non-male minor characters.

The PI’s work will focus on a corpus of late Byzantine (c. 1200–c. 1460) histories. Parallel to this work, the successful postdoctoral fellow, the PI, and external collaborators will explore several other contemporary historiographical traditions. These transhistorical studies will aim to create a framework by which different historiographical and narrative traditions can be meaningfully placed in conversation.

About the position

The postdoctoral fellow will principally be expected to extend the transhistorical dimension of the project, by pursuing research related to the narrative hierarchies of a non-Byzantine medieval historical tradition. Researchers are expected to share their chronological focus with the project (c. 1200–c. 1460), but their field of specialisation within medieval history/literature is entirely open.

The postdoctoral fellow’s primary responsibility will be to research and write at least two journal articles. Prospective candidates are asked to clearly articulate the topics on which they intend to work in their project description. Candidates will not be expected to apply a rigid ‘project methodology’, but are encouraged to elaborate how their proposed research speaks to the research questions and transhistorical agenda of the project. Proposals should relate to questions of narrative/narrative theory, gender, hierarchies, subalternity, or non-elite counterpower.

Applications from candidates working on related traditions (e.g., Armenian, Seljuk, early Ottoman, Slavonic, crusader, Ethiopic) are particularly welcome, but candidates will be judged primarily on their thematic relevance and the quality of their research proposal.

Application Deadline: 28 February 2022

More details on the post and application process are available here