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LAMEM has served as a model on what true interdisciplinary scholarly collaboration in the humanities can look like. Meetings are open to students of any major or minor interested in listening to faculty members and advanced students share their works-in-progress, and to contribute to the collegial, expert discussion that follows the research presentation. Often, students taking premodern courses drop in during their semesters, since LAMEM presentations often further enrich a premodern course’s curriculum; sometimes, students like the atmosphere so much that they attend LAMEM meetings regularly (or even end up going to graduate school to study medieval history!). By student demand, LAMEM has begun to publish a list of LAMEM-related courses being taught by LAMEM faculty at Brooklyn College, so students can delve deeper into topics that spark their interest in LAMEM colloquia.
Courses Offered This Semester Affiliated Faculty LAMEM Students Why Premodern Colloquia Schedule Colloquia Archives
Held each semester, colloquia are open to all students and faculty.
Organized by professors Lauren Mancia and Brian P. Sowers, the two-day conference will explore “lived religion” from Late Antiquity to the Central Middle Ages.
Director Lucas Rubin discusses the legacy of the world's most rigorous and intensive instruction program in the classical languages.
LAMEM Spring 2025 Colloquia Student Presentations
Amulets and Tombstones: Folklore of Life and Death in the Jewish Communities of the Early Modern Caribbean
Dwelling in Gardens: The Late Antique Transformation of Vegetal Space
Though it has no formal interdisciplinary program for the study of the late antique, medieval, and early modern world, Brooklyn College’s School of Humanities and Social Sciences has a stellar collection of faculty studying the world before 1700 from many different angles.
Thus, in spring 2014, several faculty members founded the Late-Antique-Medieval-Early-Modern faculty working group (LAMEM), a group made up of 23 different faculty members from eight different departments and programs around the School of Humanities and Social Sciences (HSS) (Art, Classics, English, History, Judaic Studies, Modern Languages and Literatures, Philosophy, and Religion).
LAMEM meetings give faculty members and graduate students a space to share their scholarship-in-progress with a welcoming audience of fellow faculty, undergraduates, graduate students, and alumni from around Brooklyn College. Because of LAMEM, HSS faculty members and advanced graduate students have a space to share their scholarly work during the semester, as well as a chance to discuss pedagogical issues that arise when teaching courses on premodern literature, culture, religion, history, art, language, and thought. The connectedness fostered through LAMEM has even encouraged team-teaching and scholarly collaboration between LAMEM-affiliated faculty, and the feedback given to LAMEM presenters has aided their presentations in becoming conference paper, published articles, or books. LAMEM has also recently begun to invite scholars visiting Brooklyn College, CUNY, or the New York area to participate and present in our colloquia.
And why is it important?
From a LAMEM event recorded on September 17, 2021, where six professors (Professors Arlig, Ball, Mancia, Meyer, Sowers, and Steel) discuss why the study of the premodern is important for students today.
Why our 2021 Hess Scholar-in-Residence thinks studying premodernity is important.
If you are a student or scholar interested in attending LAMEM events, or if you are a faculty member, professor, or graduate student interested in presenting, contact:
Nicola Masciandaro, Professor, Department of English E: nicolam@brooklyn.cuny.edu P: 718.951.5000, ext. 3653
May 2–December 2023 Library Exhibit Area
Learn More
June 5–6, 2023
This conference brings together 13 experts in premodern religion from a variety of disciplines, including history, medieval studies, classics, Islamic studies, religious studies, Judaic studies, art history, archaeology, and women’s and gender studies, to critically examine the topic of religious experiences from Late Antiquity to the Central Middle Ages.
