Dr Catalin Taranu

2021–2022 University of Bonn, Institute for English, American, and Celtic Studies (IAAK)

• English in the Middle Ages: Old English
• English in the Middle Ages: Middle English
• Medieval Literatures and Cultures: Dwellings of Sorrow and Joys in the Mead-hall: Understanding Old English Emotions
• Medieval Literatures and Cultures: Monster and Heroes of Medieval England
• Medieval Studies  
• History of the English Language

2017 Alexandru Ioan Cuza University of Iasi, Romania

• undergraduate course Medieval and Early Modern English Literature

2015–2016 University of Leeds, Institute for Medieval Studies

•  undergraduate course Introduction to Medieval Literature

2014–2015 University of Leeds, School of English

• postgraduate team-taught course Old and Middle English

  Publications:

• The Bard and the Rag-picker: Vernacular Verse Histories in Early Medieval England and Francia (London: Routledge, 2021)
• Vera Lex Historiae?: Constructions of Truth in Medieval Historical Narrative (New York: Punctum Books, 2022), co-edited with Michael Kelly

  Journal Articles:

• ‘Shame in the Emotional Life of Germanic Heroic Poetry’, New Europe College Yearbook 2020-2021
• ‘Who Was the Original Dragon-slayer of the Nibelung Cycle?’, Viator 46 (2015), 23-40
• ‘Senses of the Past: The Old English Vocabulary of History’, Florilegium 29 (2012 [2014]), 65-88
• ‘The Construction of Anglo-Saxon Legendary History’ Retrospective Methods Network Newsletter 8 (2014), 84-89
• ‘The Elusive Nature of Germanic Heroic Poetry: A Rhizomatic Model’, Networks and Neighbours 1 (2013), 44-66
• ‘“A New Heaven and a New Earth”: The Making of the Cistercian Desert’, Ex Historia 5 (2013), 1-18

 Book Chapters:

• ‘Introduction’ to Vera Lex Historiae?: Constructions of Truth in Medieval Historical Narrative (New York: Punctum Books, 2022), co-written with Ralph O'Connor
• ‘“Truth is the trickiest”: Vernacular Theories of Truth in Old English Verse’, in Vera lex historiae?: Constructions of Truth in Medieval Historical Narrative (New York: Punctum Books, 2022)
• ‘The Balloon That Wouldn’t Burst: A Genealogy of “Germanic”’, in Interrogating the ‘Germanic’: A Category and its Use in Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages, ed. by James Harland and Matthias Friedrich Reallexikon der Germanischen Altertumskunde Ergänzungsbände 123 (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2020)
• 'Men Into Monsters: Troubling Race and Masculinity in Beowulf', in Dating Beowulf: Studies in Intimacy, ed. by Daniel C. Remein and Erica Weaver (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2019)
• ‘Goths, Geatas, Gaut: The Invention of an Anglo-Saxon Tradition’, in Transforming the Early Medieval World: Studies in Honour of Ian N. Wood, ed. by Kivilcim Yavuz and Ricky Broome (Leeds: Kismet Press, forthcoming)

Education:

2012–16                 Ph.D. Medieval Studies: University of Leeds 

Thesis title: The Making of Poetic History in Anglo-Saxon England and Carolingian Francia

Supervisors: Dr. Alaric Hall and Professor Catherine Karkov

Examiners: Professor Clare Lees and Professor Ian Wood

2011–12                 M.A. Medieval Studies (Distinction): University of Leeds 

2009–10                  Erasmus mobility: University of Paris III Nouvelle Sorbonne 

2007–10                 B.A. English and French: Alexandru Ioan Cuza University of Iasi, Romania 

Academic Appointments:

2023-2025               Project Director: ‘Grammars of Emotion: Shame and the Social Economy of                                          Honour in Medieval Heroic Literatures’, joint funding by the European Union                                          and Romania’s Recovery and Resilience Plan (PNRR-III-C9-2022 – I9), New                                            Europe College, Bucharest 

2021–2022              Professurvertreter (temporary Professor): Institute for English, American, and                                       Celtic Studies, Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn

2020–21                  Postdoctoral Research Fellow: New Europe College, Bucharest 

2017–18                  Postdoctoral Research Fellow: Institute for Research in the Humanities,                                                University of Bucharest

2017                         Teaching Assistant: Alexandru Ioan Cuza University of Iasi, Romania

2015–2016             Graduate Teaching Assistant: University of Leeds, Institute for Medieval Studies

2014–2015              Graduate Teaching Assistant:  University of Leeds, School of English

‘Extended Mind, Extended Emotion: Making the History of Emotions without Subjectivity’, International Medieval Congress (IMC) Leeds, UK (July 2024)

‘Dark Emotions: The Role of Shame in Racializing Public Anxieties from Beowulf to Brexit’, Bates College, USA (December 2023) – invited lecture

‘The Figure in the Carpet: Narrative Structure and Theories of History in Old English Heroic Poetry’, IMC Leeds, UK (July 2023)

‘Emotions Without a Self? Extended Selfhood and Authenticity in Early Medieval Affective Performance’, Medieval Identities: (Re)Constructing the Self and the Other, Freiburg, Germany (May 2023)

‘Who Needs a Self When You Have Emotions? Performance and Authenticity in Early Medieval Affective Selfhood’, New Approaches to the Mind in the Early North, Reykjavkik, Iceland (May 2023)

‘Anarchical Narrative Emplotting and Historical Reflection in Early Medieval 'Heroic' Verse Language’, IMC Leeds, UK (July 2022)

‘”Shamed Among My People”: The Emotional Effect of Heroic Verse in the Self-construction of its Elite Audiences’, Emotion and the Medieval Self in Northern Europe, Reykjavík, Iceland (May 2022)

‘Men into Monsters: Anxiety about Race and Masculinity in Beowulf’, International Medieval Congress (IMC) Leeds, UK (July 2019)

‘The Hero’s Shameful Burden: Honour, Violence, and Anxious Masculinity in Heroic Poetry’, The Umeå Group for Premodern Studies Workshop, Umeå, Sweden (May 2019) – invited lecture

‘Vera lex historiae: Constructing Truthfulness in Early Medieval History-Writing’, IMC Leeds (July 2018)

‘Honour, Shame, and Violence in Germanic Heroic Poetry’, Honor-Shame Dynamics in Western History: Bielefeld, Germany (June 2018)

‘Old Bones, New Soups: Was Beowulf Ever an Origin Story?’, Where did you come from, where did you go? Origin Narratives and the History of Peoples, Places and Ideas, Aberystwyth, UK (June 2018)

‘Violence and Shame in Germanic Heroic Culture’, Medieval Europe and Beyond University of Bucharest Research Group (April 2018) – invited lecture

‘Gothicism in Early Medieval North-Western Europe: A Rhizomatic Network of Ideas’, Networks and Neighbours IV: Nijmegen, Netherlands (September 2017)

‘A Balloon that Wouldn’t Burst: A Genealogy of “Germanic”’, Interrogating the ‘Germanic’: York (May 2016)

‘True Franks and Teutons: The Social Life of Germanic Heroic Poetry in Carolingian Francia’, Networks and Neighbours III: Leeds (July 2015)

‘The Many Battles of Maldon’, Nordic Research Network Conference: Edinburgh (February 2015)

‘Sigurd Before “Sigurd”?: The Pretextual History of the Nibelungs’, Norse in the North: Leeds (May 2014)

‘Germanic Heroic Poetry: A Rhizomatic Model’, Comparing the Medieval North. Coordinating Methodologies in the Study of Medieval Scandinavia: Aarhus, Denmark (April 2014) 

‘Beowulf Between Two Worlds’, Indigenous Ideas and Foreign Influences: Helsinki, Finland (September 2013)