Welcome to SPACE, our adult continuing education program which offers interactive monthly courses for personal enrichment! Learn more here.
New Each Time
Days and Times
Meeting Mondays & Wednesdays at 10:00 PM Eastern for eight 1-hour sessions on April 1, 6, 8, 13, 15, 20, 22, 27
This class needs more votes by March 1 to get confirmed.
This module is a standing candidate which means it will be ready to launch as soon as it gets enough interest. Token holders can set aside a Token to reserve their seat for class and help it get confirmed.
Ready to continue reading Old English texts but looking for a lighter pace and additional linguistic support? This series of Intermediate Old English Readings provides a guided pathway into the same rich body of prose and poetry explored in the Advanced Old English Series, while offering a more gradual reading pace and expanded instructional support.
Each module focuses on a selected Old English work drawn from a range of genres, including biblical retellings, allegorical poetry, homiletic prose, and other representative texts from the Old English canon. Modules are designed as stand-alone readings, allowing students to join in any month. Throughout each module, Dr. Isaac Schendel works with participants to build reading fluency, reinforce grammar and vocabulary, and explore the literary, historical, and cultural context of each text.
This series is intended for students who have completed a beginning Old English sequence or who possess equivalent familiarity with core grammar and foundational vocabulary. Students should be prepared to work through authentic Old English texts with guidance, dictionary support, and collaborative discussion, but full comfort with advanced poetic conventions or complex syntax is not required.
Required texts vary by module. Please consult the specific monthly module listing for text and edition information.
Each module focuses on a selected Old English work drawn from a range of genres, including biblical retellings, allegorical poetry, homiletic prose, and other representative texts from the Old English canon. Modules are designed as stand-alone readings, allowing students to join in any month. Throughout each module, Dr. Isaac Schendel works with participants to build reading fluency, reinforce grammar and vocabulary, and explore the literary, historical, and cultural context of each text.
This series is intended for students who have completed a beginning Old English sequence or who possess equivalent familiarity with core grammar and foundational vocabulary. Students should be prepared to work through authentic Old English texts with guidance, dictionary support, and collaborative discussion, but full comfort with advanced poetic conventions or complex syntax is not required.
Required texts vary by module. Please consult the specific monthly module listing for text and edition information.
Note: All sessions will be live recorded and shared with all enrolled students afterward for review and to allow those who cannot attend live to still participate in the class.
Required Texts
A number of Old English poems, like The Panther and the Whale, describes animals as allegorical representations of metaphysical truth. To the Anglo-Saxons, the Panther is a kind and gentle creature to everyone except the serpent, and its supposedly warm-hearted nature reflects God’s love for everyone (except the Devil, of course). Similarly, the whale deceives sailors into a false security and then drags them to the bottom of the ocean, just like the Devil seeks to trick sinners into Hell. These poems, entertainingly bizarre depictions of the natural world, offer key insight into the medieval Anglo-Saxon worldview, where the line between the natural and supernatural world is blurry and hard to define (if it exists at all).
Required Text: The best edition would be the collection Old English Shorter Poems: Volume 1: Religious and Didactic with the Dumbarton Oaks Medieval Library. Other editions are fine, but they may follow different editorial principles and there might therefore be small orthographical, punctuation or other discrepancies. The bibliographic information for the DOML edition is: Jones, Christopher A. (editor). Old English Shorter Poems: Volume 1: Religious and Didactic. Dumbarton Oaks Medieval Library 15. Cambridge/London: Harvard University Press, 2012. ISBN: 9780674057890.
Check out Current and Upcoming offerings from:
| Sessions Overview | ||
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| # | Signum Time US/Eastern |
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| 1 |
Wed, Apr 1 10:00 PM |
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| 2 |
Mon, Apr 6 10:00 PM |
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| 3 |
Wed, Apr 8 10:00 PM |
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| 4 |
Mon, Apr 13 10:00 PM |
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| 5 |
Wed, Apr 15 10:00 PM |
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| 6 |
Mon, Apr 20 10:00 PM |
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| 7 |
Wed, Apr 22 10:00 PM |
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| 8 |
Mon, Apr 27 10:00 PM |
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