TILTS: The Renaissance Institute

About the Renaissance Institute


The inaugural year of the Texas Institute for Literary and Textual Studies will focus on the topic of "Literature and Religious Conflict in the English Renaissance."


Our modern world faces a great deal of newly prominent religious conflict, ranging from 9/11 and subsequent Al Qaeda attacks to the Chinese repression of the Falun Gong, the international Anglican/Episcopalian split over ordaining gay bishops, and harsh debates in the US about abortion. In this context, 21st-century literary scholarship has felt compelled to a new engagement with its own earlier experience of violent religious conflict - the bitter struggle we now know as the Protestant Reformation.

During the years from 1526 to 1659 religio-political violence was ignited over and over again, throughout the English world: in Ireland, in the Low Countries, in France, and in England itself. All the great English Renaissance writers, from Sir Thomas More through Sidney and Spenser, Shakespeare and Milton, took up complex positions of interrogation, resistance, and personal commitment regarding many of the most inflammatory issues that arose. The UT English Renaissance community is devoting the 2009-10 school year to exploring these questions. The tabs on this page lead to a variety of individual and community projects that together constitute the year's Institute: the fall Odyssey course, the spring speaker series, the summer symposium, and the work of individual faculty and graduate students. 

 

Staff 

Directors

Frank Whigham
Parlin 316
512.471.8794
ffw@mail.utexas.edu

Wayne Rebhorn
Parlin 328
512.471.8759
warebhorn@mail.utexas.edu 		    Steering Committee

J.K. Barret
Mary Blockley
Douglas Bruster
James Loehlin
Eric Mallin
John Rumrich
Hannah Chapelle Wojciehowski

Andrea Golden Coordinator

Andrea Golden
Parlin 108/110
512.232.2343
amgolden@mail.utexas.edu

For administrative questions regarding travel, reimbursements, Odyssey Course registration, and general information, please contact Andrea Golden.

FAQ 

 

Q. How do I enroll in the fall Odyssey course?

A. If you are paying by credit card you can register on the secure web site at www.utodyssey.org. Registration by phone can be made at 512-471-2934. For full details see the Fall 2009 course bulletin [link]. Note: The cost for the fall lecture series is $150. A 20% discount (to $120) is available for UT Austin faculty, staff, and students; Texas Exes members; OLLI members and OLLI wait list; Littlefield Society members; and Odyssey alumni who have taken an Odyssey class in the last two years.

Q. What is the TILTS summer symposium?

A. A four-day scholarly symposium to be held at the University of Texas at Austin, May 24 through May 27, 2010. Scholars whose research concerns any aspect of the Institute's topic are invited to send individual proposals for the first symposium to the Directors of the Institute. (Applicants should feel free to interpret both "literature" and "religious conflict" in broad  terms.) TILTS Fellows will receive an honorarium of $1,200, and expenses for travel as well as for food and lodging during the four-day event (air travel and lodging to be booked by the Institute). Fellows are expected to produce substantial scholarly essays which, together with other texts and materials, will be the focus of presentations and discussions at the Symposium. Texas Studies in Literature and Language will publish a special issue of selected essays from the Symposium.

Q. How do I apply for the summer symposium?

A. Address applications to: Wayne A. Rebhorn and Frank Whigham, Directors of the Texas Institute for Literary and Textual Studies, at TILTS.renaissance@austin.utexas.edu. Applicants must hold the Ph.D. and should submit the following, in a single pdf file:

Successful applicants will be notified after November 15, 2009, and will then be asked to develop their proposals into essays of 25-30 pages, which must be submitted to the Directors by March 1, 2010 for advance circulation among the participants in the Symposium. Application deadline is October 1, 2009.