about
about me
Hi! I’m Clare.
Right now, I’m finishing up my MA in English at Georgetown University, focusing on world Medieval literature, particularly literature by women. I also do work in higher ed at the moment, and before this I got my BA in Classical Civilization, focusing on propaganda surrounding women in the early Roman empire. What that ends up meaning is this: I like to find out what women were up to and what people were saying about them at big transitional periods in history. I also am a lifelong lover of making and experiencing art — at times in my life, I’ve sung in choirs and a cappella groups, played in orchestras and wind ensembles, painted, danced, embroidered, doodled, journaled, knitted — you name it. Lastly, I’m a big lover of making things accessible and fun for everyone — I want people to learn cool things about history and about themselves and to have a great time doing it. This project is a product of those interests — keep scrolling to learn more. Click here to drop me a line.
what is this project?
This project was primarily undertaken as my capstone for my MA, but it’s also a labor of love. Essentially, this is a whole collection of activities that you can do — engaging many of your different senses — to learn about yourself and about medieval monastic women. How will we do that? Great question.
I believe that creating art is not only fun but is a way to engage spiritually with yourself and the world around you. But that’s not a huge revelation. What might surprise us, though, is that I also think that women religious felt the same way about their artistic endeavors in the Middle Ages. They viewed their art as a form of religious devotion, a way to better engage with their religious beliefs and to get to know themselves better.
You definitely don’t need to be religious in any way to engage with these activities, even though Hildegard of Bingen and Julian of Norwich (the two women with which this project is most occupied) were obviously very religious. I think anyone can engage with their spirituality through art, whether it be learning about yourself, others, the world around you, the universe, or a religious figure or belief.
There’s a lot more to learn through these activities — click below and try it out. If you’re wary of it all, I personally suggest you start with the coloring pages, but take a look and see what speaks to you.
I want to learn even more
Great news! I wrote about some of the more in-depth stuff about this project. There’s a lot of academic research behind the medieval aspects, and a lot of curriculum and learning design behind how the activities are laid out.
On the medieval research end, there’s a lot to learn and read, and I’ve also provided some good books and articles to read as well as a few videos to watch.
My curriculum design is based heavily on CAST’s Universal Design for Learning as well as some other curriculum designs. Again, the page linked below has all kinds of information on what that is and what that means for my project.
I hope these documents can help you if you want to learn more about anything mentioned in this project as well as if you’d like to use this in a classroom or a community group setting. If you’re planning on using In Every Sense with a group of your own, please click here and drop me a line as well — I’d love to hear from you about it.
If you want to know what all of this looks like, click below! Happy learning!
