In March 2026, the Program in Medieval Studies held its annual graduate conference, titled “Seeing Sound, Speaking Images: The Senses in the Middle Ages.” Held over two days, the conference brought together graduate presenters, workshop leaders, and performers for a series of panels, hands-on sessions, and performances designed to explore the multisensory dimensions of medieval experience.
The conference was organized by graduate students Megan Coates (Art & Archaeology) and Claire Apostoli (Classics), who envisioned the event as “experimental and interactive.” The program included a manuscript study session in Princeton University Library’s Special Collections, workshop-style presentations that invited audience participation, and a keynote concert featuring ModernMedieval Voices and DEMESTVO.
The event received support from the Center for Collaborative History, the Committee for the Study of Late Antiquity, the Program in the Ancient World, the Seeger Center for Hellenic Studies, and the Departments of Art & Archaeology, Classics, English, Music, and Religion.
This year’s Medieval Studies Graduate Conference opened with a keynote concert featuring ModernMedieval Voices, directed by Jacqueline Horner-Kwiatek (Music), and DEMESTVO, led by graduate student Anastasia Shmytova (Music). The concert combined performance with discussion to encourage a more active and reflective mode of listening, according to Claire Apostoli (Classics) and Megan Coates (Art & Archaeology), who organized the conference. Apostoli and Coates also commissioned a new song for the event, from graduate student performer Lucy McKnight (Music). The concert was held in the Princeton Theological Seminary Chapel.
Conference speakers were invited to a guided manuscript session prior to the keynote concert. The discussion-oriented experience was held in Special Collections and led by Eric White (Princeton University Library). Read a reflection of this event by graduate student Izzy Friesen (Classics) on the Department of Art & Archaeology website.
The conference featured workshop-style panels that invited audience participation and discussion. Panels included “Seeing, Touching, and the Politics of the Senses” with Sarah Frisbie (Case Western) and Claire Pettit (Classics); “Hearing the Sacred: Voice, Music, and Liturgy” with Catherine Miki Otachime (Columbia) and Sean Widlake (Rutgers); “Smell, Taste, and the Visceral Body” with Adelaide Greig (Fordham), Zihan Guo (East Asian Studies) and Matthew Madain (History); and “Ritual Technologies of Perception: Movement, Space, and Non-Visual Operations” with Yining Zhu (UPenn), James Nowak (University of Toronto), and Gretchin Kepplinger (History).
