SOME STARTING DEFINITIONS

THESE ARE ALSO POSTED AT MEMO'S WEB PAGES
(http://medievalelectronicmultimedia.org/definitions.html)

MEDIEVALISM: "Medievalism is the study of responses to the Middle Ages at all periods since a sense of the mediaeval began to develop. Such responses include, but are not restricted to, the activities of scholars, historians and philologists in rediscovering medieval materials; the ways in which such materials were and are used by political groups intent on self-definition or self-legitimation; and artistic creations, whether literary, visual or musical, based on whatever has been or is thought to have been recovered from the medieval centuries. The Middle Ages remain present, moreover, in the modern consciousness, both through scholarship and through popular media such as film, video games, poster art, TV series and comic strips, and these media are also a legitimate object of study, if often intertwined with more traditionally scholarly topics. "
(T.A. Shippey, Studies in Medievalism, http://www.medievalism.net/)

MODERNIST MEDIEVALISM: Experimental medievalist fictions that imply historical discontinuity, rejecting traditinal values and assumptions. rewritten medieval values and assumptions into new values and assumptions, but framed within symbolic antinquities associated with the Middle Ages. Full of angst an a sense of futility, an infusion of what we perceive to be medieval characterization, plot, and fantasy with an awareness, exploration and elevation of the individual unconsciousness and consciousness. (Carol L. Robinson)

POST-MODERN MEDIEVALISM: More "medieval" than Modernist Medievalism in that it is more critical of contemporary perspectives of medieval values and societal codes, and is thus less comprehensive: fragments of a fragmented history, a synergism of histories, seamless and constantly changing histories that strike us as "medieval"--whether or not they truly are medieval in nature. A recognition that we don't really know the past any more than we know the future (much less the current zeitgeist). (Carol L. Robinson)

NEOMEDIEVALISM: a neologism that was first popularized by Italian medievalist Umberto Eco in his 1973 essay "Dreaming in the Middle Ages," and has been used in a variety of way since. Angst becomes aggression. Histories are purposely fragmented. The illusion of control is made through changes of the illusion, rather than attempted changes of reality. There is no longer a sense of the futile, or at least it is second-staged by an illusionary sense of power and a denial of reality. Medieval concepts and values are purposely rewritten as a consious vision of an alternative universe (a fantasy of the medieval that is created with forethought). Furthermore, this vision lacks the nostalgia of earlier medievalisms in that it denies history. Contemporary values (feminism, gay rights, modern technolgical warfare tactics, democracy, capitalism, ...) dominate and rewrite the traditional perceptions of the European Middle Ages, even infusing other medieval cultures, such as that of Japan.
*Neomedievalism is also a term used in political theory, and was first discussed in 1977 by theorist Hedly Bull in _The Anarchial Society: A Study of Order in World Politics_ (pg. 254-55). (Carol L. Robinson)