Author Isabel Moreira to Speak at USU

Isabel Moreira, author of Dreams, Visions and Spiritual Authority in Merovingian Gaul, will speak at Utah State University Thursday, April 5, at 3 p.m. in the university’s Merrill-Cazier Library room 101.

The event is free, refreshments will be served and all are invited.

 

Moreira, who is an associate professor of early medieval history at the University of Utah, will present “Purgatory and the Politics of Certainty: Anglo-Saxon Missionaries at Home and Abroad.”

 

In this talk, Moreira examines the eighth century origins of purgatory as an imagined place and suggests that the missionary field proved an important testing ground for new and emerging ideas about the character, function and utility of the Christian afterlife. In particular, the talk highlights some of the difficulties encountered by Anglo-Saxon missionaries who were placed in the opposition of arguing against the family-oriented afterlives expected by the pagan communities they encountered.

 

The lecture is sponsored by the British and Commonwealth Studies Program, Medieval Studies, the departments of English and history, and the College of Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences.

 

Additional funding was provided by the Utah Humanities Council (UHC).

 

For more information on Moreira’s presentation, email ccooper@english.usu.edu.

 

 

Contact: USU Department of English, 797-2733