Liberal Arts - 32 Campus Drive
Missoula, MT - 59812
406-243-5231
Ashby Kinch
– Associate Professor
Office: LA 126
Phone: (406) 243-4462
Email: ashby.kinch@mso.umt.edu
Curriculum Vita: View/Download CV
Description:
I am a professor of English literature specializing in the literature of the medieval period, particularly late medieval literature. I also study the history of lyric poetry and work in the field of translation studies, specifically Middle English translations of Latin and French writing in the fifteenth century. I have recently published articles on word-image relations in both medieval literature and in the work of a contemporary American poet, Cole Swensen. I am also developing a research interest in neuroscience and poetry. My current book project, "Imago Mortis: The Mediating Image of Death in late Middle English Poetry," focuses on "macabre" literature of the 15th century and its relationship with the visual iconography of death: based on my analysis of images of three principal typologies (Bedside Death scenes, the Three Living and Three Dead, and the Danse Macabre) in France and England, I examine three Middle English poems (Hoccleve's "Lerne to Die," the anonymous Middle English "Three Dead Kings," and Lydgate's "Dance of Death") in terms of how they are influenced by, and in turn mediate reception, of these visual traditions.
Research Interests:
Medieval Literature, particularly Middle English Literature
History of the English Lyric
Late Medieval Art / Macabre Art
Thanatology / Death Studies
Courses:
LIT 220: British Literature: Anglo-Saxon to Renaissance
LIT 491: Poetry, Perception, and the Brain
Hobbies:
Skiing, rugby (mostly watching these days), guitar.
Education:
Occidental College, A.B. English and Comparative Literary Studies
University of Michigan, PhD, English (Specializations: Middle English Literature and critical theory)
Teaching Experience:
Kealing Junior High School Latin Teacher (1992-3)
Composition Instructor, University of Michigan (1994-97)
Great Books Instructor, University of Michigan (1997-2000)
Assistant Professor, Christopher Newport University (2000-03)
Selected Publications:
Chartier in Europe, eds. Emma Cayley and Ashby Kinch. Cambridge, D.S. Brewer, 2008.
“The Broken Mirror of the Book: Cole Swensen’s Such Rich Hour and Les Très Riches Heures de Jean, duc de Berry, Word & Image 27.2 (2011), 175-189.
“‘La Crudele in amore’: Carlo del Nero Reads La Belle Dame sans mercy,” Chartier in Europe, Cambridge, D.S. Brewer, 2008, pp. 165-182.
“Image, Ideology, and Form: The Middle English Three Dead Kings in its Iconographic Context,” Chaucer Review 43.1 (2008), 49-82.
“De l’ombre de mort en clarté de vie”: The Evolution of Alain Chartier’s Public Voice,” Fifteenth-Century Studies 33 (2008), 151-170.
“A Prolegomenon to the Stonyhurst Medulla: An Edition of the Letter A,“ Bulletin du Cange (Archivium latinitatis medii aevi) 65 (2007), pp. 45-116 (co-authored with Vince McCarren and Sean Pollack)
“‘To thenke what was in hir wille’: A Female Reading Context for the Findern Anthology,” Neophilologus 91. 3 (July, 2007), 729-44.
“A Naked Roos: Translation and Subjection in the Middle English La Belle Dame Sans Mercy” JEGP 105.3 (2006), 415-445.
Affiliations:
International Courtly Literature Society
New Chaucer Society
International Alain Chartier Society
Rocky Mountain Modern Language Association
International Experience:
English Teacher, Japan, 1992
Luce Scholar, Malaysia 1995-6
Research/Archival work in the Bibliotheque Nationale de France (Paris) and the British Library (London)
Extensive travel in Europe (England, France, Germany, Italy, Russia, Spain, and Switzerland)
Extensive travel in Asia (China, Mongolia, Hong Kong, the Philippines, Thailand, Indonesia)
Languages Known:
- Latin - general intermediate
- French - general intermediate
- Italian - limited working proficiency