Meet the team

Dr Aengus Ward - Lead Instructor

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have been a lecturer in the Department of Modern Languages (Hispanic Studies) since 1994. I teach medieval Spanish literature and Spanish language and linguistics. My research interests lie in the fields of medieval Spanish history and historiography, textual editing, diachronic phonology and syntax.

The Estoria project emerges from my interest in medieval Iberian chronicles and my previous ventures into the world of textual editing. Weaim to produce a digital edition of the Estoria de Espanna by the end of 2016, but we also hope to create a series of tools which will engage a wider audience with the history of Iberia and the superb medieval manuscripts that preserve the Estoria.

Web page Links to an external site.

Email

  

Dr Bárbara Bordalejo

Screen Shot 2014-07-28 at 18.19.44.pngDr Bordalejo is a digital humanist and a textual scholar with a background in English Literature. She has published electronic editions of Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, Darwin’s Origin of Species and 15th Century Spanish Cancioneros. Her interests focus on textual criticism with particular emphasis in electronic editing and the use of computer methods to study texts, collation of large textual traditions, the history and future of the book and transmedia storytelling. She teaches digital literature and new media, English and American literature. She is a member of the executive of Global Outlook: Digital Humanities.

Web page Links to an external site.

 

Dr Fiona Maguire

Screen Shot 2014-07-28 at 18.19.53.pngDr Maguire is a research fellow on the Estoria team and has worked on several projects involving palaeography and digital editions.
 

Dr Enrique Jerez

Dr Jerez joined the team recently, in October 2014, as a research fellow. For nine years (1997-2006) he worked in the Biblioteca Nacional in Spain as part of the Golden Age Research Project led by Pablo Jauralde. His role involved cataloguing Castilian poetry manuscripts dating from the 16th and 17th centuries. He has been involved in research into textual criticism and the history of the historiography studied by Diego Catalán, with whom he worked closely for five years in the preparation of the monograph Rodericus romanzado (FRMP, 2005). He also completed his PhD thesis under the direction of Professor Catalán, on the topic of the ideological motivations and composition techniques of one of the principal Alfonsine sources, the Chronicon mundi by Lucas de Tuy. These days, Dr Jerez's interests have widened to the study of narrative symbolism in medieval literature, and in particular the frontier between Legend and History.

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Mr Zeth Green

Screen Shot 2014-07-28 at 18.20.02.pngI am a developer and researcher working in the digital arts and humanities, primarily on electronic editions and tools concerning the New Testament and other ancient works. I am the software developer on the project.

Web page Links to an external site.

 

Mrs Polly Duxfield

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I came to the Estoria Digital project through my background in sociolinguistics and as an ex-student of Aengus’s here at the University of Birmingham, where I completed both my BA and my MPhil. I spent my year abroad in Santiago de Compostela where I became interested in Galician sociolinguistics, which was the topic of my MPhil. After my masters I qualified as a teacher and taught first in a primary school, specialising in MFL, then at secondary schools in Worcestershire, teaching GCSE and A Level French and Spanish. My main academic interests lie in linguistics, especially sociolinguistics, but participating in the EDIT project has given me the opportunity to develop my interests and begin to explore other fields, such as medieval studies, digital humanities, textual editing and e-learning. In my spare time I am a Girl Guide leader, a role that I have now done for around ten years, and I have recently taken over Rainbow unit.
 
 

Miss Marine Poirier

Screen Shot 2014-07-28 at 18.20.18.pngI am currently a contractual doctoral student (‟allocataire-monitrice”) in Spanish linguistics at the University of Rennes 2 and research assistant on the Estoria Digital project in Birmingham. After a Master’s degree prepared at the Universities of Rennes and Salamanca with a dissertation on the Estoria (2011) and French agrégation (2012), I worked as a teacher at a secondary school in Rennes, teaching Spanish A level. Since September 2013, I have benefitted from a research contract for a thesis I am preparing under the joint supervision of Dr. Chrystelle Fortineau-Brémond, Dr. Virginie Dumanoir and Dr. Aengus Ward about the representation of Others’ discourse in the Estoria de Espanna, more specifically about “dizque” / “diz que” / “diz … que”. For any further information, you can see my personal webpage below.

Web page Links to an external site.

 

Mr Christian Kusi-Obodum

Screen Shot 2014-07-28 at 18.20.28.pngI began working as part of the Estoria Digital programme at the start of 2014 as a Birmingham alumnus and having been taught by Aengus Ward. During my year abroad I studied in Lisbon and Oviedo, allowing me to experience the amazing cultural and linguistic variation in the Iberian Peninsula. After graduation I trained to be a French and Spanish teacher in Reading, and after a short time teaching English in Poland I returned to the University of Birmingham to help with the Estoria project. I am excited to be exploring historiography, especially in the case of medieval Iberia, the frontier por excelencia between Christendom and the Islamic world. I’m keen to develop skills in palaeography and textual editing, as it will bring manuscripts right into the modern age, offering new dynamics for historical analysis. Outside of work I enjoy creative writing, as well as challenging myself to hold my balance on a ‘slackline’, otherwise known as tightrope walking!