The Usefulness of the Middle Ages (Jeff Rider)

Jeff Rider (Wesleyan University)  is a professor of the literature and history of medieval Europe. He specializes in Flemish history, the Arthurian legend and medievalism (the reception and uses of medieval artifacts in contemporary society).

 This lecture will explain the importance of imagining other times and places, other worlds than the world of our everyday experience, whether those worlds are or were real or fictional, because it helps us live better and more successfully. It will show how cultivating an empathetic imagination through the study of history and literature and imagining the worlds they project makes us more resilient, more adaptable, and better able to cope with adversity, create new things, and imagine alternative courses of action than we would if we did not study history and literature.

This talk is part of the Danish Institute for Advanced Study's IDEAS series.