Nicholas Watson (academic)

Nicholas Watson is an English-Canadian medievalist, literary critic, religious historian, and author. He is Henry B. and Anne M. Cabot Professor of English at Harvard University and chair of the Harvard English Department.[1][2]

Education and early career

Nicholas Watson was raised in Winchester, England.[3] After an undergraduate education at the University of Cambridge and graduate work with Vincent Gillespie at Oxford, he began his scholarly career with a 1987 dissertation at the University of Toronto on the Yorkshire hermit Richard Rolle.[3] Watson is Henry B. and Anne M. Cabot Professor of English at Harvard; before joining the faculty at Harvard he taught at the University of Western Ontario from 1990 to 2001.[4]

Career

Watson has written on vernacularity, gender, religious censorship, ritual magic, and mystical literature; he has also edited and translated important works from medieval Latin and Middle English. He is credited with introducing the concept of "vernacular theology" to literary and religious studies.[5] His scholarship has explored figures such as Julian of Norwich, William Langland, Marguerite Porete, Geoffrey Chaucer, John of Morigny, Richard Rolle, the Pearl Poet, and Archbishop Thomas Arundel.[3]

Awards

In 1990 he was awarded the John Charles Polanyi Prize.[6] His research has been supported by the Canadian Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, the Guggenheim Foundation,[7] the American Council of Learned Societies,[8] and the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study.[9] In 2016 he was named a Fellow of the Medieval Academy of America.

Works

References

  1. ^ "Life in Brief: Nicholas Watson". Retrieved 31 March 2015.
  2. ^ "Nicholas Watson, Henry B. and Anne M. Cabot Professor of English Literature". Harvard University: Dept. of English. Archived from the original on 2 April 2018. Retrieved 4 August 2015.
  3. ^ a b c Potier, Beth (7 February 2002). "Visions and magic: Medievalist Watson decodes some of history's most recalcitrant texts". Harvard Gazette. Harvard University. Retrieved 31 March 2015.
  4. ^ Rasmussen, William (18 April 2001). "Medieval Lit. Scholar Tenured". The Harvard Crimson. Retrieved 31 March 2015.
  5. ^ Rice, Nicole (3 April 2005). "Review of Blumenfeld-Kosinski, Renate, Duncan Robertson, Nancy Warren, eds. The Vernacular Spirit: Essays on Medieval Religious Literature". The Medieval Review. Retrieved 31 March 2015.
  6. ^ John Charles Polanyi Prize Winners
  7. ^ "Nicholas Watson: Guggenheim Fellow". Archived from the original on 3 April 2015. Retrieved 31 March 2015.
  8. ^ Nicholas J. Watson F'08: ACLS Fellow
  9. ^ "Religion in the vernacular: Nicholas Watson traces the decline of the clergy and the rise of the laity". Harvard Gazette. Harvard University. 18 December 2008. Retrieved 31 March 2015.