Medieval and Early Modern Studies (MEMS) Minor

The undergraduate minor in medieval and early modern studies provides students with a broad, humanities-based approach to the rich and fascinating cultures that flourished globally from around 500 CE to 1800 CE.

Requirements 

In addition to the program requirements listed below, students must:

  • take at least nine hours of their minor "core" requirements at UNC–Chapel Hill
  • earn a minimum cumulative GPA of 2.000 in the minor core requirements. Some programs may require higher standards for minor or specific courses.

For more information, please consult the degree requirements section of the catalog.

This interdisciplinary minor requires students to take five classes representing at least three different subject codes.

Core Requirements
One core course chosen from:3
Medieval Art in Western Europe
IDEAs in Action General Education logo History of the Indian Subcontinent to 1750
IDEAs in Action General Education logo Introduction to Islamic Civilization
IDEAs in Action General Education logo Great Books I: Epic and Lyric Traditions
IDEAs in Action General Education logo British Literature, Medieval to 18th Century H
IDEAs in Action General Education logo Medieval History
IDEAs in Action General Education logo Early Modern European History, 1450-1815
IDEAs in Action General Education logo Studies in Medieval and Early Modern Music
At least one course at the 300 level or above3
No more than three courses at the 100 level (including the core course)9
Total Hours15
H

Honors version available. An honors course fulfills the same requirements as the nonhonors version of that course. Enrollment and GPA restrictions may apply.

The following courses are approved for the MEMS minor. With the prior approval of the MEMS minor supervisor up to two courses can be applied to the minor as transfer credits from other institutions.

Medieval and Early Modern Studies Course List
AMST/ANTH 54IDEAs in Action General Education logo First-Year Seminar: The Indians' New Worlds: Southeastern Histories from 1200 to 1800 13
AMST/HIST 110IDEAs in Action General Education logo Introduction to the Cultures and Histories of Native North America3
ANTH 121IDEAs in Action General Education logo Ancient Cities of the Americas3
ARTH 54IDEAs in Action General Education logo First-Year Seminar: Art, War, and Revolution 1, H3
ARTH 151IDEAs in Action General Education logo History of Western Art I H3
ARTH 264Medieval Art in Western Europe3
ARTH 265Medieval Iconography H3
ARTH 274IDEAs in Action General Education logo European Baroque Art3
ARTH 450The City as Monument H3
ARTH 466History of the Illuminated Book3
ARTH 471Northern European Art of the 14th and 15th Centuries3
ARTH 472Early Modern Art, 1400-1750 H3
ARTH 490Special Topics in Art History (based on topic)3
ASIA/HIST 131Southeast Asia before 1800 through Digital History3
ASIA/HIST 135IDEAs in Action General Education logo History of the Indian Subcontinent to 17503
ASIA/HIST 138History of Muslim Societies to 15003
ASIA/RELI 180IDEAs in Action General Education logo Introduction to Islamic Civilization3
ASIA/RELI 183IDEAs in Action General Education logo Asian Religions3
ASIA/RELI 284IDEAs in Action General Education logo The Buddhist Tradition: East Asia3
ASIA/RELI 285IDEAs in Action General Education logo The Buddhist Tradition: Southeast Asia and Sri Lanka3
ASIA/RELI 487Mountains, Pilgrimage, and Sacred Places in Japan3
ASIA/RELI 488IDEAs in Action General Education logo Shinto in Japanese History3
ASIA/RELI 489IDEAs in Action General Education logo Animals in Japanese Religion3
ASIA/RELI 581IDEAs in Action General Education logo Sufism3
ASIA/RELI 582IDEAs in Action General Education logo Islam and Islamic Art in South Asia3
ASIA/RELI 584IDEAs in Action General Education logo The Qur'an as Literature3
ASIA 300/RELI 283IDEAs in Action General Education logo The Buddhist Tradition: India, Nepal, and Tibet3
ASIA 301/RELI 286IDEAs in Action General Education logo Premodern Japanese Religions3
ASIA 303/RELI 288IDEAs in Action General Education logo Chinese Religions3
CLAS 259Pagans and Christians3
CLAS/CMPL 364The Classical Background of English Poetry H3
CMPL 120IDEAs in Action General Education logo Great Books I: Epic and Lyric Traditions3
CMPL 121IDEAs in Action General Education logo Great Books I: Romancing the World H3
CMPL 122IDEAs in Action General Education logo Great Books I: Visual Arts and Literature from Antiquity to 1750 H3
CMPL 123IDEAs in Action General Education logo Great Books I: Politics and Literature from Antiquity to 17503
CMPL 124IDEAs in Action General Education logo Great Books I: Science and Literature from Antiquity to 17503
CMPL 223IDEAs in Action General Education logo Global Authors: Cervantes3
CMPL 317IDEAs in Action General Education logo Myth, Fable, Novella: The Long History of the Short Story H3
CMPL 452The Middle Ages3
CMPL 453IDEAs in Action General Education logo The Erotic Middle Ages3
CMPL 454IDEAs in Action General Education logo Literature of the Continental Renaissance in Translation H3
CMPL 456IDEAs in Action General Education logo The 18th-Century Novel3
CMPL 473IDEAs in Action General Education logo Drama, Pageantry, and Spectacle in Medieval Europe3
CMPL/ENGL 621Arthurian Romance3
ENGL 120IDEAs in Action General Education logo British Literature, Medieval to 18th Century H3
ENGL 153IDEAs in Action General Education logo Sex, Gender, and Sexuality in the Premodern World3
ENGL 223IDEAs in Action General Education logo Chaucer H3
ENGL 224IDEAs in Action General Education logo Survey of Medieval English Literature, excluding Chaucer H3
ENGL 225IDEAs in Action General Education logo Shakespeare H3
ENGL 226IDEAs in Action General Education logo Renaissance Drama H3
ENGL 227IDEAs in Action General Education logo Literature of the Earlier Renaissance H3
ENGL 228Literature of the Later Renaissance H3
ENGL 230IDEAs in Action General Education logo Milton H3
ENGL 23718th-Century Drama H3
ENGL 325IDEAs in Action General Education logo Shakespeare and His Contemporaries H3
ENGL 327IDEAs in Action General Education logo Renaissance Literature and Its Intellectual Contexts3
ENGL 329IDEAs in Action General Education logo Medieval Feminisms3
ENGL 330IDEAs in Action General Education logo Perspectives on the Renaissance3
ENGL 331IDEAs in Action General Education logo 18th-Century Literature H3
ENGL 430IDEAs in Action General Education logo Renaissance Literature--Contemporary Issues3
ENGL/PWAD 660War in Shakespeare's Plays3
FREN 315IDEAs in Action General Education logo Imposteur!: Faking and False Identities in French and Francophone Drama and Film3
FREN 370IDEAs in Action General Education logo French and Francophone Studies to 17893
FREN 387IDEAs in Action General Education logo Paris/Versailles: The Court and the City in the 17th Century3
FREN 554Writing the Mediterranean3
FREN 675Literature and Enlightenment, 17th - 18th Centuries3
GERM 210Getting Medieval: Knights, Violence, and Romance3
GERM 216The Viking Age3
GERM 500History of the German Language3
GERM 505Early New High German3
GERM 511Old Saxon3
GERM 514Old Norse I (Old Icelandic)3
GERM 515Old Norse II (Old Icelandic)3
GERM 615Foundations in German Studies II3
GERM/WGST 220Women in the Middle Ages3
GERM 508Old High German3
GSLL 53IDEAs in Action General Education logo First-Year Seminar: Early Germanic Culture: Myth, Magic, Murder, and Mayhem 13
HIST 107IDEAs in Action General Education logo Medieval History3
HIST 127IDEAs in Action General Education logo American History to 18653
HIST 142IDEAs in Action General Education logo Latin America under Colonial Rule3
HIST 151IDEAs in Action General Education logo European History to 16503
HIST 177HHonors Seminar in Early European History3
HIST 228IDEAs in Action General Education logo Medieval Science3
HIST 255IDEAs in Action General Education logo Manor to Machine: The Economic Shaping of Europe3
HIST 306IDEAs in Action General Education logo Princes and Reformations in Germany, 1400-16003
HIST 307IDEAs in Action General Education logo War and Enlightenment in Germany, 1600-18153
HIST 398IDEAs in Action General Education logo Undergraduate Seminar in History (based on topic) H3
HIST 431The Medieval Church3
HIST 432The Crusades3
HIST 434IDEAs in Action General Education logo Medieval England3
HIST 435The Medieval University3
HIST 437IDEAs in Action General Education logo Aristocratic Culture in the Central Middle Ages3
HIST 452The Renaissance: Italy, Birthplace of the Renaissance, 1300-15503
HIST 453Mediterranean Societies and Economics in the Renaissance World3
HIST/PWAD 254IDEAs in Action General Education logo War and Society in Early Modern Europe3
HIST/PWAD 266IDEAs in Action General Education logo Global History of Warfare3
HIST/RELI 454The Reformation3
HIST/WGST 280IDEAs in Action General Education logo Women and Gender in Latin American History3
ITAL 241IDEAs in Action General Education logo The Renaissance Mind and Body3
ITAL 357Dante, Petrarch, and Boccaccio in English3
LATN 205Medieval Latin3
MUSC 251IDEAs in Action General Education logo Studies in Medieval and Early Modern Music3
PHIL 215IDEAs in Action General Education logo Medieval Philosophy3
PHIL 220IDEAs in Action General Education logo 17th and 18th Century Western Philosophy H3
PHIL 415Medieval Philosophy3
PHIL 421IDEAs in Action General Education logo Rationalism3
PHIL 422IDEAs in Action General Education logo Empiricism3
PHIL 470Political Philosophy from Hobbes to Rousseau3
PORT 501Survey of Portuguese Literature I3
RELI 64IDEAs in Action General Education logo First-Year Seminar: Reintroducing Islam 13
RELI 161IDEAs in Action General Education logo Introduction to the History of Christian Traditions H3
RELI 165IDEAs in Action General Education logo Mysticism H3
RELI 362IDEAs in Action General Education logo Mary in the Christian Tradition H3
RELI 366Medieval Religious Texts3
RELI 367The Art of Devotion in Medieval and Early Modern Europe3
RELI 450IDEAs in Action General Education logo Sexuality in Jewish Tradition and History3
RELI 489IDEAs in Action General Education logo Animals in Japanese Religion3
RELI 525Seminar in Religion and Literature3
RELI 566Islamic and Jewish Legal Literature3
RELI 586IDEAs in Action General Education logo Women and Gender in Japanese Religions3
RELI/WGST 371Women Mystics3
SPAN 280Cervantes in English Translation3
SPAN 371Studies in Spanish Literature3
SPAN 383Medieval Spanish Literature3
SPAN 384Spanish Renaissance3
SPAN 613Colonial and 19th-Century Spanish American Literature3
SPAN 617Cervantes and the Quijote3
SPAN 650The Spanish Comedia of the Golden Age3
H

Honors version available. An honors course fulfills the same requirements as the nonhonors version of that course. Enrollment and GPA restrictions may apply.

1

Restricted to first-year students only.

See the program page here for special opportunities.

Department of English and Comparative Literature

Visit Program Website

Greenlaw Hall, CB# 3520

(919) 962-5481

Chair

Marsha Collins

ECL Undergraduate Advisor

Hilary Lithgow

lithgow@email.unc.edu

Director of Undergraduate Studies

Joseph Fletcher

jafletch@email.unc.edu