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Dr Kenneth Austin

Lecturer in Early Modern European History

Office: 2.45, 13 Woodland Road: Consultation hours (PDF)

Phone: 0117 928 7620

Email: kenneth.austin@bristol.ac.uk

Research interests

My research lies in the field of late medieval and early modern European history. More specifically, I am interested in the intellectual, religious and cultural history of this period, and especially the connections between the worlds of the Renaissance and the Reformation. My doctoral research focused on the life and writings of the sixteenth-century scholar and Jewish convert to Christianity, Immanuel Tremellius (1510-1580). In 2007, I published a biography of Tremellius (see below). This was the first modern study of a highly influential figure who has been surprisingly overlooked in the historiography of the continental reformation. This work also intersects with a number of broader themes, including the intellectual and religious context of this period, sixteenth century scholarship, the European Reformation, friendship and patronage networks, and toleration and irenicism. In my more recent research, I have been pursuing further my interests in these areas. I am currently working on a study of the Reformation and the Jews. I am also conducting research which focuses on correspondence and friendship networks within the European reformation.

Research supervision

I would be interested in supervising students who wish to work on any subject which overlaps with my research interests outlined above. I would particularly welcome proposals in the following areas:

• Any aspect of Protestantism, and especially Calvinism, in continental Europe
• The Renaissance
• Scholarship of the fifteenth to seventeenth centuries
• Friendship and correspondence networks in the Renaissance and Reformation eras
• Topics relating to the encounter (positive or negative) of different religions and confessions
• Late medieval and early modern Italian history

I currently supervise research students who work on the following topics:

• The Renaissance studio and the cultivation of the self
• Food as a religious and cultural marker in late medieval and early modern Spain
• The theological implications of anatomical study in C17th England

Please do not hesitate to get in touch with me to discuss your research ideas.

Undergraduate teaching

I contribute to the team-taught first year Lecture Outline, Introduction to Early Modern History, and co-ordinate the first year unit, Approaching the Past, taken by all History and History of Art students.

In addition, I offer the following undergraduate units:

• The Culture and Civilisation of the Renaissance (first year Special Topic)
• The Early Reformation (second year Lecture Response Unit)
• Calvinism and Europe (third year Special Subject)
• Getting Acquainted with Friendship (third year Reflective History unit)

Postgraduate Teaching

I am currently the Programme Director for the MA in History. I also teach an Optional Unit, entitled Persecution and Toleration: Dealing with Difference in Late Medieval and Early Modern Europe.

Selected publications

• ‘“Epitome of the Old Testament, Mirror of God's Grace and Complete Anatomy of Man": Immanuel Tremellius and the Psalms’, in Bruce Gordon and Matthew McLean (Eds), Shaping the Bible in the Reformation: Books, Scholars and Readers in the Sixteenth Century (Brill: Library of the Written Word Series, forthcoming 2011)
• ‘Dealing with difference: Correspondence and Religious Identity, c.1570-1650’, in Anne Dunan-Page and Clotilde Prunier (Eds), Croire à la lettre (Presses Universitaires de la Méditerranée, forthcoming 2011)
• ‘A Wandering Jew in the Service of Reform: Immanuel Tremellius and International Calvinism’, Dimensioni e problemi della ricerca storica. Rivista del Dipartimento di storia moderna e contemporanea dell'Università degli studi di Roma ‘La Sapienza’ (forthcoming 2011)
• (with Wendy Anderson), ‘Faith, Friendship and Learning: Intercultural Communication in the Republic of Letters’, Language and Intercultural Communications 10, 1 (2010), pp.17-31
• From Judaism to Calvinism: The Life and Writings of Immanuel Tremellius (1510-1580) (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2007)
• ‘Humanism and the cult of the text’ in Jonathan Hill (Ed.), The History of Christianity (Oxford: Lion Hudson, 2007), p.242
• 'Immanuel Tremellius' Latin Bible (1575-9) as a Pillar of the Calvinist Faith', in David Adams and Adrian Armstrong (Eds), Print and Power in France and England, 1500-1800 (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2006), pp.27-38
• ‘Immanuel Tremellius and the Avoidance of Controversy' in Luc Racaut and Alec Ryrie (Eds), Moderate Voices in the European Reformation (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2005), pp.70-89
• 'Immanuel Tremellius (1510-1580), the Jews and Christian Hebraica' in Achim Detmers and J. Marius J. Lange van Ravenwaay (Eds), Bundeseinheit und Gottesvolk. Reformierter Protestantismus und Judentum im Europa des 16. und 17. Jahrhunderts (Wuppertal: Foedus, 2005), pp.71-88.

Full Publications

Full list of Dr Austin's publications held in the University's IRIS publications database.