University Directory

Paul J. Patterson, PhD

Professor of English, Faculty Pre-Law Advisor

Paul Patterson PhD

Department

Office

Merion 139

Phone

610-660-1353
Contact
    • BS – Secondary Education, English, Theology - Pillsbury College
    • MA – Department of English, Butler University
    • MA – Medieval Literature, Department of English, University of Notre Dame
    • PhD – Medieval Literature, Department of English, University of Notre Dame

  • Research Interests

    • Late medieval religious writing; Middle English Literature; manuscript studies; textual criticism; book history; Chaucer reception

    Pedagogical Style

    • My courses emphasize close reading and discussion. To that end, my courses feature short lectures, discussion, group work, and in-class responses. I emphasize the material nature of the text and as often as possible introduce my students to textual and editing theory and to medieval manuscripts and early print books.

    Professional Organizations

    • Early Book Society; Langland Society; Lollard Society; Medieval Academy of America; Modern Language Association; and New Chaucer Society
    • Book Review Editor for the Journal of Medieval Religious Cultures (JMRC)
    • I have also taught at the University of Cincinnati and St. Joseph’s College of New York.

  • Books:

    • Mirror to Devout People (Speculum devotorum), Early English Text Society, o.s. 346, Oxford University Press (2016).

    Articles and Book Chapters:

    • “Translating Access and Authority at Syon Abbey,” in 'Diuerse Imaginaciouns of Cristes Life': Devotional Culture in England and Beyond, 1300-1560, edited by Stephen Kelly and Ryan Perry. Forthcoming from Brepols (2015), pp. 443-459
    • “Preaching with the Hands: Carthusian Book Production and the Speculum Devotorum,” in Medieval Latin and Middle English Literature: Essays in Honor of Jill Mann edited by Maura B. Nolan and Christopher Cannon (Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 2011), 134-51.
    • “Reforming Chaucer: Margins and Religion in an Apocryphal Canterbury Tale,” Book History 8 (2005): 11-36.
    • “The Book and Religious Practice in Late-Medieval England (Introduction),” Religion and Literature 37.2 Summer (2005): 1-8.
    • Editor, “The Book and Religious Practice in Late Medieval England,” Special Issue of Religion & Literature, 37.2 (2005)
    • Book Reviews in Notes & Queries, The Yearbook of Langland Studies, and The Medieval Review

    Forthcoming and In-progress:

    • “Female Readers and the Sources of the Mirror to Devout People," Journal of Medieval Religious Cultures (Spring 2016)
    • "Sermons,” in The Encyclopedia of Medieval British Literature, eds. Robert Rouse and Sian Echard (Wiley-Blackwell, 2016)
    • NEH Summer Stipend (2011)
    • Huntington Library / British Academy Exchange Fellowship for Study in Great Britain (2011); Course Development Grant, Saint Joseph’s University (2011)
    • Newberry Library / British Academy Exchange Fellowship for Study in Great Britain (2010)
    • Saint Joseph's University Faculty Summer Development Grant, (2009)
    • Shallek Dissertation Award, Medieval Academy of America and Richard III Society of America (2004-2005).
    • Participant in “Adaptations,” Mellon Regional Faculty Fellowship, Penn Humanities Forum (2011-12); “The Reformation of the Book: 1450-1700, ” NEH Summer Seminar (2007) and “Image, Text, Context: Interdisciplinary Approaches to the Illuminated Manuscript,” Erasmus Institute Summer Seminar (2005)
    • Adviser to the “Parker’s Scribe” project, a subproject to the Mellon Foundation-funded digitization initiative “Making Medieval English Manuscripts: New Knowledge, New Technologies” (http://www.stanford.edu/group/dmstech/cgi-bin/drupal/node/41)