After the cancellation of our intended 2020 Spring Symposium<\/a> at Princeton University in early March, our events in person had to be suspended during the height of the worldwide Covid pandemic and widespread lockdown.<\/p>\n For that time, we focused on other activities, notably our website.\u00a0 Its online format provided a form of lifeline for our ongoing activities.\u00a0 Its existing patterns, such as webposts, webpages, galleries, and our blogs, provided the structure and the templates for those activities, to start with, before in person events could resume.<\/p>\n Grapes Watermark in a Selbold Cartulary Fragment, with Back-Lighting and Scale.<\/p><\/div>\n Thus there emerged in 2020 and beyond:<\/p>\n See, for example:<\/p>\n Next, after their cancellation in 2020, the annual conferences at which the RGME sponsors sessions and other activities could resume in online format in 2021 and beyond.<\/p>\n At the 2021 Congress online, Phillip Bernhardt-House shows onscreen the RGME Poster for his 2018 Congress Session. Photography Mildred Budny.<\/p><\/div>\n Thus, in 2021, there emerged the first online activities of the RGME.\u00a0 The 2021 International Congress on Medieval Studies (ICMS), held online in May, provided the opportunity to revive and present the sessions which had been accepted and prepared for May 2020, but this time not in-person.\u00a0 See:<\/p>\n Our Associate, Michael Allman Conrad, participates in our ‘Divination’ Session at the 2021 ICMS online.<\/p><\/div>\n The 2023 Congress returned to its in-person format, albeit with some hybrid features which rendered some sessions or other activities accessible online as well for Congress registrants. In that complicated way, for the RGME, the 2023 Congress had online as well as in-person manifestations.<\/p>\n At the 2021 online ICMS, the RGME Director presides onscreen for Vajra Regan’s Session for the RGME and Societas Magica.<\/p><\/div>\n See:<\/p>\n For these online or partly online years of the ICMS, some sessions \u2014 including some of the RGME’s \u2014 whether sponsored or co-sponsored, were recorded and made accessible for viewing for a limited period to Congress registrants, before disappearing from view.<\/p>\n When issued, those recordings had undergone editing, as might be expected, but that work included some unannounced editing of portions of the speakers’ presentations \u2014 to the speakers’ surprise when viewing the recorded version.<\/p>\n Otherwise, records of RGME proceedings at the ICMS in its online iterations circulate in screenshots, photographs of the screen, photographs in person for the online sessions, or the like.<\/p>\n William Campbell and David Sorenson, plus online screen projection, in person at the Congress for an online session for the RGME and SIMS. Photograph by Barbara Williams Ellertson.<\/p><\/div>\n Because the scheduling of the events for the 2021 online ICMS posed a conflict between the customary business meetings for the RGME and for its co-sponsor the Societas Magica<\/a>, we resolved to overcome the difficulty by creating an innovation for our Open Business Meetings.<\/p>\n Customarily, we would hold an annual Congress Business Meeting<\/strong>, for which the Report and the Agenda would circulate both at the event and afterward on our website as a downloadable pdf.\u00a0 See our Business Meetings<\/a>.\u00a0 This time, besides the pre-arranged Open Business Meeting at the Congress, we held an online Pre-Congress Business Meeting<\/strong>.\u00a0 Both had their Agenda<\/strong> and Report<\/strong>, available on our website.<\/p>\n The Pre-Congress Meeting gave the opportunity to gather beforehand people not attending the Congress (and paying its registration fee), along with people who would soon attend the Congress, and could join the Congress Business Meeting then.<\/p>\n The opportunity for the Pre-Congress Business Meeting arose through the generosity of our Associate, Barbara Williams Ellertson, who offered to host the event through her Zoom subscription.\u00a0 The RGME had no such facility.\u00a0 Although we had experience in attending online events of various kinds, by Zoom and other methods, we lacked experience in hosting them. With her contribution and guidance, the meeting could take place and show the way.<\/p>\n The 2021 Pre-Congress Business Meeting was so successful that its tradition continues.\u00a0 See:<\/p>\n 2021<\/strong><\/p>\n 2022<\/strong><\/p>\n Pre-Congress Business Meeting (30 April 2022)<\/p>\n Congress Business Meeting (11 May 2022)<\/p>\n 2023<\/strong><\/p>\n 2023 Pre-Congress Business Meeting <\/strong>(online)<\/p>\n 2023 Congress Business Meeting<\/strong> (both in person, with lunch provided by donation, and online)<\/p>\n The Zoom recordings for these Meetings join the RGME Library & Archives.<\/p>\n 2023 Congress Meeting held in-person and online. Photograph by Barbara Williams Ellertson.<\/p><\/div>\n Following the success of our first online Business Meeting, and with a donation to give the RGME a Zoom subscription allowing for longer meetings and more participants than a basic, free, subscription, we created a new online series of events.\u00a0 See:<\/p>\n Episode 1, hosted by Barbara Williams Ellertson, launched the series with an interview for which she was invited to speak about her interests in books and the origins and development of the BASIRA Project<\/a>, to create a database for Books as Symbols in Renaissance Art<\/strong>.\u00a0 See:<\/p>\n 2021: Episodes 1\u20133 More are planned.<\/p>\n Lisbon, Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga: The mid 15th-century Saint Vincent Panels, attributed to Nuno Gon\u00e7alves. Image (https:\/\/upload.wikimedia.org\/wikipedia\/commons\/3\/3a\/Nuno_Gon%C3%A7alves._Paineis_de_S%C3%A3o_Vicente_de_Fora.jpg) via Creative Commons.<\/p><\/div>\n In 2022, having the experience of the first online meetings held by the RGME for its Business Meetings in 2021 and its first online Episodes for “The Research Group Speaks”, we advanced to resuming our Symposia<\/strong> before in-person events could return.<\/p>\n With the structure in place, we turned to a pair of Symposia for the Spring and Autumn.\u00a0 The pair itself formed a new departure.\u00a0 Previously, we had only held a single Symposium per year, and some years might pass without a Symposium.<\/p>\n 2022 Autumn Symposium Program Booklet, Front Cover.<\/p><\/div>\n In 2022, the newly formed Editorial Committee chose the Theme for the Year:\u00a0 “Structured Knowledge”<\/strong>. The theme set the stage for the pair.<\/p>\n For the 2022 Autumn Symposium, we resumed the practice of producing Illustrated Symposium Booklets<\/strong>, to circulate online at the event and to distribute in both printed and digital forms by mail and through our website.<\/p>\n In 2023, with the year’s Theme of “Materials and Access”<\/strong>, we not only prepared the pair of Spring and Autumn Symposia<\/strong>, but also, by request, held a half-day Pre-Symposium<\/strong> the day before the Spring Symposium.\u00a0 Organized by Katharine C. Chandler, Jennifer Larson, and Jessica L. Savage, that event offered a series of “Lightning Talks”<\/strong> which responded to the Call for Proposals circulated in various ways.<\/p>\n 2023 Spring and Autumn Symposia<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n Pre-Symposium<\/strong><\/p>\n The Illustrated Program Booklet for the Spring Symposium includes the Pre-Symposium.<\/p>\n 2023 Spring Pre-Symposium\/Symposium Booklet Front Cover.<\/p><\/div>\n Plans advance for Symposia in 2024, to be held online, or both in-person and online.<\/p>\n By October 2022, the pattern of our online events had achieved momentum and experience, and with it more tasks for sustaining their organization and accomplishment, without a technical support team, such that it became advisable to seek an improved updated, and reliable method of automating the registrations for them and their Zoom Links for access.<\/p>\n With the advice and guidance of our Associate, N. K\u0131v\u0131lc\u0131m Yavuz, the RGME set up a registration portal outside its website and with Eventbrite.\u00a0 Visit our RGME Eventbrite Collection<\/strong> for upcoming events and a tour of previous events.<\/p>\n So far, our Collection includes these types of activities:<\/p>\n With registration, we invite you to make voluntary donations to the RGME, an organization principally powered by volunteers, to help us to support our mission and activities.\u00a0 We are grateful for your contributions and your interest.<\/p>\n London, British Library, Cotton MS Julius A. VI, fol. 4v, detail.<\/p><\/div>\n *****<\/p>\n![\"Grapes](\"https:\/\/manuscriptevidence.org\/wpme\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/Selbold-watermark-with-scale-251x300.jpg\")
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Congress Sessions
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2020 ICMS (cancelled)<\/h4>\n
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2021 ICMS (online, with revival of sessions planned for the 2020 Congress)<\/h4>\n
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2022 ICMS (online)<\/h4>\n
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2023 ICMS (partly in-person, partly online, and partly hybrid)<\/h4>\n
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2024 ICMS (like 2023)<\/h4>\n
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Their Recordings<\/h3>\n
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Open Business Meetings
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Episodes for a new Online Series
\n“The Research Group Speaks” (2021\u2013)<\/h2>\n\n
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\n2022: Episodes 4\u20139
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RGME Symposia Online<\/h2>\n
A Pair of Spring and Autumn Symposia (2022\u2013)<\/h3>\n
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Plus a Pre-Symposium of “Lightning Talks” (Spring 2023)<\/h3>\n
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RGME Eventbrite Collection<\/h2>\n
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Suggestion Box<\/h2>\n