Lynn Ransom
Lynn Ransom joined Penn Libraries in February 2008 as the Project Manager for the Schoenberg Database of Manuscripts and is a founding member of the Schoenberg Institute for Manuscript Studies. Lynn holds a B.A. in art history from the University of the South and an M.A. and Ph.D. from the University of Texas at Austin in medieval art history, with an emphasis on manuscript illumination. Before coming to Penn, Lynn held positions in the manuscript collections at the Free Library of Philadelphia and the Walters Art Museum in Baltimore, MD. She also served as a researcher at the Index of Christian Art at Princeton University. She has published on manuscript illumination of the 13th and 16th centuries. Her current research interests involve the provenance of medieval manuscripts and the research potential of Name Authorites in Linked Open Data contexts.
Lynn oversaw the NEH-funded redevelopment of the Schoenberg Database of Manuscripts (2014-2017) into an open-access, user-maintained finding aid for the world's pre-modern manuscripts and served as the Principal Investigator for the US team on the Mapping Manuscript Migrations project, a Round 4 Trans-Atlantic Platform Digging into Data Challenge Award recipient (2017-2020). She is currently serving as the Director of Digital Medievalist (until 2022) and the President and Executive Director of Digital Scriptorium (2021-2023). She is also Co-Editor of the Schoenberg Institute's journal Manuscript Studies. A list of her other publications can be found here.
In partnership with the Rare Book Department of the Free Library of Philadelphia, the Schoenberg Institute for Manuscript Studies (SIMS) at the University of Pennsylvania is pleased to announce the 15th Annual Lawrence J. Schoenberg Symposium on Manuscript Studies in the Digital Age.
This year’s symposium will consider the networks of exchange, transmission, and translation of natural knowledge evident in manuscript culture in the pre- and early modern periods. We will examine in particular the role of the manuscript book in the translation of natural knowledge across linguistic, regional, disciplinary, and epistemic boundaries. How did scholars, physicians, or philosophers use glosses, diagrams, or other elements of mise-en-page to convey information? What does the manuscript record reveal about the diffusion and conservation of knowledge? How does the materiality of the book itself drive the movement and development of scientific knowledge? What was the role of the scientific manuscript in the era of printed books?
The program will begin Thursday evening, November 10, 5:00 pm, at the Rare Book Department of the Free Library of Philadelphia, Parkway Central Library, with a keynote address by Elly R. Truitt, Associated Professor in the Department of the History and Sociology of Science, University of Pennsylvania. The symposium will continue November 11-12 at the Kislak Center of Special Collections, Rare Books, and Manuscripts at the University of Pennsylvania.
Other confirmed speakers include:
- Persis Berlekamp, University of Chicago
- Jennifer Borland, Oklahoma State University
- Petros Bouras-Vallianatos, University of Athens
- Vivek Gupta, University of Cambridge
- Eric Gurevitch, Vanderbilt University
- Shireen Hamza, Harvard University
- Jack Hartnell, University of East Anglia
- Tzvi Langermann, Bar-Ilan University
- Elaine Leong, University College London
- Pamela O. Long, Independent Historian
- Maria Montserrat Cabré Pairet, Universidad de Cantabria
- Dominic Olariu, Phillips University Marburg
- Ahmed Ragab, Institute of the History of Medicine, The Johns Hopkins University
- Alexandre Roberts, University of Southern California
Program and registration details coming soon. Stay tuned!
Follow this link for more information on the Schoenberg Symposium Series.
