Freond Ic Gemete Wid

Freond ic gemete wið: Perspectives on Medieval Britain; Language, Literature, Society is the outcome of a symposium convened at Charles University in Prague in March 2012. It offers a mosaic of perspectives on medieval Britain represented by detailed and closely focused analyses of individual aspects of linguistic, literary and socio-cultural practice from the early Anglo-Saxon period to the late Middle Ages. The contributions in the field of linguistics are concerned with the problematics of identifying and interpreting the imprint of diverse linguistic communities and the dynamics of language change on textual material, addressing issues of methodology and the interpretive models of contemporary scholarship. The chapters on literature and cultural studies present new readings in canonical texts as well as interpreting neglected or marginal material. The predominant perspective emphasizes the broadly conceived foundational and/or normative character of the narratives, establishing an imagined community with the text at its centre or offering an authoritative model for an existing or emergent social structure or polity.