Natalie Van Deusen, PhD
Pronouns: she/her/hers
Contact
Associate Professor, Faculty of Arts - Modern Languages and Cultural Studies Dept
- vandeuse@ualberta.ca
Adjunct Associate Professor, Faculty of Arts - History, Classics, & Religion Dept
- vandeuse@ualberta.ca
Overview
Area of Study / Keywords
Old Norse-Icelandic; Medieval Studies; Hagiography; Disability Studies
About
I received my PhD in Scandinavian Studies from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 2012. My doctoral research focused on Old Norse paleography and philology, and my dissertation was a new study on and edition of the Old Norse legend of Martha and Mary Magdalen. I hold the inaugural Henry Cabot and Linnea Lodge Scandinavian Professorship in the Department of Modern Languages and Cultural Studies at the University of Alberta, where I serve as Program Advisor for Scandinavian, Norwegian, and Swedish. I am also Adjunct Associate Professor in Religious Studies in the Department of History & Classics.
I am President of the Association for the Advancement of Scandinavian Studies in Canada. I also serve as Editor for Scandinavian-Canadian Studies / Études scandinaves au Canada.
I live in Edmonton with my spouse and our two children. When I'm not on campus, you can find me with them, or teaching group exercise and spinning classes at the gym.
Research
My research interests include Old Norse-Icelandic paleography and philology, manuscript culture, hagiography and religious literature (poetry and prose), and women's and gender studies. I have published articles and book reviews in such venues as Scandinavian Studies, Journal of English and Germanic Philology, Speculum, Scandinavian-Canadian Studies, Arthuriana, Arkiv för nordisk filologi, and Maal og minne. In 2014, I was awarded a Killam Research Fund award from the University of Alberta to conduct archival research for a book I have since co-written and published with Professor Kirsten Wolf (UW-Madison), entitled The Saints in Old Norse and Early Modern Icelandic Poetry. I have also published a detailed study, edition, and translation of the history, cults, and legends of Martha and Mary Magdalen in medieval Iceland with the Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies. I recently completed a Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) Insight Grant in which I examined early modern poetry on famous (and infamous) women from the Bible, history, saga literature, as well as saints and their function; this work resulted in a number of articles and article-length editions of previously unedited (and in some cases, undiscovered) poems, a co-edited volume, and a forthcoming monograph on the post-Reformation poetic tradition surrounding St. Agnes of Rome. I also hold a SSHRC Insight Development Grant for a research project entitled "'Completely Healed': Miracles, Cures, and Constructions of Disability in the Old Norse-Icelandic Sagas of Bishops." At present, I am excerpting and analyzing instances in which individuals in these sagas seek healing and are “healed” of various visible and invisible ailments in order to determine how medieval Christian Icelanders perceived and constructed disability in relation to the body and mind.
Teaching
I teach a variety of courses on Nordic history, literature, and culture from the Middle Ages to the present. I also supervise graduate students in MLCS and History, Classics, and Religion.
Announcements
On sabbatical leave July 1, 2022-June 30, 2023.