As we continue on with life and studies, it’s important to think back on what we learned and also what lies ahead. The importance of internationalism and globalization are growing more and more important as ease of communications and travel cause more cross-cultural interactions to occur. Because of these interactions, I think it’s more important than ever to think back on how we viewed medievalism at the start of the class, how our view of medievalism has changed, and how our class remained limited in its scope of discussions of the medieval in our international world.
Class started with a variety of different definitions and viewpoints about what the medieval period really was and vague notions that it had something to do with disease, and knights, and peasants, and kings. The medieval was the Dark Ages, King Arthur, and the Vikings. It was something both real and fictional and completely confused at the beginning.
I would like to think that through the course of our discussions in class, the medieval (or at least our understanding of it) grew and refined itself. The Dark Ages weren’t really as dark as people make them out to be, stories centered around the “medieval” are usually in some way a commentary of the author, and often reflect a strange mix of both the wishes and the critiques of both the past and the present. Eaters of the Dead and How to Train Your Dragon played with ideas of Vikings whilst simultaneously commenting on modern values and views of the medieval past in different ways. Both show Vikings as large, crude smelly guys with horned helmets and a love of battle. They both also comment on intercultural relations, and how uncomfortable or dangerous the Other seems because of the difference in practices. One plays with storytelling narratives and seems to follow many of the traditional values associated with Beowulf and other heroic epics, while the other introduces a character that supports very modern values of inventiveness, cleverness, and teamwork. Because of the contrasts of these works, and the other works we looked at in class, our understanding of the medieval world changed as our view of what is medieval expanded.
However, our view of the medieval is limited by Western perceptions of medievalism. As we are living in an international world, we need to expand our view of medievalism beyond the Euro-centric view and realize that other countries existed and actually flourished after the fall of Rome. We need to realize – both in the present day and looking back at global history – that there are six other continents that Western history does not even consider when writing its narratives. Japan’s Heian period (794-1185) is considered as one of the most culturally rich periods for Japan. Assigning values of barbarism, knighthood, or other strictly Euro-centric ideals in a global context to all history will only create problems and misunderstandings. In order for us to move forward in this international world, we not only have to look back and understand how European medievalism affects the Western past, but also look at how the rest of the world sees their past and how that past affects their present.
Getting Medieval 
As an international student, I completely agree that the way we view medievalism today is highly euro-centric. As we critically think about how medievalism and our understanding of it has changed, I wonder whether popular conceptions of the ‘middle ages’ would be more positive, had our view of it been more global. To add on to the example you provide about Japan’s Heian period being one of the most culturally rich periods for Japan, perhaps shifting our focus to a more international perspective would help break the association of the middle ages and darkness.
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OP, you bring up some interesting points here about our view of the Middle Ages being very Euro-Centric. When I think of the Middle Ages I think of the things associated with the European version of this time. Your blog post now raises the question, how do we shift away from focusing specifically on the information about the Middle Ages that has been forced down our throats by the modern media? I think we have to start asking more questions, and when we see something that intrigues us, go and research it. For example, lets say I just watched “The Messenger,” and I was very intrigued by the daily lifestyle of the people displayed in the movie, I could jump on google and see just how accurately it was portrayed. I could also do research into what life was like during the Middle Ages for people of other countries. I feel like this would slowly start to shift my focus away from Europe and more towards the other 6 continents in the world that get the cold shoulder in the modern Medieval narrative.
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