Public History PhD student, Wendy Vencel, Awarded MAA/GSC Grant from Medieval Academy of America

We are pleased to announce that Public History PhD student, Wendy Vencel’s, summer internship project, “Ballintober Bonds,” has been awarded the 2024 MAA/GSC Grant for Innovation in Community Building and Professionalization from the Medieval Academy of America. The MAA/GSC Grant is “awarded annually to an individual or graduate student group from one or more universities. The purpose of this grant is to stimulate new and innovative efforts that support pre-professionalization, encourage communication and collaboration across diverse groups of graduate students, and build communities amongst graduate student medievalists.”

As part of her summer internship with Castles in Communities (CIC) Archaeological Field School and Research Project in Ballintober, Ireland, Wendy will be creating a three-part workshop series and an interpretive display panel for the entrance of Ballintober’s historic graveyard. CIC prioritizes collaboration with members of the Ballintober community to promote tourism and facilitate a conservation management plan for the castle ruins that will one day be open again to the public. CIC examines the late 13th century Anglo-Norman castle at Ballintober and its associated deserted medieval settlement from past to present. The castle was one of the principal centers for the O’Conor kings of Connacht, who ruled the Kingdom of Connacht off and on from the year 967, and continuously from 1102 to 1475. “Ballintober Bonds” will introduce community members to local archaeological work and teach the next generation of archaeologists a decolonizing framework for their work in this discipline, including open dialogue and cooperation with the communities in which they work. 

Wendy’s dissertation will focus on medieval archaeology and its uses in forming national narratives and how people today interact with those narratives. Her research currently focuses on castle complexes and castle tourism (particularly castles in Scotland) and why people choose to go abroad to visit castles.