Our work on this topic seeks to bridge the divide between medieval and early modern studies by taking a long view of three questions surrounding particular uses of vernacular languages and broader processes of vernacularization in this period: How did changes in technologies of communication, such as the rise of letterpress printing, intersect with the uses of vernacular languages? How were the structures of "vernacular theology" transfigured during the period leading up to and following the Protestant Reformation and Catholic Counter-Reformation? And how does a focus on vernacularization help us to reevaluate theories and practices of translation-whether from one language to another, from one medium to another, or from one cultural sphere to another?

John King is Distinguished University Professor Emeritus at the Ohio State University. He is the author of numerous books, including the following:
English Reformation Literature: The Tudor Origins of the Protestant Tradition; Tudor Royal Iconography: Literature and Art in an Age of Religious Crisis; Spenser's Poetry and the Reformation Tradition; Milton and Religious Controversy: Satire and Polemic in Paradise Lost; Foxe's Book of Martyr's and Early Modern Print Culture. He is the recipient of fellowships from the American Council of Learned Societies, the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, and the National Endowment for the Humanities, among many others.

This event is part of a yearlong series, “Speaking in Tongues,” organized by the Medieval and Renaissance Studies Program at the University of Pittsburgh and supported by a collaborative research grant from the University of Pittsburgh’s Humanities Center.