Welcome to my online research journal entitled Shield Walls and Lyres. The title of this blog combines the key elements in the study of early English and Scandinavian culture by modern academics: war and peace, obligation and pastime, joy and grief. These were all central to Anglo-Saxon and early Scandinavian life and shaped the literary and cultural works they produced. However the focus on these as cultural signifiers rather than performances central to life within the great hall often leads to the nuance of these works escaping criticism.
I aim to explore performativity and its effects on early English and Norse texts which are often negated by modern formalist study and philology. This blog in itself will serve as an experiment in performativity as I attempt to perform the role of someone competent in the field of digital humanities.
This blog will allow me to build upon my ideas and hopefully discover new avenues of research so I do hope you stick around and join me on this journey of discovery and rediscovery.