Medieval and Early Modern Studies rests on the conviction that the period from roughly 300 to 1700 CE involves a dynamic continuum of human interactions and religious, cultural, technological, economic, and ecological changes that still affect the present. As scholars in this area, we are united by our interest in finding new ways of conceiving what happened to people and communities in the past, and we actively encourage ways of seeing the history of Europe, Asia and the Americas in culturally plural terms. We understand that medieval society was global, with the movements of texts, people and objects across borders. We actively foster investigation of how events of the past may affect our understanding of transitions to modern and contemporary cultural forms.