Program Description The MARS undergraduate program is a new and exciting program at Brock, and it is growing every year, in terms both of the number of students in the program and the opportunities it offers its students. Its focus on the medieval and Renaissance periods allows students to study the magnificent art, the great literature, and the complex but fascinating history of the period in a carefully developed but flexible program.
Students are led from Rome and the Mediterranean through Venice and Florence to Paris, London, and the New World of the Americas, from late antiquity to the burgeoning of the modern era, by scholars and teachers thoroughly immersed in this dynamic field of study.
The Centre is more than just an undergraduate program, though. Its participating faculty are active researchers in their fields of expertise, and the Centre organizes a number of activities that allow students and the larger community to gain real insight into that research. The Centre runs a works-in-progress series in which its participating faculty present their research, and we regularly host visiting speakers from other universities and academic institutions both national and international.
Brock’s Special Collections library also provides the opportunity to study real artefacts from the period. To its collection of books and manuscripts from the period it has recently been able to add several more, including rare thirteenth-century land documents, late medieval and early Renaissance music, and an original letter signed by the late sixteenth-century king of Scotland, James VI. Students in the MARS program are in daily contact with the people and the materials that make medieval and Renaissance studies a dynamic and rewarding pursuit on an international scale.
