People
Magdalena Naum
Research Fellow
Office: Courtyard Building 1.7
Phone: +44 (0) 1223 339293
Fax: .
Email: mn375@cam.ac.uk
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Current research projects
Guests, refuges, colonists: medieval migration in the Baltic Sea region (post-doctoral research project)
The aim of this project is to approach medieval migration in the Baltic Sea region. Using an interdisciplinary approach and focusing on three case studies (the 11th-12th C Slavic migration to the islands of Falster, Lolland and Møn (Denmark); the 12th-14th C Danish and Swedish settlement in Estonia; and German urban settlement in 13th-15th C Kalmar) I would like to scrutinize the social consequences of movements for both the immigrants and the host communities. Through the study of material culture, landscape and written sources I would like to illuminate experiences, cultural practices and identities formed in the context of migration, and point out possible effects of migration on the relationships between human beings and the material world. The ultimate goals are to illustrate that human resettlements were an important part of medieval development in the region and to elaborate a methodology for approaching migration in the past.
Sweden in the Delaware valley: everyday life and identities in the seventeenth century colony of New Sweden (with Lund University, Sweden)
This project will scrutinize the daily life in the colony of New Sweden (1638-1655) and shortly after its collapse from a historical archaeological perspective. The main focus is on the process of settling in and daily life in the colony, mechanisms of formation of cultural identities and the complexity of colonization as a process. In particular we are interested in: 1) the processes of migration, perception and settling in America and the ambiguities that arose between different settlers around the meaning and the function of the colony; 2) technological choices in vernacular architecture and their meaning for the construction of cultural identities; 3) aspects of interactions between the settlers and the Native Americans and the ways material culture of both European and Native origin was exchanged, interpreted and used by these diverse groups.