Elisa Jones
Assistant Professor
Office Hours: Tuesdays 2:00-4:00, and on Zoom by appointment
Phone: 843.953.1420
E-mail: jonesej@cofc.edu
Elisa J. Jones earned her Ph.D. from the University of Chicago. She specializes in French history and the history of rights, with related research interests in the history of the book and censorship. Elisa’s book project The Right to Be Seen and Heard: Liberty of Conscience and the Practice of Citizenship in Early Modern France is a counter-intuitive history of liberty of conscience during the civil and religious wars in late sixteenth and early seventeenth century France known as the Wars of Religion. The unanswered questions this project addresses about how liberty of conscience functioned are nested within the current – and increasingly urgent – scholarly reassessment of the origin and nature of universal human rights. In addition to her two articles in progress, Elisa is planning a new research project that approaches the relationship between religion, liberties, and civil authority through the conflicts over marriage and rape during the Wars of Religion.
Through her previous role as the Early Career Postdoctoral Fellow in the Center for Renaissance Studies at the Newberry Library, Elisa is involved with several ongoing digital history and pedagogy projects. She is currently coordinating the development of a new digital resource for the Newberry’s vast digitized early modern French pamphlet collection, as well as editing and developing content for the Newberry’s Digital Collections for the Classroom. Elisa has worked extensively in libraries and archives, and has taken graduate courses at the School of Information Sciences at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
Education
Ph.D., The University of Chicago, 2019
M.A., History, The University of Chicago, 2009
M.A., History, The Catholic University of America, 2005
B.A., Political Science, The Johns Hopkins University, 2000
Research Interests
Early Modern Europe and the Atlantic World
Early Modern French History
Renaissance and Reformation Studies
History of Rights, Toleration, and Political Thought
History of Information and Censorship
History of the Book
Digital History and Methodology
Archival Theory and Practice
Courses Taught
Italian Renaissance
Race and Religion in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance
The History of Human Rights in Global Early Modern Europe
Digital History: Methodology, Practice, and Outreach
Honors and Awards
Center for Renaissance Studies Early Career Postdoctoral Fellowship (Newberry Library), 2019-2020
Doris G. Quinn Dissertation Fellowship (University of Chicago), 2017-2018
Von Holst Prize Lectureship (University of Chicago), 2017-2018
The Divinity School Martin Marty Center Junior Fellowship (University of Chicago), 2016-2017
Bessie Pierce Prize B.A. Preceptorship (University of Chicago), 2015-2017
Georges Lurcy Charitable and Educational Trust Fellowship (France), 2013-2014
Institute for the History of the Reformation Summer Course Fellowship (Switzerland), 2013
Fulbright Institute of International Education Doctoral Fellowship (France), 2012-2013
Publications
The Right to Be Seen and Heard: Liberty of Conscience and the Practice of Citizenship in Early Modern France (in progress)
“The Citizenship of Jean Bodin in Word and Deed: Property, Pluralism, and the Polity in the French Wars of Religion” (in progress)
“Pamphlets beyond Polemics: Cheap Print and Negotiating in Public during the French Wars of Religion” (in progress)
Catalogue entries in Renaissance Invention: Stradanus’s Nova Reperta (Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 2020).
Digital Projects
“French Pamphlets Digital Initiative.” Coordinator and new content creator, Newberry Library (in progress).
“Premodern Censorship, Public Dissent and the Unexpected Histories of Rights.” Author and coordinator, Digital Collections for the Classroom, Newberry Library (in progress).
“French Renaissance Paleography.” Contributor and editor, Newberry Library (ongoing). https://www.newberry.org/french-renaissance-paleography
“Italian Paleography.” Metadata creator and editor, Newberry Library. https://italian-paleography.library.utoronto.ca/
Videos
Center for Renaissance Studies Premodern Plagues Video Series,
"Public Health and the State: Plague in Early Modern France" https://youtu.be/fn1dplYtydM
Center for Renaissance Studies Professional Development Seminar,
“Digital Pedagogical Design and the Humanities in the Age of COVID” https://youtu.be/c1z5xdjussM