Project role
My work as a post-doctoral researcher focuses on analysing documentary evidence for material practice. Looking at the written primary sources alongside the material objects will allow for a broader picture of ritual practice to emerge and has the potential to shed light on the use of material objects that may not have survived.
Background
I am a Lecturer in Medieval Studies within the Department of History at the University of Reading. I am also a member of the Graduate Centre for Medieval Studies and the Centre for Health Humanities.
In addition to working on ‘MeRit’ and teaching for History, I am the School Director for Recruitment and Admissions (Humanities) and Undergraduate Admissions Tutor (History). I am also co-editor of the journal Reading Medieval Studies.
Education and training
Doctor of Philosophy History, University of Reading, 2016
MRes Medieval Studies, University of Reading, 2011
BA (Hons) Classical and Medieval Studies, University of Reading, 2010
Areas of interest
- Medieval saints’ cults and posthumous miracles.
- Lived religious practice and experience in the Middle Ages.
- Medieval medicine and broader practices of healthcare.
- The lives of women and children in the Middle Ages.
Selected publications
Salter, R. J. (2022) Beyond the Miracula: Practices and Experiences of Lay Devotion at the Cult of St Æbbe, Coldingham’. In Christiania Whitehead, Hazel J. Hunter Blair, and Denis Renevey (eds.) Late Medieval Devotion to Saints from the North of England: New Directions: 263-84. Medieval Church Studies 48. Turnhout: Brepols.
Salter, R. J. (2022) Visiting Reading Abbey: Cure-Seeking Pilgrims and the Cult of St James. Reading Medieval Studies 48: 263-83.
Salter, R. J. (2021) Minors and the Miraculous: The Cure-Seeking Experiences of Children in Twelfth-Century English Hagiography. In L. Preston-Matto and M. Valante (eds.) Kids those Days: Childhood in Medieval Culture, 59-86. Explorations in Medieval Culture 13. Leiden: Brill.
Salter, R. J. (2021) Saints, Cure-Seekers and Miraculous Healing in Twelfth-Century England. Health and Healing in the Middle Ages 1. Woodbridge: York Medieval Press.
Salter, R. J. (2020) Memory, Myth, and Creating the Cult of St Æbbe of Coldingham. Journal of Medieval Monastic Studies 9: 31-50.
Salter, R. J. (2015) Only Half Healed: The Unusual Accounts of the Deaf and Mute in Twelfth-Century English Hagiography. The Reading Medievalist: A Postgraduate Journal 2: 85-108.