Tolkien studies

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For the journal see Tolkien Studies

Tolkien studies is the scholarly research of the works of J.R.R. Tolkien this includes his fictional literature and languages and his philologist research.

History

Tolkien's Scholarship

Tolkien's own academic research has had a great impact within the field of philology.

Tolkien wrote many of the entries under "W" in the Oxford English Dictionary and many of those entries still survive this day as he originally wrote them. He also wrote the groundbreaking A Middle English Vocabulary which looked at common words instead of exotic words.

His lecture titled Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics changed scholars understanding of the epic poem. During his time it was largely viewed as a historical document, but Tolkien argued that it should be examined as a literay work of art. This method of studying Beowulf is now popular today.

Age of Innocence

Generally, the history of Tolkien scholarship is divided into four time periods:

• the book reviews
• the cult period and the fierce reactions to it
• the acceptance of Tolkien as a literary agent
• and lastly, the post-movie phase, featuring expanded volumes, reprints, and a wide variety of subjects.

The first two periods have been summarized by Tom Shippey as the "Age of Innocence": the time before the publishing of The Silmarillion, Unfinished Tales, The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien and The History of Middle-earth. After the publishing of at least some of those, many musings, theories and guesses were flattened by additional information. The field of literary critics taking interest was still thin, and serious academic research was rare. The first conference on Tolkien's literature was held in 1966; before that, only collected works on children's literature had picked up serious attention for The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings.

1,800 New Entries

A major turn in scholarship was the publishing of The Silmarillion, edited by Christopher Tolkien. The book included the history of things that were previously no more than a "background-word", such as Beren or Gondolin. Apart from many expanded entries, the second edition of J.E.A. Tyler's The Tolkien Companion included some 1,800 new entries. A landmark publication of this time was Shippey's The Road to Middle-earth.

Fields

Linguistics

Invented languages

Main article: Languages

Courses

"...It is a long tale..." — Aragorn This article or section needs expansion and/or modification. Please help the wiki by expanding it.

There are a number of universities and colleges that offer course work in Tolkien studies. This is a listing of some of the courses devoted solely to Tolkien studies. There are some institutions that offer Tolkien studies as part of another course.

• Bethel University offers a course on the theology of Middle-earth.
• Bradley Unviersity offers a course taught by J.R.R. Tolkien scholar Mike Foster on The Lord of the Rings.
• Cardiff Centre for Lifelong Learning offers a course on the literature of Tolkien and how it relates to his understanding of earlier fantasy literature.
• Rice University offers a course on The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit as a mythology for England.
• Rutgers University offers a course on Christian elements found in The Lord of the Rings.
• Victoria University of Wellington offers a course on The Lord of the Rings and how it relates to medieval literature.

See Also

• Tolkien research at Wikipedia
• Elvish Linguistic Fellowship
• Omentielva
• The Tolkien Society
• Tolkien Studies