Michaela Selway

Email: michaela.selway@uni-tuebingen.de
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaela-selway-123808163/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/MichaelaSelway
Academia.edu: https://uni-tuebingen.academia.edu/MichaelaSelway

ResearchGate: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Michaela-Selway

 

Previous Studies

My previous studies were completed at the University of Auckland, New Zealand. I completed a Bachelor of Arts in History and Spanish in 2017, a Bachelor of Arts (Honours) in History with First Class Honours in 2018, and a Master of Arts in History with First Class Honours in 2020.

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My Honours dissertation compared the legal status of Jews and Muslims living under Christian rule in Medieval Iberia as they were discussed in Las Siete Partidas (The Seven Law Codes) to their living situation discussed in other primary sources from the period. This dissertation was entitled ‘Contesting the Motivations for Conversion in Las Siete Partidas'.

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My Masters thesis focused on the incorporation of the Bible into five origin stories from across Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages: Paulus Orosius’ Historiae adversus paganos, Gregory of Tours’ Decem libri Historiae, Geoffrey of Monmouth’s Historia regum Britanniae, William of Malmesbury’s Gesta Regum Anglorum, and Ordericus Vitalis’ Historia ecclesiastica. It specifically analyzed how these various authors sought to connect their local histories to the Biblical narrative in order to create a legendary and divinely-inspired origin myth and to morally instruct their audience. They accomplished this through the establishment of a Biblical timeline, the incorporation of genealogies, discussions on exilic stories, and commentaries on the restoration that Jesus brought to the world.

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In 2021, I completed the Latin: A Course for Beginners through the National Extension College.

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Academic Work

Throughout my academic career so far, I have been employed in two research positions and one history fact-checking job at the University of Auckland.

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Since October 2020 I have been working on the Early Medical Women of New Zealand project. This oral history project seeks to tell the stories of the first 400 women to graduate from New Zealand’s first Medical Program. It solely focuses on those who graduated between 1896 (when the first woman graduated) to 1967 (when the second New Zealand Medical School opened). Through oral interviews with the graduates or their families and archival research, we construct biographies which are published on our open-access website. These are published publicly to increase the awareness of what these incredible women experienced and achieved.

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Between 2018 and 2021, I worked on the “Transliterating Te Tiriti” Project. Following the Reacting to the Past pedagogy, we constructed a new history assessment revolving around the events of the signing of Te Tiriti o Waitangi in 1840. We wrote a comprehensive game book and individual role sheets, and play tested the assessment in three different university classes. This project aims at creating a new level of understanding for students learning about the events that occurred in 1840 by immersing them in the world. Academic outputs include but are not limited to presentations, newspaper articles, and diary entries. In 2020, we published our research in the Australasian Journal of American Studies.

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I also worked as a freelance fact checker for individual historical projects at the University of Auckland throughout 2021 and an Assistant Proofreader at Rockweather Proofreading Services, specializing in Master’s and Doctoral Theses.

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