Dr. William Biel Assistant Director william.biel@westpoint.edu Biography Dr. William Biel earned a PhD in Medieval Studies from the English department at the University of Connecticut following an MA earned abroad at the University of Iceland. While at UConn, he taught courses on Ancient and Medieval Literature through a global perspective, alongside regularly teaching sections of first year composition and piloting the UConn writing program’s newly developed writing studio. At USMA, Will previously worked as a consultant in the Mounger Writing Center before joining the Writing Program as an Assistant Director in 2023. In addition to his work in the field of composition, Will researches Middle English Arthurian literature, Old Norse sagas, historical linguistics, material culture, gender studies, and the environmental humanities. His work has been published in the academic journals Scandinavian-Canadian Studies and Early Middle English. Publications & Presentations Publications2021 “Drinking English: The Wassail in Laȝamon’s Brut ,” Early Middle English 3.2 (2021): 57-74.2021 “Memory of Iron: Object Rhetoric and Collective Memory in Laxdæla saga,” Scandinavian-Canadian Studies 28 (2021): 174-199.Reviews2019 “Ian Felce. William Morris and the Icelandic Sagas. Woodbridge: D.S. Brewer, 2018.” Medievally Speaking2019 “Romance and History: Imagining Time from the Medieval to the Early Modern Period. Edited by Jon Whitman. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015.” Comparative Literature Studies 56.4 (2019): 894-898.Select presentationsMay 2023 “Wholly Bodies: Object, Masculinity, and Disability in Chrétien’s Conte du Graal” International Congress on Medieval Studies, Kalamazoo, MIJuly 2019 “Memory of a Mountain: Engendering the Landscape in the lai of The Two Lovers,” International Medieval Congress, LeedsApril 2019 “Knightly Dreams: Political (Non-)Materiality in Late Middle English,” International Piers Plowman Society Conference, Miami, FLAugust 2018 “Ætt and Æventýr: Family Fantasy in Vatnsdæla saga,” International Saga Conference, Reykjavík & Reykholt, IcelandMarch 2017 “Sá er þessu sverði bregður: Arthurian Swords across Sagas,” Encounters and Reimaginings: Medieval Scandinavia and the World, UC Berkeley, CAApril 2015 “Wondrous Strangers: The Diffusion of a Courtly Motif through the Sagas,” Bergen-Cambridge Postgraduate Symposium in Old Norse Studies, Bergen, NorwayMarch 2015 “Breaking the Barrow: De- & Re-Constructing an Old Norse Chronotope,” Interdisciplinary Student Symposium on Viking and Medieval Scandinavian Subjects, Aarhus, Denmark