Roger L. Martínez-Dávila, Ph.D.

roger martinez davila

Roger L. Martínez-Dávila, Ph.D.

Professor
Department of History
Co-Director
Center for Research Frontiers in the Digital Humanities

Biography

Websites

Roger, a Mexican American and a descendant of Roman Catholic and Sephardic Jewish families, is a Professor of History at the University of Colorado and holds a Ph.D. in medieval European history and global medieval history from the University of Texas at Austin and a Master of Public Policy from the University of California-Berkeley. His first monograph, Martinez Book CoverCreating Conversos: The Carvajal-Santa María Family in Early Modern Spain (2018), is published by the University of Notre Dame Press. In Creating Conversos, he unravels the complex story of Jews who converted to Catholicism in Spain between the fourteenth and sixteenth centuries, migrated to colonial Mexico and Bolivia during the conquest of the Americas, and assumed prominent church and government positions. Rather than acting as alienated and marginalized subjects, the conversos were able to craft new identities and strategies not just for survival but for prospering in the most adverse circumstances.

Presently, Roger and an interdisciplinary team of scholars are launching Augmented Reflections: Experiencing the Interchange of Plains Indians and Spaniards in Southern Colorado, 1500-1850 CE. Our endeavor reshapes interpretation, understanding, and knowledge by generating virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality worlds (AR, interactive digital projections placed over the real world). We create a methodological interpretive digital experience that places participants within a narrative of Plains Indian life, Indian-Spanish interchange, and the Spanish-Indian (Hispano) settlement of southern Colorado. Akin to a three act drama, our project grants the public and researchers a chance to observe, evaluate, and reflect upon the cultural transformation of southern Colorado from the 16th-19th centuries.

Roger served as a Marie Curie Fellow (2015-2018) and continues to implement his European Commission research project, Global Citizen Scholars: Energizing English and Spanish- Speaking Humanists to Advance KÑowledge and Act (GCS – EESSPHAÑA), at the Universidad de Carlos III de Madrid. GCS is a global research, educational, and social engineering endeavor that employs MOOCs to teach medieval Spanish history as well as train tens of thousands of students to perform original transcription of medieval manuscripts from Spanish archival collections. This initiative continues at the Deciphering Secrets project website. Roger offers MOOCs on the www.coursera.org platform via his University of Colorado affiliation.

His exploration of issues of religious co-existence extends in the realm of public history. Specifically, he served as a Guest Curator for The New Mexico History Museum in Santa Fe, New Mexico, which is the official state history museum located in the historic Palace of the Governors.

Fractured Faiths As co-curator of Fractured Faiths: Spanish Judaism, The Inquisition, and New World Identities, which opened May 22, 2016 (through Dec. 31, 2016), he identified, researched, and selected 150+ objects and art works for inclusion in the $600,000 USD exhibition, as well as coauthored the majority of the museum exhibition’s narrative and object labels. The exhibit was logistically challenging as we loaned objects from over twenty-five institutions and private collectors in Spain, Mexico, and the United States, including the Museo Sefardi (Toledo, Spain); Biblioteca Nacional de España; the Archivo General de la Nacion (Mexico City); the Museo Franz Meyer (Mexico City); the Hispanic Society of America (NY); the Jewish Museum of New York; and the Bancroft Library (Berkeley). In addition, he co-edited and authored the exhibition catalogue that includes an introductory essay, five scholarly papers, and a discussion of the principal objects included in the exhibit. The exhibition received positive reviews in the Albuquerque Journal and the Santa Fe New Mexican; over six-hundred persons attended the member opening on May 21, 2016.

In 2014, he created and co-directs the Revealing Cooperation and Conflict Project, which evaluates inter-religious relations in medieval Spain. The RCCP team of scholars from Spain, Switzerland, and the USA invigorates the humanities and public’s imagination by creating visually-compelling, data-robust, and historically-lush digital worlds like our Unity-based collaborative work, Virtual Plasencia (and our digital narration, “La Mota: A Christian Assumes Ownership over Jewish Homes, circa 1416”.

His latest scholarships centers around the regeneration of medieval worlds using immersive reality technologies.  Theoretically, he is defining a new field of research – L'école des Annales Électronique – which revitalizes the early 20th century French Annales School of History by employing digital tools and processes to better understand the "totality" of communities. Efforts to develop this field are materializing with the awarding of 2021-2023 National Endowment for the Humanities grant. Specifically, he and a colleague, Dr. Lynn Ramey of Vanderbilt University, developed an Institute for Advanced Topics in the Digital Humanities titled, the Immersive Global Middle Ages, which empowers traditional faculty, museum specialists, and cultural creators to create their own digital virtual reality worlds that reveal the Middle Ages through different religious and cultural lenses.

Areas of Interest

  • Late Medieval/Early Modern Europe with an emphasis on Spain
  • Medieval Global Interconnections Medieval Jewish Civilization
  • Medieval Paleography
  • Digital Humanities, Virtual and Augmented Reality, Crowdsourcing, and Massive Open Online Courses

Courses Taught

UCCS

Graduate and Undergraduate University Courses

  • HIST 7130: Graduate Research in Digital Global History
  • HIST 7110: Graduate Research in Medieval European History
  • HIST 6130: Graduate Readings in Digital Global History
  • HIST 6110: Graduate Readings in Medieval European History
  • HIST 6000: Graduate Historiography

Undergraduate University Courses

  • HIST 4990: History Capstone Course: Undergraduate Senior Thesis
  • HIST 4160: A Crossroads of Civilizations: The History of Spain and North Africa
  • HIST 4150: Astrolabes, Arms, and Azulejos: Medieval Science, Technology, and Material Culture
  • HIST 3480: Ideas, Identities, & Indiscretions: Transformations in Early Modern Europe (1400-1800)
  • HIST 3000: From Baghdad to Burgos: Christians, Muslims, and Jews in the Medieval Mediterranean World
  • HIST 1020: The Medieval World: A Survey of the European, Byzantine, and Islamic Middle Ages
  • HIST 1030: The Rise of Modern Europe: From The Renaissance Until the French Revolution
  • HIST 1011: Western Civilization I: Finding History’s Path from Antiquity to the Modern Era
  • HIST 1021: Western Civilization II: From the Renaissance to Modernity
  • HUM 3990: Transitions and Rebirth: The Idea of the Renaissance in Europe (750-1600)

CU-Coursera.org/UC3M edX.org

Journal Articles and Other Publications

Martínez-Dávila, Roger Louis. “The Space Between Jews, Christians, and Muslims in Medieval Spain: MOOCs, Citizen Science, and Digital Manuscript Collections.” Proceedings of Dark Archives Conference 2019, Medium Ævum Journal. (2022). (In press)

Martinez-Davila, Roger Louis; Perrone, Sean; Serrano-Nebras, Francisco Garcia; and Martin de Vidales Garcia, Maria (2018) "Deciphering Secrets of Medieval Cathedrals: Crowdsourced Manuscript Transcriptions and Modern Digital Editions," Bulletin for Spanish and Portuguese Historical Studies: Vol. 43: Iss. 1, Article 2. https://asphs.net/article/deciphering-secrets-of-medieval-cathedrals-crowdsourced-manuscript-transcriptions-and-modern-digital-editions

Martínez-Dávila, Roger Louis, Paddington Hodza, Mubbasir Kapadia, Sean T. Perrone, Christoph Hölscher, and Victor R. Schinazi. “Telling Stories: Historical Narratives in Virtual Reality.” Routledge Digital Medieval Literature and Culture eds. Jen Boyle and Helen J. Burgess. 2017. ISBN: 9781138905047. http://bit.ly/2AXTTCJ

Martínez-Dávila, Roger Louis, and Lynn Ramey. “Remediation and 3D Design: Immediacy and the Medieval Video Game World.” Routledge Digital Medieval Literature and Culture, eds. Jen Boyle and Helen J. Burgess. 2017. ISBN: 9781138905047. http://bit.ly/2AXTTCJ

Martínez-Dávila, Roger Louis. “Spanish Online Resources for Spanish and Latin American History.” Bulletin for Spanish and Portuguese Historical Studies, Volume 41, Issue 1 (2016). ISSN: 0739-182X. https://asphs.net/article/forum-spanish-online-resources-for-spanish-and-latin-american-history/

Martínez-Dávila, Roger Louis. “Trans-Atlantic ‘Hebrew’ and Converso Networks: Conquistadors, Churchmen, and Crypto Jews in the Spanish Extremadura and Colonial Spanish America.” Journal of Spanish, Portuguese, and Italian Crypto-Jews, Volume 4, Spring 2012: 135-166.

Martínez-Dávila, Roger Louis. “Jews, Catholics, and Converts: Reassessing the Resilience of Convivencia in Fifteenth Century Plasencia, Spain.” Journal of Spanish, Portuguese, and Italian Crypto-Jews, Volume 1, Spring 2009: 95-119.

Martinez-Davila, Roger Louis, “CASE STUDY: Deciphering Secrets MOOCs: Crowdsourcing Medieval Manuscripts on Jewish, Christian, and Muslim Coexistence”, in Open Education Europa (European Commission, 2017). http://bit.ly/2E835GP

Martinez-Davila, Roger Louis. "Shields of Grace." El Palacio. Winter 2016: 56-65.

Martinez-Davila, Roger Louis. "The Potential of Massive Open Online Courses: Engaging Global Audiences to Transcribe Spanish Manuscripts,” in the Newsletter of the Association for Spanish and Portuguese Historical Studies (Volume 6, 2015): 8-13.

Martínez-Dávila, Roger Louis. “Sephardic Origins and Transformations in the Spanish Extremadura: Project Synopsis and Database User Guide.” Jerusalem: International Institute for Jewish Genealogy and Paul Jacobi Center at the National Library of Israel, 2014.

Global Events: Milestone Events Throughout History, Volume 5: Middle East. Farmington Hills: Gale Cengage Learning, 2014. Adviser and co-author.

Martínez-Dávila, Roger Louis. “Finding Spain’s Identity: Américo Castro and His Exploration of Convivencia in Medieval Spain.” HaLapid, The Journal of the Society for Crypto-Judaic Studies (SCJS), Volume XXIII/XXIV, Issues 2 and 3, Spring/Summer 2012/5772.

Martínez-Dávila, Roger Louis. “Framing a New Museum Exhibition on Sephardic Jews, Conversos, and Crypto-Jews: Collaborative Efforts with the New Mexico History Museum in Santa Fe, New Mexico.” HaLapid, The Journal of the Society for Crypto-Judaic Studies (SCJS), Issues 2 and 3, Spring/Summer 2012/5772.

Martínez-Dávila, Roger Louis. “Conference Proceedings from the Sephardic Memory and Movement Conference, March 10-11, 2011 at the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs.” HaLapid, The Journal of the Society for Crypto-Judaic Studies (SCJS), Volume XIX/XX, Issues 2 and 3, Spring/Summer 2011/5771.

Martínez-Dávila, Roger Louis. “Disparate Identities, Failures in Unity: The Complicated Social Realm of Doña Gracia Mendes Nasi.” HaLapid, The Journal of the Society for Crypto Judaic Studies (SCJS), Volume XVII, Issue 2, Spring 2010.

Recent Presentations at Meetings and Seminars Presented (2015-2022)

“L'école des Annales Électronique: A New Theory and Practice for the 21st Century Making Sense of the Past, Present, and Future of Historiography.” Keynote Address. 54th Annual Meeting of the Rocky Mountain Medieval and Renaissance Association. University of Utah, Salt Lake City, UT. June 16-18, 2022.

“Deciphering Secrets: Medieval Jews, Christians, and Muslims rediscovered through citizen science.” Citizen Science, Community Participation, and Medieval Studies Panel, Leeds International Medieval Congress, July 5-9, 2021.

“Immersive Global Middle Ages: Exploring Jewish, Christian, and Muslim Life in Medieval Plasencia (España).” Nineteenth International Conference on New Directions in the Humanities at Universidad Complutense Madrid, Spain, June 30-July 2, 2021.

"Multilingualism, Translation, Directionality in Global Medieval DH Workshop.” Participant, Vanderbilt University's Center for Digital Humanities and the Global Middle Ages Project on October 16, 2020. 

“Embracing Complicated Iberian Heritages." Keynote Speech, LatinX Employee Resource Group at Apple Computer, Inc. on October 12, 2020. 

“Medieval Spanish Manuscripts, Modern Digital Repositories: the future of scholarly-curated thematic collections supported via public engagement.” Dark Archives 20/20: A Conference on the Medieval Unread & Unreadable at The Society for the Study of Medieval Languages and Literature, Oxford University, Oxford (United Kingdom), September 8-10, 2020. https://aevum.space/darkarchives.

“Deciphering Secrets of Medieval Cathedrals: At the frontier of global citizen science, digital paleographic collaboration, and facilitating access to manuscripts that reveal the history of Jewish, Christian, and Muslim collaboration.” Dark Archives: A Conference on the Medieval Unread & Unreadable at The Society for the Study of Medieval Languages and Literature, Oxford University, Oxford (United Kingdom), September 10-12, 2019.

“Medieval Manuscripts, Citizen Science, and Virtual Reality: Deciphering the Secrets of Medieval Jews, Christians, and Muslims.” Keynote address at Colorado Springs Undergraduate Research Forum, University of Colorado, Colorado Springs, Colorado (USA), April 6, 2019, 

“When Faith Wasn't Enough: Blood Purity, Genealogy, and the Spanish Inquisition during the 15th-17th Centuries.” Speakers Forum at First Congregational Church, Colorado Springs, Colorado (USA), February 9, 2019.

"Creating Conversos: The Carvajal-Santa Maria Family in Early Modern Spain.” 2018 Sixteenth Century Society & Conference, Albuquerque, New Mexico (USA), November 4, 2018.

“Global Citizen Scholars: Mobilizing the public to assist with paleographic transcription of medieval manuscripts using Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs).” Associazione per l’Informatica Umanistica e le Culture Digitali (AIUCD) 2017 Conference, Sapienza Università di Roma (Italy), January 28, 2017.

“Put down your forks, folks. MOOCs aren’t done yet!” Panel member, Colorado Learning and Teaching with Technology (COLTT) Conference, University of Colorado System, Boulder, CO, August 3, 2016.

“Plus Ultra, Beyond Text: Digital 3D Representations of Late Medieval Spanish Inter-Religious History” workshop presentation at the Programme du séminaire “Épistémologie et pratiques des Humanités numériques” on May 13, 2016. Paris, France.

"Digitally Democratizing Discovery: Mobilizing Global Citizen Scholars for Manuscript Studies" public lecture at the Behavioral Studies Colloquium at ETH-Zurich on April 5, 2016. Zurich, Switzerland.

"Global Citizen Scholars: Crowdsourcing Discovery and Manuscript Transcription Via Massive Open Online Course" public lecture at the Power and Institutions in Medieval Islam and Christendom project at the Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Cientificas on February 1, 2016. Madrid, Spain.

“Virtual Plasencia (Spain): Evaluating the Relationships of Jews, Christians, and Muslims Via an Interdisciplinary Geovisualization and Transcription Endeavor.” Unpublished paper presented at Session 375 “What’s New in the Digital Humanities” Roundtable, 50th International Congress of Medieval Studies, Kalamazoo, MI, May 16, 2015.

“New Research Directions: Medieval Iberia (A Roundtable in Memoriam of Olivia Remie Constable.” Session 198, 50th International Congress of Medieval Studies, Kalamazoo, MI, May 15, 2015.

“Massive Open Online Courses and Crowdsourcing Discovery.” Virtual youtube.com presentation for the University of Colorado System President’s Teaching and Learning Collaborative, May 11, 2015. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=weeSwrjk7SA

“Discoveries in the Medieval Cathedral of Plasencia (Spain): Archival Secrets About Identity, Religion and Faith, and Warfare.” Invited lecture at Bea Spade Memorial Lecture Series, Colorado State University-Pueblo, March 14-15, 2015.

Virtual Plasencia.” Digital Lighting Round, 129th Meeting of the American Historical Association, New York, NY, January 3, 2015.

Grants, Fellowships, and Scholarships (2010-2022)

Year 2021

  • $239,560, “Immersive Global Middle Ages Advanced Digital Humanities Institute”, National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH), Office of Digital Humanities. Co-project director and co-principal investigator. 

Year 2018

  • $100,000, “Augmented Reflections: Experiencing the Interchange of Plains Indians and Spaniards in Southern Colorado, 1500-1850 CE”, 2018 College Research Initiative, UCCS College of Letters, Arts, and Sciences co-primary recipient.

Year 2017

  • $7,500, “Deciphering Secrets” Massive Open Online Course award for graduate student teaching assistants, UCCS Office of the Chancellor, primary recipient.

Year 2016

  • 12.000 €, “Introduction to Calligraphy and Paleography in Medieval and Early Modern Spanish Archives,” Massive Open Online Course, 2016-17 Convocatoria para la Presentación de Propuestas de MOOCs y SPOC, Universidad Carlos III Madrid, co-primary recipient.

Year 2015

  • $180,000, 3-Year UC3M CONEX Marie Curie Fellowship, “Global Citizen Scholars: Energizing English and Spanish-Speaking Humanists to Advance KÑowledge an Act.” Connecting Excellence to the Universidad Carlos III Madrid (CONEX) Program, primary recipient.
  • $10,000, “Deciphering Secrets: The Illuminated Manuscripts of Medieval Europe,” University of Colorado System Office of the President, primary recipient.
  • $4,000, “Deciphering Secrets: The Illuminated Manuscripts of Medieval Europe,” UCCS Office of the Provost, primary recipient.
  • $1,900, “Convivencia Re-Envisioned: The Three Worlds of Renaissance Spain,” a musical and digital video performance of Virtual Plasencia by the RCCP and the Texas Early Music Project in Austin, Texas, September 5 and 6, 2015; primary recipient.
  • $3,000, University of Colorado President’s Fund for the Humanities grant, “The Revealing Cooperation and Conflict Project’s Virtual Plasencia”, primary recipient
  • $1,500, “Deciphering Secrets: Unlocking the Manuscripts of Medieval Spain” Research Proposal, University of Colorado System President’s Teaching and Learning Collaborative, primary recipient

Year 2014

  • $12,590, “The Revealing Cooperation and Conflict Project’s Virtual Plasencia”, University of Texas General Libraries Grant, co-primary recipient

Year 2013

  • $4,800, UCCS Arts and Humanities Award for “The M3 Project: Mapping Medieval Microcosms in Medieval Spain”, UCCS, primary recipient
  • $5,300, Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) Development Award for “The M3 Project: Mapping Medieval Microcosms in Medieval Spain”, UCCS Office of the Provost, primary recipient
  • $4,200, Online Course Development Award for HUM 3990: Digital Humanity, UCCS College of Letters, Arts, and Sciences, primary recipient

Year 2012

  • $99,134, “Colorado Consortium of Reacting to the Past” Immersive and Game-Based Learning Faculty Challenge Grant, Colorado Community College System, co-primary recipient
  • $9,250, “Expressions of Complex Identities: Sephardic Jews, Conversos, and Crypto-Jews (1391-2015)”, Guest Curator Grant, New Mexico History Museum (Santa Fe, NM), primary recipient

Year 2011

  • $7,500, The International Institute for Jewish Genealogy (IIJG) and Paul Jacobi Center Research Grant; National Library of Israel, Givat Ram Campus of the Hebrew University, Jerusalem; primary recipient
  • $4,665, Maurice Amado Faculty Incentive Grant, UCLA’s Maurice Amado Program in Sephardic Studies and Center for Jewish Studies, primary recipient
  • $1,500, Program for Cultural Cooperation Research Grant, Spanish Ministry of Education, Culture, and Sports, primary recipient
  • $300, Faculty Assembly Women’s Committee Research Grant, UCCS, primary recipient
  • $500, Faculty Fellow of the Integrated Writing Across the Curriculum Seminar, UCCS, primary recipient

Year 2010

  • $3,000, University of Colorado President’s Fund for the Humanities grant, “Sephardic Memory and Movement: The Spanish Jewish Diaspora and Its Cultural and Artistic Contributions to the American Southwest”, primary recipient
  • $1,350, University of Colorado Diversity and Excellence grant, “Sephardic Memory and Movement: The Spanish Jewish Diaspora and Its Cultural and Artistic Contributions to the American Southwest”, primary recipient

University Service

System-level

  • UCCS Faculty Member (2019-2020), CU Online Accelerator Committee
  • Representative At Large (2018-2019), University of Colorado Faculty Council
  • Board Member (2010-12), University of Colorado President’s Fund for the Humanities

University-level

  • Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Faculty Fellow, UCCS Graduate School (2021-ongoing)
  • Member (2020), UCCS Emergency Operations Center Team, Operations Group-Academic Affairs (COVID-related duties)
  • Member (2021), COVID Impact Recommendations Task Force (UCCS Office of the Provost)
  • Faculty Director (2019-2021), UCCS Online and Digital Education (UCCS Office of the Provost)
  • College of LAS Faculty Representative (2013-2014, 2019-2022), UCCS Faculty Assembly
  • Member (2010-current), UCCS Faculty Minority Affairs Committee
  • Board member (2014-2021), Global Intercultural Research Center (GLINT)

College-level (College of Letters, Arts, and Sciences)

  • Dean's Review Committee (2022-current)
  • Chair (2018-2019), Member, (2018-2020); Budget and Planning Committee
  • Co-Faculty Adviser (2013), UCCS Sociedad Nacional Honoraria Hispanica
  • Member (2013), UCCS Heller Center for the Arts & Humanities Academic Comm. (2013)
  • Faculty Adviser and Founder (2011-2015), UCCS Historical Engineering Society
  • Member (2012-2014), Planning Committee
  • Chair (2012), Member (2010-11); UCCS Rosa Parks and Cesar Chavez Scholarship Committee (2012)
  • Board Member (2010-11), UCCS Center for Religious Diversity and Public Life

Department-level

  • Chair (2021), UCCS Department of History
  • Graduate Director (2018-2021), UCCS Department of History