Education
Ph.D., Trinity College Dublin, 2013
Areas of Expertise
Environmental History, Digital Humanities, Digital Heritage, Pre-Modern History, Medieval
Archaeology
Biography
Victoria McAlister is a historian and archaeologist specializing in the landscapes
and material culture of pre-modern Ireland. She joined the History Department in 2022,
having previously been at Southeast Missouri State University. Her current book manuscript, The Insular Globe: Animals and Landscapes of Colonization, Ireland c. 700-1700, examines the landscape changes associated with colonization and the transition of
medieval to modern. In 2025-26 she will complete this book as a Long-Term Fellow at
the Folger Library.
This work benefits from the digital heritage project Human-Environmental Exchanges in the Landscapes of Medieval Ireland on which she is co-Principal Investigator. This study uses photogrammetry data collected
from drone flights combined with the historical record to trace the remnants of the
Middle Ages in modern-day landscapes; explaining why some landscape remnants are particularly
resilient in an era of mechanized and intensive land use. She is the editor of Eolas: The Journal of the American Society of Irish Medieval Studies and of the Environment, Production, and Exchange, 1100-1550 section for Routledge Resources Online. In addition, she has produced The Great Castles
of Europe for The Great Courses (2024), which is available to stream. Her research
has been supported by the National Humanities Center, the National Endowment for the
Humanities, the American Philosophical Society, and the Castle Studies Trust.
Selected Publications
- Victoria L. McAlister, “‘They live on beasts only, and live like beasts’: Archaeological
and Historical Reassessment of Agriculture in Later Medieval Gaelic Ireland in a European
Context.” In Brendan Kane and Patrick Wadden, eds., An Eoraip: Ireland in Medieval and Early Modern Europe (Brill, 2025).
- Victoria McAlister, “Residence at Kilcolman Castle: Gender and Material Culture in
Castles,” Virtual Reality tour and teaching resources for Thomas Herron, ed., Castle to Classrooms: Developing Spenser’s Kilcolman Castle in Virtual Reality (2024) available at https://go.wondavr.com/R2NcRAf8Qkb
- Victoria L. McAlister and Linda Shine, eds., Rethinking Medieval Ireland and Beyond: Lifecycles, Landscapes, and Settlements (Brill, Explorations in Medieval Cultures Series, 2023).
- Victoria L. McAlister and Jennifer Immich, “What is Lost can be Found: History and
Geographic Information Systems as Tools for Identifying Deserted Rural Medieval Settlement.”
In McAlister & Shine, Rethinking Medieval Ireland and Beyond.
- The Irish Tower House: Society, Economy and Environment c. 1300-1650 (Manchester University Press, hardback 2019, paperback 2021).
- Victoria L. McAlister, “Castles and Connectivity: Exploring the Economic Networks
between Tower Houses, Settlement, and Trade in Late Medieval Ireland,” Speculum: The Journal of the Medieval Academy of America 91:3 (July 2016), 631–59.
- Vicky McAlister and Terry Barry, eds., Space and Settlement in Medieval Ireland (Four Courts Press, 2015).
Recent Book Reviews
- Review of Richard C. Hoffmann, “The Catch: An Environmental History of Medieval European
Fisheries” (Cambridge University Press, 2023). H-Environment, H-Net Reviews. April 2025, https://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=59729
- Review of Anastasija Ropa and Timothy Dawson, eds., “The Horse in Premodern European
Culture”; Anastasija Ropa and Timothy Dawson, eds., “Echoing Hooves: Studies on Horses
and Their Effects on Medieval Societies.” Speculum, 99:4 (2024), 1348–50.
- Review of Tracy Collins, “Female Monasticism in Ireland: An Archaeology” (Cork University
Press, 2021). The Medieval Review. December 2022, https://scholarworks.iu.edu/journals/index.php/tmr/article/view/36001/39007
- Review of Nicholas Terpstra and Colin Rose, eds. “Mapping Space, Sense, and Movement
in Florence: Historical GIS and the Early Modern City” (London: Routledge, 2016). H-Environment, H-Net Reviews. October 2020, .
Awards and Honors
- Long-Term Fellow, Folger Library, 2025-26
- Donnelley Family Fellowship, National Humanities Center, 2021-22
- Excellence in Promoting Experiential Learning Award, Southeast Missouri State University,
2019
- Award for Teaching Excellence, Southeastern Medieval Association, 2017
- College of Liberal Arts Honors Award for Outstanding Teaching, Southeast Missouri
State University, 2017
Recent Lectures and Presentations
- “The Lived Experience of the Forgotten: Identifying Vernacular Settlement of Medieval
Ireland with the HELM Project” (with Jennifer Immich), 60th International Congress
on Medieval Studies, 2025.
- “Multidisciplinary Methodologies in Archaeology: Digital Analysis of Settlement in
the Landscapes of Medieval Ireland” (with Jennifer Immich), Society for American Archaeology,
2025.
- “Mistakes Maketh the Methodology: Developing a Replicable Interdisciplinary Process
with GIS for Identifying Deserted Medieval Settlements in Ireland” (with Jennifer
Immich), American Society for Environmental History Presents series, 2025.
- “Digitizing Deserted Medieval Rural Settlement: Drone Data, GIS, and the HELM Project”
(with Jennifer Immich), American Society for Environmental History, 2024.
- “Deploying Drones: The HELM Project and Recreating the Landscapes of Medieval Ireland”
(with Jennifer Immich), North American Conference on British Studies, 2023.
- “Colonized Cattle in a Complex Landscape: Livestock Experiences of Medieval Ireland,”
58th International Congress on Medieval Studies, 2023.
- “Colonizing and Colonized Animals in the Landscapes of Medieval Ireland,” Medieval
Academy of America, 2023.