In memoriam Dr. Elizabeth Makowski (1951-2021)

Remembering Liz Makowski

With the passing of Dr. Elizabeth Makowski on September 7, 2021, the Department of History at Texas State University lost a valued colleague and friend, a superb scholar, and an inspiring teacher beloved by her students.  Liz made a strong impression on the history faculty from the first day of her on-campus job interview.  She delivered her job talk in Dennis Dunn’s living room while holding her young daughter Maggie, who was less than 6 months old at the time and still nursing.  We were all impressed with Liz’s devotion to her daughter and her sang-froid as she calmly and expertly delivered her job talk.  Liz’s on-campus interview is the only one on record that required a trip to the store to buy diapers.  After Liz joined the department, a number of faculty members enjoyed Maggie’s visits to their offices when she accompanied her mother to the university.  Just as in her job talk, Liz remained unflappable over the course of her career whatever happy occasion, crisis, or misfortune might develop, a trait that resulted in an impressive scholarly output and a consistently excellent reputation as a great teacher.

As a scholar, Liz focused exclusively on medieval nuns and their various challenges.  Her first book, Canon Law and Cloistered Women: Periculoso and Its Commentators, 1298-1545 (1997) dealt with the papal directive that nuns remain cloistered and unable to leave the convents. In her review in Church History (Dec. 1998, 774-76), Helen Hills (University of Manchester) explains that Makowski’s book is “the first thorough study” of this important directive and its influence on the female monastic establishments.  Hills describes the book as a close study of canon law which reveals much about “the relationships between religious practice, institutional organization, belief systems, and gender.”  Hills points out that one of Liz’s achievements is revealing how Periculoso created greater distance between monks and nuns, since monks were not subject to the same rules.  Another strong feature of the study was its attempt to determine how completely the directive was followed which resulted in Liz’s assertions that many nuns did not adhere to Periculoso.

 Her second book, A Pernicious Sort of Woman: Quasi-Religious Women and Canon Lawyers in the Later Middle Ages (2005) won the History of Women Religious, Distinguished Book Award, from Notre Dame University in 2007.  Sean Field (University of Vermont) wrote in his review in Speculum, (Jan., 2007, 207-09), that this is “an insightful study of the way canon lawyers wrote about semireligious women’s communities. . . .“

Liz’s third book, English Nuns and the Law in the Middle Ages: Cloistered Nuns and Their Lawyers (2012) once again focused on a particular problem faced by women religious—attempts to seize the endowments of their orders by relatives of their benefactors.  Henrietta Leyser, (St. Peter’s College, Oxford) praised Liz’s revealing study of English nuns’ tenacity in defending the endowments of their houses through reliance on lawyers and the English courts (English Historical Review, April 2015, 543).

The last historical study that Liz wrote, Apostate Nuns in the Later Middle Ages (2019), examined the cases of women who left their convents despite the Church’s insistence that their vows bound them to the monastic life until death.  In her study Liz examines the cases of women who left their convents for various reasons including an insistence that they had not willingly taken the vows or had never even taken the vows yet were charged with apostasy.  In her review of the book in Speculum (April 2021, 533) Tanya Stabler Miller (Loyola University Chicago) wrote, “Engrossing and informative, Makowski’s book is a wonderful addition to her already impressive body of work on women, agency, and the law.”

These historical studies were preceded by a literary study that she co-authored with Katharina Wilson, Wykked Wyves and the Woes of Marriage: Misogamous Literature from Juvenal to Chaucer. (1989).  After publishing her last historical study of nuns, canon law, and lawyers, Liz turned to writing fiction and completed The Case of the Reluctant Novice: A Mother Phillipa Mystery, a novel was published by Amazon on August 29, 2021.

Liz Makowski was a remarkable teacher of the history Medieval Europe, who endeared herself to her students and earned the respect of her colleagues for her excellent teaching.  In nominating her for the Alumni Association Teaching Award of Honor, her colleague Ron Brown emphasized that Liz had the task of bringing to life a society and culture vastly different from that of the modern world in which our students live.  Liz described herself as a “guide to students in a foreign land.”  She proved to be very effective in carrying out this mission.  Michelle Seiler-Godfrey, who worked under Liz as an undergraduate and graduate student, recalled “her energy and how infectious it was.  I think she could get just about anyone excited about anything.”  Francisco Javier Rodriguez-Arroyo was also struck by “the sheer passion” with which Liz delivered her lectures.  According to Francisco “no other word” than passion “can truly describe Dr. Makowski’s attitude toward the discipline of history.”  Liz offered her students challenging courses.  Bryan Mann, one of her graduate students and later a colleague in the Department of History, praised her demanding graduate historiography class which had served him as an excellent introduction to the graduate program in history.

Liz loved assisting students improve their understanding and investigation of history.  Describing the efforts Liz exerted to improve his approach toward history, Francisco asserted that “Dr. Makowski has single-handedly done more to help me improve as a student than any educator I have had the pleasure of studying under. . . .”  Louie Valencia, one of Liz’s undergraduate students and subsequently her colleague in the Department of History, recounts how Liz helped him prepare his first conference paper:  Liz “encouraged me to apply to my first conference when I was an undergrad. In preparation, she read drafts of my paper on representations of Liberty and the Virgin Mary—written originally for her Honors class, “Inventing the Dark Ages.” I still remember her giving me a big thumbs up at the conference, encouraging me despite my stage fright.”

Liz also provided encouragement and assistance to both undergraduate and graduate students interested in entering Ph.D. programs at other universities.  Michelle Seiler-Godfrey explained how, during her M.A. studies, Liz had taken on the task of teaching her Latin, which was not taught at Texas State but knowledge of which was essential for research in the Middle Ages.  Michelle with her newly acquired knowledge of Latin, subsequently went on to the University of Iowa where she earned a Ph.D. in Medieval History.  Louie Valencia credits Liz with encouraging him to consider earning a Ph.D. in European history at Fordham University and helping him prepare the materials he needed for a successful application.  After completing his Ph.D. and joining the history faculty at Texas State, Liz continued to serve as a mentor to Louie.  Bryan Mann also considers Liz as a mentor after earning his Ph.D. and joining the history faculty at Texas State.

These heart-warming testimonials from students regarding Liz’s approach to teaching and mentoring her students are reflected in the comments from her colleagues which poured into Jeff Helgeson’s mailbox after he announced Liz’s passing.  A number of colleagues commented on Liz’s kindness, gentle nature, and eagerness to assist her fellow faculty and staff (Leah Renold, Dwight Watson, Peter Siegenthaler, Gary Hartman, Roberta Ruiz). Other colleagues made reference to Liz’s wit and sense of humor (Leah Renold, Ana Romo, Elizabeth Bishop, Jeff Helgeson). Both Debra Law and Jeremy Roethler recalled Liz’s visits to their classrooms and her interest in providing an assessment that would reassure them of the quality of their teaching.  Jeremy said “She wrote an extraordinary teaching evaluation for me. Not the obligatory one-paragraph memo, but a full-page letter. So thoughtful. I didn't even know who she was before that day and of course she didn't know me either.”  Debra explained “My first semester teaching here, Liz was assigned to sit in during my 2311 class for my very first review. She came up and said that she had fun…and that has hardly ever happened. (You can picture her face and the quiet way that she critiqued things.)”  Before earning her Ph.D., Debra had been an M.A. student of Lydia Garner in our department.  At the conclusion of Debra’s class, Liz “put her arm around me and said, ‘Lydia [Garner] would be so proud of you.’”

The entire faculty recognized that Liz was a superb scholar whose publications made a significant contribution to the history of women religious and the European Middle Ages in general.  This judgment is firmly supported by the scholarly reviews of her work discussed above and in the comments of many faculty members (Jimmy McWilliams, Louie Valencia, Leah Renold, Ana Romo, Dennis Dunn, Bryan Glass).

Her scholarship was rewarded in 2010 when she was named Ingram Professor of History.  In 2013 she presented the Ingram Lecture entitled “The Curious Case of Mary Felton,” an account of one of her runaway nuns.  One can access this interesting lecture at this web address:  https://www.txstate.edu/history/news-events/speakers/makowski.html.  

Mary Brennan, who was serving as chair of the department at the time of the lecture suggests that this event was representative of Liz’s career and contribution to history, the Department of History at Texas State, and the students to whom Liz was so dedicated:  “I can hear her during her Ingram Lecture, talking about her recalcitrant nuns.  That lecture was typical Liz: smart, intellectual, witty, and yet understandable to non-specialists. I think that was why she was such a successful teacher.  She was able to take complex ideas and distill them in such a way that undergraduates ‘get it.’”

-Ken Margerison