Stephen A. Mitchell is the Robert S. and Ilse Friend Professor of Scandinavian and Folklore at Harvard University. His research centers on the Nordic world in the medieval and early modern periods, and employs a variety of interdisciplinary approaches, including performance theory, memory studies, anthropological linguistics, and other folklore-centered perspectives. He is a former Master of Eliot House (1991-2000) and, together with colleagues from the University of Aarhus and Moesgaard Museum, Denmark, he annually teaches in and directs Harvard’s Viking Studies Program in Scandinavia, featured in USA Today as one of the nation’s most unique study abroad programs.A frequent award recipient, Mitchell is the author of many publications, his most recent being Old Norse Folklore: Tradition, Innovation, and Performance in Medieval Scandinavia from Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, arriving in late 2023.
For more information, please see his faculty website at http://scholar.harvard.edu/smitchell/ and read more about Steve in the Harvard Gazette article "The ongoing allure of Tolkien."