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***DAVE BLACKWELL*** over video image of pink donkey piñatas
These pink donkey piñatas may not seem like a sign of change, but they are part of new changes within the University of Colorado's journalism school.

The piñatas are part of an advertising package created by CU advertising student Lauren Brown for Evol Burritos, with other graphic design features. The package is a symptom of the growing changes in journalism, and CU's steps to meet them.

Dean of the Journalism school Paul Voakes proposed the merging of the journalism school and ATLAS, the interdisciplinary Alliance for Technology, Learning and Society, with the support of ATLAS's director John Bennett.

***PAUL VOAKES***
We've got a faculty that is definitely aware and studying these changes. In terms of all of the cutting-edge technical aspects, we see a wonderful opportunity with ATLAS."

***DAVE BLACKWELL***
The merger not only broadens the scope of journalism students' abilities to match the evolving field of journalism, but also makes sense financially. The School of Journalism needs to eliminate almost 8 percent of its 4 million dollar budget, and ATLAS needs to eliminate 10 percent of its 1.2 million dollar budget.

These changes, if approved, could revolutionize the Journalism program at CU, and allow for better preparation of students for the world.

***LAUREN BROWN*** shot of Lauren Brown speaking
I think that with emerging digital media being so present in advertising and journalism, you have to have these skills to be a marketable candidate.

***DAVE BLACKWELL***
And thats the way the cookie crumbles.

Not So Clean

California, one of the self-proclaimed most progressive states around, where I imagine it will soon be law that everyone has to drive hybrids, is home to six of the top ten worst places to breathe in the US, according to the American Lung Association. The ALA considered several factors in their survey, including ozone pollution and particle pollution.

The California cities that made the list were Bakersfield, Los Angeles, Fresno, Visalia-Porterville, Hanford-Corcoran, and Sacramento. Also on the list were Birmingham, AL; St. Louis, MO; New York, NY; and Pittsburgh, PA.

More here.

Let Them Be Kids

"During a fire drill at a middle school in Worcester, England, students aged 10 to 13 looked on in horror as "as a man appeared brandishing a gun and appeared to shoot dead Mr. Kent, their science teacher, as he ran across a field." It was only ten minutes after the shooting that teachers revealed the whole thing to be fake. The exercise was apparently "intended to teach Year 8 pupils how to investigate, collect facts and analyse evidence." They couldn't have just pretended to lose the class rabbit, or something?"

Found the article here.

...Incredible. If this were just a prank, I might think it was funny. Actually, I still think it's funny, but that's beside the point. This is demonstrative of a tendency amongst adults that is becoming more and more common. We want our children to be grown up without them leaving home.

The parents of these children may not have been involved, but it's a tendency nonetheless. Why on earth would they make these children aware of such an adult situation at such a young age? They aren't even capable of reacting properly at this point of their lives, so what's the point of scaring them? It's the same idea with sex and drug ed. Kids younger and younger are being taught about it by a biased source likely before they've even been exposed to it. What's the point?

And what kind of evidence did they expect the kids to analyze? Fingerprints and blood samples???

Let kids be kids. There's no need to scare them yet. The world will do that eventually anyway, so let them have this time to themselves.

Patrik DeCicco and Zoey

I recently did my first real portrait assignment. I loved it.

The subject-- that sounds too formal, too stiff. Portraits are nothing if not personal. You get to work closely with someone, get to know them, and incorporate that into the photos. I could be cheesy and say something along the lines of, the photos are a glimpse into someone's soul. Which is partly true, but it's nothing so grand. It's merely an attempt to capture and clearly show this person, in this case Patrik DeCicco, owner of Boulder Map Gallery Inc, avid sky diver and base jumper, and his beautiful dog, Zoey. They made this experience truly wonderful. It was a pleasure to work with them.

Here are some of the results from the shoot. They're nothing special, but I'm proud of them.
















It was great work, and reminded me of all the beauty of photography :)

Important Facts

1) No-one in the entire world can touch all their own teeth with their tongue.

2) Mad people everywhere are now trying this.

4) You've just tried, and discovered this to be untrue.

5) Now you're sitting there with a crazed smile on your face.

5) Bet you didn't notice that I'd skipped number 3!

6) And now you've gone back to check.

7) Bet you didn't notice that I'd skipped number 6 either.

8) Fooled again...

9) Bet you didn't notice that number 5 appears twice!

10) Now that hopefully you've got a smile on your face, remember that that's what it's all about.

Jedi Bears

I have a list, of creatures in the world that not only scare me, but inspire a sense of terror for whatever reason. Ironically, this is the same list as the list of creatures I want to spend time with. Maybe someday I'll get around to posting the list, but right now, I'd just like to address one: polar bears.

Polar bears are huge, the largest land predator of today. They weigh in between1,000 and 1,500 pounds, on average. They blend in so well with their environment that they might as well be giant ninjas, and they don't fear humans. This last is startling. Most mammals are skittish of human settlements, but in many areas polar bears acquire a taste for garbage, and sometimes for humans themselves. They're one of the rare predators that have been known to actively hunt humans. And we're just beginning to learn about their origins.

In Norway 2004, a rare fossil of a polar bear jaw was discovered, and it may hold secrets as to not only the age and origins of the species, but also the ability of polar bears to adapt to climate change.

“Our results confirm that the polar bear is an evolutionarily young species that split off from brown bears some 150,000 years ago and evolved extremely rapidly during the late Pleistocene, perhaps adapting to the opening of new habitats and food sources in response to climate changes just before the last interglacial period,” says Charlotte Lindqvist, research assistant professor in the University at Buffalo Department of Biological Sciences.

The age of the fossil implies that polar bears are a relatively new species, off-shooting from their closest relatives, the brown bear. Ironically, this fossil that tells us the polar bear is young is also "the oldest mammal mitochondrial genome to be sequenced." It's nearly twice as old as the oldest mammoth genome yet sequenced.

The term "mitochondrial genome" refers to all the DNA in the mitochondrion, the energy-producing component of most complex beings. Think of them as midichlorians, giving energy to living beings. The polar bear is a Jedi Knight. Polar bears with lightsabers...frightening.

The fossil also shows that polar bears have survived other climate changes, including interglacial warming periods. This may seem to be a point against global warming arguments, but the rapidity of this current climate change may be too much for the polar bears. We don't know if they can keep up.

Yes, they terrify me. But if they disappear, I'll never get the chance to face one in its home environment. And that makes me terribly sad.

Full Article

Trippy

Against Nebraska, you are a baby apple

upon shoe worn floor

reaching out as elephants pass by

and nod farewell to asses

The Tipping Point

Malcolm Gladwell's number one national bestselling novel The Tipping Point dissects revolutionary social trends and their causes, drawing on real historical events to demonstrate his points with clarity and purpose. The novel is compelling and original, using experiences that everyone can relate to, drawing the reader in and making him or her feel like they are discovering the facts for themselves. Gladwell found modern examples of everything he addressed in the form of real life persons, and shows the readers how these ideas and concepts are present in our everyday lives.

The Tipping Point addresses the phenomena of certain social trends, ones that for a while are low key and unknown and then explode into a cultural obsession, or ones that at the height of their popularity suddenly plummet to obscurity. That point where a trend rises or falls is called the "tipping point," the event or person that triggers a set of reactions that leads to one of the two outcomes stated above. Malcolm Gladwell says of his book:

It is the biography of an idea, and that idea is very simple. It is the best way to understand the emergence of fashion trends, the ebb and flow of crime waves, or, for that matter, the transformation of unknown books into bestsellers, or the rise of teenage smoking, or the phenomena of word of mouth, or any number of other mysterious changes that mark everyday life is to think of them as epidemics.

This idea of social trends as epidemics is central to the book, as Gladwell points out that such trends have much in common with epidemics. First of all, social trends are clear examples of contagious behavior. They often start out with only a few people, and those few people are the main means of conveying a trend to the rest of a population. Fashion trends begin with a few different minded people starting their own fashion, and they spread those fashions until they become popular to the point where their styles are being featured in fashion shows. Secondly, in most cases of explosive trends, small changes created big effects. The actions of a few, or the circumstances in a small situation affect the larger picture to an almost disproportional degree. A third characteristic is that all the changes occur quickly. There's no slow build-up, no steady decline, but sharp rises or falls. It all occurs in one dramatic moment, the tipping point. This is the same way one could describe an outbreak of a virus in a small town.

The majority of Gladwell's book is dedicated to the three rules of epidemics: the Law of the Few, the Stickiness Factor, and the Power of Context. The Law of the Few states that any social epidemic is based on the efforts of a few people with a particular set of social skills. This law is heavily studied by economists, and is referred to as the 80/20 Principle, in which 80% of the work is done by 20% of the population. For example, 80% of beer is drunk by 20% of beer drinkers. Those who affect the social change are coined by Gladwell as Connectors, Mavens, and Salesmen. Connectors are those people who form large social networks for the sake of meeting people, and have an uncanny ability to form relationships with mere acquaintances. Mavens are information specialists, people who garner information about a particular market, and then distribute it to people around them, making their knowledge public. Salesmen are, like their name implies, people with the charismatic ability to sell you on an idea, so convince those who are doubtful to take a certain course of action. For all of these Gladwell sites Paul Revere as one of the best examples. Paul Revere and William Dawes both set out on a fateful night to warn the militias of the coming of the British, but Paul Revere's ride is famous while William Dawes' is practically unheard of. That is because Paul Revere was a Connector, a Maven, and a Salesman all at once. He knew many people through his work as a messenger, he ran information gathering groups to find out about the British, and he had the charisma to convince militia leaders and common folk about the urgency and veracity of his message. Paul Revere was one of those rare people who could reach everyone and bring them to his cause with ease, helping to set in motion one of the most important events in our nation's history: the Revolutionary War.

The second of the three rules of epidemics is known as the Stickiness Factor. The Stickiness factor is the specific content of a message that renders it more memorable to the listener or audience. This idea is crucial, because if no one remembers what the message was or the effect is not lasting, then there is no hope for any significant change in trend. This is especially crucial in advertising, where the entire point is to get a customer to remember a product or service. For example, Winston filter-tip cigarettes came up with a new and catchy slogan to promote their cigarettes, "Winston tastes good like a cigarette should." The grammatical and syntax problems made the slogan more memorable, and within months soared past competition to become the second largest cigarette seller at the time, and soon after became the largest.

The third and final rule of epidemics is the Power of Context, which states that people will react differently in certain situations depending on the surroundings and the specific context. For example, during the spring and summer months, the spread of STDs in East and West Baltimore increase at a rapid rate, but during the colder seasons drop down dramatically. The cold deters people from frequenting several bars and thus increasing the risk of getting an STD. Take another example, the 1964 stabbing of Kitty Genovese. Kitty was attacked three times over the course of a half hour and eventually killed, all while thirty-eight of her neighbors watched from their windows. None of them called the police. When later asked, none of them could even say why they didn't call the police. After several experiments, psychologists have determined that this was because with so many people watch, all the neighbors thought that if there were really a problem, someone else would call the police. If only one person had been witness, Kitty's life probably would've been saved.

This book aptly expresses a form of journalism that is deeply researched and thought through, with not a single extraneous thought or sentence. Malcolm Gladwell clarifies every point with a precise and relevant example, showing just how prevalent the concept of tipping points exist in our lives. He reveals the causes of social trends in a way that they can be applied through our everyday lives, whether it's to spread an idea, sell a product, or try to change the world.

From Roman to Anglo-Saxon England

*Another long history essay. Sorry to anyone who actually reads this, but I just felt like putting some research papers online.

The Dark Ages, so called because so little is known about them, because so few primary sources are to be found. The term has meant many things in the past, whether it be used when referring to the period after the glory of the Roman age, and before the time in which the term was coined, or because it was commonly thought that the period was plagued with illiteracy and ignorance, requiring enlightenment. But historians only drew these conclusions because they didn't know what else to say, particularly about the British Isles. However we need not be ignorant about this time. It is a critical time in British history, the transformation from Roman Britain to the precursor to modern Britain, Anglo-Saxon England. How did this come to be? What about the fall of the Western Roman Empire allowed for this drastic change? Towards the end of the fourth century and the beginning of the fifth century, when the decline of Rome was in full, the loss of military control of Britain represented a loss of Roman influence in Britain. The Roman army was a representation of Rome itself, a physical manifestation of the building power of the great empire, and with its absence the physical reminder of that power disappeared. In addition, when the army left, so did much of the governing structure that had been built around it, to maintain the wages and supplies of the soldiers. This not only left the British open to invasion from foreign barbarians, but also, more importantly, left a vacuum to be filled. In filling that vacuum, the Anglo-Saxons gained access to the entire island, and were from there able to create a sphere of influence that shaped the development of a nation.

In truth, the Western Roman empire had begun to lose its hold upon Britain even before the "fall of Rome," most particularly in the form of its military occupation, if not in the form of cultural influence. Throughout the third century and the beginning of the fourth, leading right up to the sack of Rome, Roman Britain was subject to numerous rebellions and usurpations, as well as military threats that severely taxed the Roman military presence in Britain, and over time, the Roman garrison was reduced to a fraction of its original numbers. One of the most famous of these crises was the rebellion of Magnus Maximus in 383. Maximus was a Dux Britanniarum, or a Duke of the Britains, and a military leader within Britain. With the support of the military behind him, Maximus was proclaimed emperor, and "placed himself at the head of the British military. . . .and landed at the mouth of the Rhine. The troops. . . .quickly revolted to his standard. . . ." In order to compile a formidable military force, Maximus drained the forts of Wales and West Britain, leaving them completely vulnerable to raids from the Picts and the Scots. Even after his defeat in 388, there's no sign of any strengthening of the British garrisons. The empty forts of Wales and Western Britain were never reoccupied, leaving a critical weakness in British defenses that continued until the full departure of Roman forces. Rather, upon his defeat in Gaul, Maximus's forces were absorbed by the Western Roman army and put to use in defense of Italy against the barbarian threat. When faced with a similar barbarian threat in the form of the Picts, Rome sent its most powerful general to deal with the situation: Stilicho. This was the last occasion in which aid was sent from Rome to Britain to aid against the islands barbarian foes. By 401, the situation was largely in hand, and Stilicho withdrew with British forces in tow to deal with the invading Goths in Italy. In much the same manner, the rebellion and then recognition of Constantine III drew even more of the reduced British manpower, as Constantine crossed into Gaul with his army and established control over much of the Western Roman empire. At this point there are British regiments serving all over Europe, even in the East, but aside from a few minimal garrisons left in the walled towns on the frontier in Britain, the island was left largely undefended.

These series of upheavals are marking points for the end of Roman rule in Britain, Culminating in the elevation of Constantine III as emperor. Upon Constantine's departure to the continent with most of what was left of the Roman British military, the Britons, having been left to defend themselves against the barbarian invaders, chiefly the Saxons, took matters into their own hands. According to the Greek historian Zosimos of 500, the Britons "rebelled against Rome and removed themselves from Roman jurisdiction." However, Zosimos's work does not account for the motive behind the supposed revolt. For long, the event has been viewed as an uprising of peasants against their masters, and this was merely an episode of class struggle. If that were the case however, then why was the Britons' first action to rescue their towns and expel the barbarians from their territory, rather than to tear down the Roman hierarchy in place? A much more likely explanation is the rebellion was led by landowners and members of the local oligarchy who had the most at stake in the urban centers. Rome's ability to defend its citizens in Britain had failed, and as such their only choice was to defend themselves. A year later, the emperor Honorius a letter to the cities of Britain, telling the Britons to look to their own defense. Honorius covered the fact that Britain had already acted on its own behalf, and made it appear as if he still had some measure of control. But after 409, there was no attempt to restore the island to Roman rule.

The emperor's letter to the British citizens that they should look after themselves implies a shift in the relationship between Rome and its subjects. In Britain and other areas, such as Gaul, the Roman government had been an important aspect of everyday life, particularly for the maintenance of the military. But without a military presence, the governing bodies had lost much of their purpose, particularly in the collection of taxes. So with the crippling of the local governments and the absence of a military, the citizens were left two major choices for their own defense: to rise up and defend themselves, or to hire defenders from amongst the barbarians. For the most part the Britons chose the former, but it was the latter that had the deepest long-term effect of the creation of a new Britain. Those who chose the latter continued to resist Saxon dominance in Britain until 634. The old separation between citizen and soldier to which the people had become so used to was gone; Britain was becoming militarized.

After the departure of the Roman military, otherwise referred to as the abandonment of Britain, there were rapid changes to the governing system that lasted until the dominance of the Angle-Saxons, lasting in some areas until the eleventh century. The relation between the Romano-British aristocracy and the imperial government which had administered the cities of Britain were no longer in existence. As Malcolm Todd states in his essay "After the Romans," "The evils of Roman taxation had gone, but so had the protective umbrella of Roman power." In its absence, the contemporary land-owning families attempted to hold onto their own power. And though some succeeded for a period of time, the lack of a central authority in Britain eventually worked against the local magnates who tried to hold on to their authority. Without a central government to administer and organize the economic base of the British society, it began to fall apart. The great agricultural estates began to slowly and gradually fall into decline with less demand coming from towns and garrisons. They were unsure of the market for their crops, and as they became more and more isolated, they became unable to plant or harvest crops. In the case of the centralized market industries, the industries, unlike the agricultural estates, collapsed early-on in the fifth century, some even ending before 400. With the fall of urban and military demand, the markets the industries such as metalworking and pottery centers depended were no longer there. What needs there were for such goods were taken care of locally. And without an organized system, successful distribution of goods became an exercise in futility. Another apparent sign of deep economic change can be found in the cessation of Roman coins reaching the island in the beginning of the fifth century. The copper coins which were such a great part of daily life began to fall into disuse. Coins are now only found in settlements and cities which had a previous Roman phase. Even in the important economic centers of the later years, such as Cornwall of the sixth and seventh centuries, had no coins to be found. Britain at this time was going through some very incredible changes, trying to adapt to a new situation. This instability only aided the Anglo-Saxons in their coming dominance of Britain.

The choice to ally with one barbarian war-leader against the rest became increasingly more common as time went by. After creating an agreement, a war-leader, often a Saxon in the beginning, would defend the former Roman civilians against other barbarians--Picts and other Saxons--in exchange for supplies--including food, material, and shelter--and small tributes, or taxes. Increasingly, this allowed the Saxons to fill the vacuum left by the Roman army. One of the most often cited cases of this, expected by Gildas to date 446, comes from Gildas's work On the Ruin of Britain, writing, "Then all the councillors, together with that proud tyrant Gurthrigern, the British king. . . .invit[ed] in among them (like wolves into the sheep-fold), the fierce and impious Saxons. . . .to repel the invasions of the northern nations." Gildas goes on to lament the foolish embracement of the Saxons, godless heathens, by the British kings, and cites this as one of the primary reasons for the fall of ruin of Britain. Although his commentary was largely influenced by religious perspectives, Gildas was on the right track. By taking the Saxons in with them, the British kings ensured the barbarians a foothold in their land. The agreement between the two peoples lasted a long time, but eventually the treaty was broken. Now, the Saxon army that had been called in to defend the Britons had become "a far greater threat than any posed by the Picts and the Irish." And this Saxon army set itself to conquer all of Britain.

In order to understand the transition of the island from Roman Britain to Anglo-Saxon England, it is important to look at the reasons for the Anglo-Saxon migration. First, however, there is a critical assumption that greatly changes the general understanding of the circumstances of the Saxon invasion. Gildas uses a letter from the Britons to Aetius requesting aid against the barbarian invaders as a starting point for the presence of Saxons in Britain: "'To Aetius, now consul for the third time:. . . . The barbarians drive us to the sea; the sea throws us back on the barbarians: thus two modes of death await us, we are either slain or drowned.'" The address of "consul for the third time" means that the letter was sent no earlier than 446, the earliest year the appeal could have been made, when Aetius was deemed consul for the third time, and no later than 453, when he was deemed consul a fourth time. It was Aetius's refusal of this appeal that inspired the treaty between the "proud king" and the Saxons, and the basis for Gildas's reasoning that the Saxons arrived no earlier than 446. With their arrival at that date, it was long presumed that the Saxons only began their takeover of Britain after the breaking of the treaty, when they began their campaign to conquer the island. However, there is evidence that makes that presumption faulty. First, the Saxons were originally part of a great assault on Britain in 367, including Saxons, Picts, and Scotti, found in evidence from Ammianus Marcellinus, a late Roman historian and former military officer. The massive raids were repulsed, but the Saxons managed to form a beachhead of sorts, from which small settlements and raids could be made. Second, from the Life of St Germanus of Auxerre, a bishop and former provincial governor, we see that in 429 the bishop "gave encouragement to a British army fighting Saxons who were already located in Britain." Third, and finally, from the work, The Gallic Chronical, of 452, cited a disaster c.441 by the Britons at the hands of the Saxons, that ultimately led to military domination by the Saxons. If this is the case, then Gildas, writing nearly a century later, was incorrect in his assumption that the settlement and invasion took place c.450, by which time the Saxons had already achieved much of their power.

This new revelation lends itself to the understanding that the Saxon invasion and migration was not something that happened quickly, but rather took place gradually over decades at a time, before near contemporaries ever suspected. The reasons for that migration are in large part tied with the declining Roman state. In the Saxon society, same with the Angles and Jutes, the two other Germanic tribes that made up the migrating population to Britain, authority rested in part with the chief or king, and in part with the principal lineages of the tribe, which acted as a check to the leader's power. To go to war, for example, the kind needed the help of the noble lineages to raise a militia from the tribe, since there was no standing army. But the king could generate more authority within the tribe by having control of the economy. In this case, distant trade with Rome, an exotic foreign power, provided prestige goods that greatly impressed the community and reinforced the king's position. Some of the goods included glassware, fine pottery, and a multitude of jewels, which the king would often give away in a show of generosity, a sign of power in the Germanic tribes. So when Rome began to experience recession and inflation at its decline, the Saxons, Angles, and Jutes suffered as well. Some Anglo-Saxon tribes had structured their daily life to accommodate the Roman traders and merchants, Roman luxury goods replacing the traditional economy of the tribes. The Anglo-Saxons were forced to turn to raiding to supplement their economic needs, and as such began to target vulnerable coastal towns for their raids. At the same time, a climate shift lowered the temperatures by two or three degrees, a small amount, but enough to severely destabilize the agriculture for the Anglo-Saxon tribes. Those two to three degrees caused shorter summers and longer winters, northern crops to fail more often, river valleys to flood frequently, and livestock to be suddenly more costly to take care of during the longer winters. In short, the Anglo-Saxon tribes were subjugated to a period of unrest that greatly threatened both the accumulated power of the kings and the ability of the tribe to thrive. It became clear that they needed to seek better opportunities elsewhere.

In groups of thirty to fifty, the Anglo-Saxons began crossing over to Britain, settling down in Kent, the Thames Valley, East Anglia, and the Trent Valley over several decades. The migration accounted for several tens of thousands of immigrants, and though some met violent resistance, in areas where the Britons employed Saxons as defenders against further incursions, for the most part the Anglo-Saxon migrants were received without rancor. Compared to the million population of Britain at the beginning of the fifth century, the Anglo-Saxons weren't much of a numerical threat. The farmers of the Anglo-Saxons settled in the towns fallen to disrepair after the departure of Rome, and soon reconstructed villages controlled by Anglo-Saxons was becoming the norm. It is only later, when the Saxon army began its conquest of the island, that the Saxons were seen as a true threat. Archeological evidence supports the presence of Anglo-Saxons before the invasion, with Saxon cemeteries being found at Winchester with objects dated at least a century before the conflict, presenting the conclusion the much of the success of the Anglo-Saxons is owed to a peaceful integration underlying the conquest of war.

The Anglo-Saxons found rich ground in which to replant themselves, ecologically and politically. Because of the Briton's dependence on Rome and her military presence so much, when it left them behind, they found themselves exposed to the military force and cultural influence of the Anglo-Saxons. The collapse of the structured governing system of the Romans left a gap to be filled, and the Anglo-Saxons found themselves to be a perfect fit. As time passed, the Anglo-Saxons and the Britons found themselves coexisting without much conflict, and the Anglo-Saxon nobility didn't assert itself as rulers until a few generations had passed by. Later on, the Anglo-Saxons gained continued hold with their conversion to Christianity, culminating in the eventual conquest of the entire island in the eleventh century. There are still many gaps in the knowledge of this time in British history, the Dark Ages. But slowly historians are piecing together the narrative of Britain, and the story of what happened, and how Anglo-Saxon England came to be.

Works Cited

Pat Southern, "The Army in Late Roman Britain," A Companion to Roman Britain, Malcolm Todd ed. (The Blackwell Companions to British History: Oxford, 2004)
Thomas Wright, Esq, The Celt, the Roman, and the Saxon, (Arthur Hall, Virtue, and CO: London, 1852)
Malcolm Todd, "After the Romans," The Making of Great Britain: The Dark Ages, Lesley M. Smith ed. (Shocken Books: New York, 1984)
Mathew Innes, Introduction to Early Medieval Western Europe, 300-900 (Routledge: London, 2007)
Ian Wood, "The Final Phase," A Companion to Roman Britain, Malcolm Todd ed. (The Blackwell Companions to British History: Oxford, 2004)
Thomas Charles-Edwards, "Introduction," After Rome, Thomas Charles-Edwards ed. (Oxford University Press: Oxford, 2003)
Bryan Ward-Perkins, The Fall of Rome and the End of Civilization (Oxford University Press: Oxford, 2005)
John Hines, "Nations and Kingdoms," After Rome, Thomas Charles-Edwards ed. (Oxford University Press: Oxford, 2003)
Gildas, "The Works of Gildas," Six Old English Chronicals, J.A. Giles ed. (George Bell & Sons: London, 1885)
Richard Hodges, "The Anglo-Saxon Migrations," The Making of Great Britain: The Dark Ages, Lesley M. Smith ed. (Shocken Books: New York, 1984)
Lloyd and Jenifer Lang, Celtic Britain and Ireland, (St. Martin's Press: New York, 1990)