John H. Arnold

John H. Arnold is Professor of Medieval History at the University of Cambridge. He previously worked at Birkbeck College, University of London, where he specialises in the study of medieval religious culture. He has also written widely on historiography and why history matters.

Arnold received his D.Phil in Medieval Studies from the University of York. He has been professor of medieval history at Birkbeck College, University of London, since 2008. He joined the college as a lecturer in 2001. Before that he was a lecturer at the University of East Anglia. He is a member of the Social History Society and the Medieval Academy of America.

Arnold specialises in the study of medieval religious culture, saying that while he has never been a believer in any religion, 'belief' has always fascinated him. In his work he asks "Why do people believe the things they believe? What does 'believing' really mean in practice?" Arnold has also written widely about historiography. In 2008 he wrote a policy paper, Why history matters - and why medieval history also matters, for History & Policy.

• What is Masculinity? Historical Dynamics from Antiquity to the Contemporary World (Palgrave, 2011), co-edited with Sean Brady
• What is Medieval History? (Polity, 2008)
• Belief and Unbelief in Medieval Europe (Bloomsbury, 2005)
• A Companion to the Book of Margery Kempe (Boydell, 2004), co-edited with Katherine J Lewis
• Inquisition and Power: Catharism and the Confessing Subject in Medieval Languedoc (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2001)
• History: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford, 2000)