Unique in the nation, the interdisciplinary Group for Early Modern Studies (GEMS) brings together University of Arizona faculty, graduate students, and community members from a wide range of fields who pursue research in the early modern period (roughly 1400-1800). GEMS members come from seventeen departments in five colleges across campus, including art, history, literature, music, science, and theater. GEMS provides opportunities for professional development, exposure to new research, invigorating academic exchange, and membership in a community of scholars. GEMS offers a Graduate Certificate in Interdisciplinary Early Modern Studies and supports research in the period through travel grants, awards, an annual lecture series, innovative graduate courses, and many opportunities for intellectual exchange. GEMS belongs to the Consortium of the Newberry Library Center for Renaissance Studies, giving GEMS members privileges at both the Newberry Library and the Folger Shakespeare Library. To become a member of GEMS, contact the Director, Kari Boyd McBride.

The GEMS Interdisciplinary Graduate Certificate Program is open to students who have been accepted into any University of Arizona graduate program as well as to individuals holding graduate degrees (such as public school teachers) who wish to pursue interdisciplinary study in the early modern period. GEMS Certificate students are uniformly enthusiastic about the opportunity to pursue interdisciplinary research and to develop expertise in more than a single field. They find that their scholarship and teaching are inevitably enhanced and altered through study outside their home disciplines and that their work becomes truly interdisciplinary in the process. On a more practical note, the ability to do interdisciplinary work is increasingly expected of graduates in all fields. In a competitive job market, the GEMS Interdisciplinary Graduate Certificate in Early Modern Studies can set candidates apart from the mass of applicants seeking a shrinking number of jobs.

GEMS is supported by many individuals and groups in Tucson and the University of Arizona. Current and past sponsors include the Graduate College and the Colleges of Architecture, Humanities, Science, and Social and Behavioral Sciences; the departments of Art History, Atmospheric Sciences, English, History, Judaic Studies, Music, Spanish and Portuguese, Theatre, and Women's Studies; the Division for Late Medieval and Reformation Studies, UAMARRC (the University of Arizona Medieval, Renaissance, and Reformation Committee), and the Alliance Française of Tucson; Charles Tatum, former Dean of the College of Humanities, Dean Mary Wildner-Bassett of the College of Humanities, Dean Ed Donnerstein of the College of Social and Behavioral Sciences, and Dean Maurice Sevigny of the College of Fine Arts; and the Learning Technologies Center.