***CROSS-POSTED--APOLOGIES FOR DUPLICATION***
Call for Papers
CONVERGING/CONVERTING IDENTITIES: GENDER, COMMUNITY, AND NATION IN
RELIGIOUS TEXTS AND IMAGES
Session Sponsored by the Society for Medieval Feminist Scholarship
at the CEMERS Conference, Binghamton University,
"Comparative Colonialisms: Preindustrial Colonial Intersections
in Global Perspective," October 31 and November 1, 1997
Medieval religious texts and images often explore the convergences of self
and other, gender and race, conversion and identity, and body and
community/nation. This session will consider the ways in which medieval
religious texts and images discuss notions of community and nationhood,
especially the way these notions are enacted on bodies. The overlapping
intersections of gender and nationhood illustrate how texts and images
embrace and/or demonize the religious other, particularly through the
use of bodies as signs of conversionary moments and sites for community
politics. Thus the community or nation defines itself not only through its
beliefs, but through bodily transformation, trauma, racial or gender
difference, or similarity.
Under the rubric of medieval religious texts and images, papers could
explore a wide variety of cultural productions, viewpoints, and cultures
in keeping with the larger conference focus on "comparative colonialisms."
Possible topics of exploration include definitions of community and
otherness, conversion and martyrdom narratives, and transvestism and other
symbolic bodily transformations.
Please contact the session organizer at the below address to express
interest or ask questions. She will be happy to respond to your queries.
Abstracts of 1-2 pages (300-500 words) should be sent (by email or regular
mail) to the session organizer, C. Annette Grise, by MONDAY, JUNE 23, 1997
for consideration. The session will be finalized and passed on to the
Society for Medieval Feminist Scholarship contact person for the June 30
deadline.
Session Organizer:
C. Annette Grise
Department of English
University College
The University of Western Ontario
London, Ontario, Canada
N6A 3K7
email: [log in to unmask]
phone: (519) 673-5121
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