Hortulus: The Online Graduate Journal of Medieval Studies is pleased to announce our sponsored session for the International Medieval Congress at Kalamazoo, which will be held from 9-12 May 2013:
Wounds, Torture and the Grotesque
The subjects of wounds and torture have become increasingly popular in medieval scholarship, while the grotesque has been of perennial interest to scholars in Art History, Religion and Theology, Anthropology, and Philosophy. Ideas of the grotesque are increasingly being reconsidered in relation to concepts of race and racial theory, a discussion which has contemporary impacts far beyond the academic world.
Concurrent to these developments in medieval studies has been an increase in scholarly attention paid to these subject areas in the field of medical humanities, which has further energized academic discussion of corporeality and the body. Such explorations include the analysis of suffering, personhood, and our responsibility to one another as human beings.
Considering these themes together in a single session potentially offers a new perspective that approaches bodily issues via the consideration of pain and suffering, of destruction rather than construction. At this time, we are accepting proposals for 20-minute papers on any of the topics outlined above. Our upcoming Spring 2013 issue of the journal will be devoted to these topics, and we hope that the papers presented in this session, given the benefit of critical feedback from the audience, will in turn be submitted to the journal for publication. We particularly encourage the submission of proposals that take a strongly theoretical and/or interdisciplinary approach, and that examine new and previously unconsidered aspects of these subjects
Please send proposals and inquiries for this session to Melissa Elmes at [log in to unmask] no later than 15 September 2012. Along with your proposal, please include a completed Participant Information Form.
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