Women&Gender Middle Ages

Catalog description

This seminar addresses the construction of gendered identities in the Middle Ages, and the experience of medieval women and men in relation to those identities. Seminar readings and discussions explore topics such as changes in attitudes towards women's authority during the Middle Ages; the experience of religious women and the meaning of female imagery in religious writings; women's opportunities and experiences in politics and the economy; the lives and writings of illustrious medieval women; and the relationship between medieval conceptions of femininity and masculinity, and their articulation of gender differences in medieval literature and science.