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Symposium

Symposium. Crisis, Gender and the Politics of Time in the Medieval and Early Modern Periods

Yearly symposium of the Centre for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, University of Southern Denmark, 5-6 November 2019 at the Convent of Noble Maidens

In the last two decades queer, gender and feminist studies have brought about a better understanding of varied temporal experiences and discourses of time in pre- and early modern societies. Far from being a disembodied concept, time is quintessentially associated with contingent social practices and narratives of gender. More specifically, the interaction between gender and temporalityis inherent tostrategies of memorialization, as well as to historiographical narratives, both medieval and modern. By using the conceptual tool of crisis, this conference looks at the broader European and Mediterranean spaces across both the medieval and early modern periods. We take the term crisis in its wider meaning and we regard it as conceptually suitable to highlighting the connections between different temporal patterns (e.g. eschatological temporalities; renewal and decadence; prophecies etc.) across a variety of social backgrounds. Contributions have a wide chronological and conceptual scope, ranging from early Christianity and Byzantium to medievalist literature, from the political import of gendered temporalities to the narratives of subjective experiences.

Venue

The symposium of the Centre for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, supported by the History Department, University of Southern Denmark and the Centre for Medieval Literature (SDU/University of York) will take place on the 5th  and 6th of November 2019 in Odense, at the former Convent of Noble Maidens.

Attendance

Attendance is free, but if interested you are required to fill in a registration form due to limited availability of seats. The registration form is available here. Registration will close on the 28th of October. For further information contact Aglae Pizzone (pizzone@sdu.dk). 

Program

Tuesday, November 5

15.00-15.15 Aglae Pizzone (SDU), Welcome and introduction
15.15-16.15 Keynote: Diane Watt (University of Surrey),(Re)writing Women’s History at Wilton Abbey
16.15-16.30 Coffee Break
16.30-17.15 Lorenz Hindrichsen (independent researcher), “Experience, though noon auctoritee”: Conflicting Temporalities in the Wife of Bath’s Prologue from Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales
17.15-18.00 Zoë Enstone (York St John University), Morgan le Fay, Nymue and the Ravages of Time: Women Readers and Subversion in Malory’sMorte Darthur
18.00-18.30 General discussion
19.30 Speakers’ dinner

Wednesday, November 6

9.00-9.30 Morning Coffee
9.30-10.30 Keynote:Shaun Tougher (University of Cardiff), Family Crisis: Dynasty and Gender in Byzantium
10.30-11.15 Maria dell’Isola (SDU),The End that Never Came. On the Relationship between Time and Gender in Some Byzantine Hagiographical Texts
11.15-12.00 Coffee Break
12.00-12.45 Emilia Olechnowicz (The Polish Academy of Sciences), “I am Richard II”: The Elizabethan Transgression of Time and Gender
12.45-14.00 Lunch on the Convent’s premises
14.00-14.45 Kristine Johanson (University of Amsterdam) ‘I've all the world in thee’: Emotion, Time, and the Making of New Political States in Katherine Philips’ Poetry

14.45-15.30
Sarah Lewis (King’s College London), Prodigal Husbands and Crises of Maturation
15.30-15.45 Coffee Break
15.45-16.30 Ana Rita Gonçalves Soares(Complutense University of Madrid), Queer Temporality. Disrupting Linear Time in Medievalist Spanish Literature
16.30-17.15 General discussion and conclusion
Editing was completed: 05.11.2019