Edited Volumes
Spencer-Hall, Alicia and Gutt, Blake. Eds. Trans and Genderqueer Subjects in Medieval Hagiography. (Amsterdam, The Netherlands: Amsterdam University Press), 2021
Now available Open Access ---> https://library.oapen.org/handle/20.500.12657/61200
This volume... more Now available Open Access ---> https://library.oapen.org/handle/20.500.12657/61200
This volume presents an interdisciplinary examination of trans and genderqueer subjects in medieval hagiography. Scholarship has productively combined analysis of medieval literary texts with modern queer theory — yet these works explored questions of gender almost exclusively through a prism of sexuality, rather than gender identity. This volume moves beyond such limitations, foregrounding the richness of hagiography as a genre integrally resistant to limiting binaristic categories, including rigid gender binaries. The collection showcases scholarship by emerging trans and genderqueer authors, as well as the work of established researchers. Working on the vanguard of historical trans studies, these scholars demonstrate the vital and vitally political nature of their work as medievalists. This volume enables the recreation of a lineage linking modern trans and genderqueer individuals to their medieval ancestors, providing models of queer identity where much scholarship has insisted there were none, and reestablishing the place of gender non-conformity in history.
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Chapters in Edited Volumes
Trans and Genderqueer Subjects in Medieval Hagiography, ed. by Alicia Spencer-Hall and Blake Gutt (Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press), 223-244., 2021
This chapter explores the ways that sacred, physically impaired, and transgender embodiment(s) ar... more This chapter explores the ways that sacred, physically impaired, and transgender embodiment(s) are all structured by reference to notions of wholeness, perfection, and cure. Focussing on the character of Blanchandin·e in the fourteenth-century French narrative, Tristan de Nanteuil, the analysis considers how disability, cure, and gender transformation are employed to modify a body according to the exigencies of the surrounding hagiographic narrative. Blanchandin·e’s physical form is repeatedly altered in response to the needs of their son, St Gilles. The chapter traces the shared efffects and afffects of the social formation – and disassembly – of trans-ness, sanctity, and physical impairment through the related, connected, and leaky bodies of Blanchandin·e and St Gilles.
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in Trans and Genderqueer Subjects in Medieval Hagiography, ed. by Alicia Spencer-Hall and Blake Gutt (Amsterdam, The Netherlands: Amsterdam University Press), pp. 281-330, 2021
Language matters, both in terms of what we say and how we say it. Our words can do real violence ... more Language matters, both in terms of what we say and how we say it. Our words can do real violence to those about whom we speak. This violence reflects the broader socio-cultural oppressions which marginalized communities face as a daily reality. Simultaneously, hateful language supports such oppressions, as a vehicle by which bigoted ideologies re-circulate and gain ever more traction in the public imagination. A considerable amount of violence has been done, and is being done, to the trans, genderqueer and intersex communities by disrespectful, othering, and offensive language. This violence is routinely perpetuated at a group level (comments about the community in general) and at an individual level (comments about specific individuals). Some wield discriminatory language knowingly, using their words as dog whistles for transphobia and queerphobia. Others, however, use disrespectful language unknowingly – due to ignorance of the offensive nature of certain terminology. Nevertheless, language is always political, and linguistic choices serve to re-inscribe, consciously or not, certain paradigms. The gender binary is a cultural construct, which is supported by normalized language which serves simultaneously to obscure alternative possibilities whilst reinforcing existing hegemonies. We provide this language guide as a resource, offering succinct suggestions as to the usage of respectful, inclusive, and non-violent terminology when talking about the trans, genderqueer and intersex communities, be that on a personal or group level.
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* See final published version here: https://www.academia.edu/45685816/Trans_and_Genderqueer_Studi... more * See final published version here: https://www.academia.edu/45685816/Trans_and_Genderqueer_Studies_Terminology_Language_and_Usage_Guide_Final_Published_Version_ *
Language matters, both in terms of what we say and how we say it. Our words can do real violence to those about whom we speak. This violence reflects the broader socio-cultural oppressions which marginalized communities face as a daily reality. Simultaneously, hateful language supports such oppressions, as a vehicle by which bigoted ideologies re-circulate and gain ever more traction in the public imagination. A considerable amount of violence has been done, and is being done, to the trans, genderqueer and intersex communities by disrespectful, othering, and offensive language. This violence is routinely perpetuated at a group level (comments about the community in general) and at an individual level (comments about specific individuals).
Some wield discriminatory language knowingly, using their words as dog whistles for transphobia and queerphobia. Others, however, use disrespectful language unknowingly – due to ignorance of the offensive nature of certain terminology. Nevertheless, language is always political, and linguistic choices serve to re-inscribe, consciously or not, certain paradigms. The gender binary is a cultural construct, which is supported by normalized language which serves simultaneously to obscure alternative possibilities whilst reinforcing existing hegemonies. We provide this language guide as a resource, offering succinct suggestions as to the usage of respectful, inclusive, and non-violent terminology when talking about the trans, genderqueer and intersex communities, be that on a personal or group level.
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in Trans and Genderqueer Subjects in Medieval Hagiography, edited by Alicia Spencer-Hall and Blake Gutt, Hagiography Beyond Tradition series (Amsterdam, The Netherlands: Amsterdam University Press, 2021), pp. 11-40
Trans and Genderqueer Subjects in Medieval Hagiography presents an interdisciplinary examination ... more Trans and Genderqueer Subjects in Medieval Hagiography presents an interdisciplinary examination of trans and genderqueer subjects in medieval hagiography. Scholarship has productively combined analysis of medieval literary texts with modern queer theory - yet, too often, questions of gender are explored almost exclusively through a prism of sexuality, rather than gender identity. This volume moves beyond such limitations, foregrounding the richness of hagiography as a genre integrally resistant to limiting binaristic categories, including rigid gender binaries. The collection showcases scholarship by emerging trans and genderqueer authors, as well as the work of established researchers. Working at the vanguard of historical trans studies, these scholars demonstrate the vital and vitally political nature of their work as medievalists. Trans and Genderqueer Subjects in Medieval Hagiography enables the re-creation of a lineage linking modern trans and genderqueer individuals to their medieval ancestors, providing models of queer identity where much scholarship has insisted there were none, and re-establishing the place of non-normative gender in history.
The Introduction sets out the rationale for the collection as a whole, and the significance and scope of trans studies, in the Middle Ages and beyond. It includes concise coverage of key scholarship in the field, contextualizing the volume and its chapters accordingly. It concludes with a chapter-by-chapter snapshot of the collection as a whole, explaining the thematic structures underpinning the volume’s analytical work.
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Parasites: Exploitation and Interference in French Thought and Culture, ed. Matt Phillips and Tomas Weber, 2018
This chapter employs the parasitic systems theory of Michel Serres, as well as Deleuze and Guatta... more This chapter employs the parasitic systems theory of Michel Serres, as well as Deleuze and Guattari’s conceptualization of the rhizome, as it explores the systems of relation and signification at work on the pages of the medieval manuscript. Taking as a case study the medieval French Vie de Saint Denis, which it examines alongside a type of inter- and intra-textual marginalia (hybrid letter-images), the chapter addresses both the interactions of visual elements on the manuscript folio, and the relations which structure the text itself. The interplay between letter and image, and their differing ways of signifying, are investigated alongside the parasitic and psychoanalytically perverse relationships which form the framework of Christian sanctity and penitence, and the logic of martyrdom. This chapter was the winner of the 2015 R. Gapper Postgraduate Essay Prize, awarded by the Society for French Studies.
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Articles
postmedieval, 2020
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Medieval Feminist Forum, 2019
This article employs Lacan’s notion of anamorphosis, and the retrospection which Kathryn Bond Sto... more This article employs Lacan’s notion of anamorphosis, and the retrospection which Kathryn Bond Stockton presents as fundamental to the assumption of queer identity, as it demonstrates the functions and value of transgender readings of medieval texts. The article analyses two thirteenth-century literary works, Le Roman de Saint Fanuel and Aucassin et Nicolette, both of which feature pregnant male characters, alongside A.K. Summers’ 2014 graphic novel, Pregnant Butch. This juxtaposition reveals the resonances between these medieval and modern portrayals of gender non-conformity, as well as the highly gendered cultural norms surrounding pregnancy. Finally, attention to Janice Raymond’s transmisogynistic claims about the “rebirth” of trans women illustrates the importance of an awareness of transgender history.
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Exemplaria, 2018
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Translations
Ovidian Transversions: ‘Iphis and Ianthe’, 1300-1650, 2019
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Thesis
This thesis investigates conceptual networks — systems of organising, understanding and explainin... more This thesis investigates conceptual networks — systems of organising, understanding and explaining thought and knowledge — and the ways in which they underlie both text and its mise en page across a range of thirteenth-and fourteenth-century French and Catalan literary texts and their manuscript witnesses. Each of the three chapters explores a separate corpus of texts, using two of four interrelated network theories: Michel Serres's notion of parasites and hosts as the basic interconnecting units that combine to constitute all relational networks; the ubiquitous organizational tree; Gilles Deleuze's concept of the fold as the primary factor in producing differentiation and identity; and Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari's unruly, anti-hierarchical and anti-arborescent rhizomatic systems. The first chapter engages primarily with parasites and trees; the second with trees and folds; and the third with folds and rhizomes. However, resonances with the other network theories are discussed as they occur, in order to demonstrate the fundamentally interconnected and often interchangeable nature of these systems. Each chapter includes close analysis of manuscript witnesses of the texts under discussion.
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Conference Papers
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In this paper, I compare two juridical negotiations of the complexities of what Robert Mills has ... more In this paper, I compare two juridical negotiations of the complexities of what Robert Mills has called ‘the sex-gender-sexuality nexus’, and which, following Judith Butler, we can also describe as a signifying chain which is imposed upon all subjects, whose order is fixed, and which is presented as a logical and predictable sequence. My first example focuses on the twelfth-century theologian Peter Cantor’s definition of sodomy, and its implications for intersex individuals, and my second example involves twenty-first century dealings with the intersection of Title VII of the United States’ Civil Rights Act, and the Supreme Court verdict known as Price Waterhouse v. Hopkins.
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The Majorcan mystic and philosopher Ramon Llull (c. 1232-c. 1315) is best known for his Art, a un... more The Majorcan mystic and philosopher Ramon Llull (c. 1232-c. 1315) is best known for his Art, a universal method of combinatory reasoning supposedly permitting comprehension of all fields of knowledge. Llull's Arbre de Ciència or Tree of Science (1295-1296) is an encyclopedic presentation of the Art, which figures sixteen branches of learning as a series of sixteen trees. Each tree represents a different aspect of the singular Tree of Science: just as the book of the Arbre de Ciència is made up of sixteen shorter books, so the Arbre itself is a single tree from which a portable forest unfolds. Thinking through Llull's Tree of Science, this paper examines mental space(s), including the spaces of thought and knowledge, and asks: what kind of space do thoughts and knowledge occupy? Why are spatial paradigms such as tree diagrams so commonly used to organise knowledge, and how are they constructed and comprehended? Further, this paper probes the limits of spatial thinking. The mental stage is at once the site of the most elementary sketches of ideas, and of the most advanced elaborations of myriad infinitesimal connections between concepts. Llull's meticulously-described diagrammatic trees, however, have proved an insoluble challenge to generations of illustrators, indicating the difficulty of translating the spatial configurations which are available to thought into graphic representations. Are these spaces of knowledge accessible and comprehensible enough to function as the didactic tools as which they are offered? Or is the space of thought a mental space only, impossible to display in any other format? Ramon Llull's recursive and intricately-conceived Arbre de Ciència tests the limits of both intellectual and graphic figurations of the spatial formulations of knowledge which it presents.
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This volume presents an interdisciplinary examination of trans and genderqueer subjects in medieval hagiography. Scholarship has productively combined analysis of medieval literary texts with modern queer theory — yet these works explored questions of gender almost exclusively through a prism of sexuality, rather than gender identity. This volume moves beyond such limitations, foregrounding the richness of hagiography as a genre integrally resistant to limiting binaristic categories, including rigid gender binaries. The collection showcases scholarship by emerging trans and genderqueer authors, as well as the work of established researchers. Working on the vanguard of historical trans studies, these scholars demonstrate the vital and vitally political nature of their work as medievalists. This volume enables the recreation of a lineage linking modern trans and genderqueer individuals to their medieval ancestors, providing models of queer identity where much scholarship has insisted there were none, and reestablishing the place of gender non-conformity in history.
Language matters, both in terms of what we say and how we say it. Our words can do real violence to those about whom we speak. This violence reflects the broader socio-cultural oppressions which marginalized communities face as a daily reality. Simultaneously, hateful language supports such oppressions, as a vehicle by which bigoted ideologies re-circulate and gain ever more traction in the public imagination. A considerable amount of violence has been done, and is being done, to the trans, genderqueer and intersex communities by disrespectful, othering, and offensive language. This violence is routinely perpetuated at a group level (comments about the community in general) and at an individual level (comments about specific individuals).
Some wield discriminatory language knowingly, using their words as dog whistles for transphobia and queerphobia. Others, however, use disrespectful language unknowingly – due to ignorance of the offensive nature of certain terminology. Nevertheless, language is always political, and linguistic choices serve to re-inscribe, consciously or not, certain paradigms. The gender binary is a cultural construct, which is supported by normalized language which serves simultaneously to obscure alternative possibilities whilst reinforcing existing hegemonies. We provide this language guide as a resource, offering succinct suggestions as to the usage of respectful, inclusive, and non-violent terminology when talking about the trans, genderqueer and intersex communities, be that on a personal or group level.
The Introduction sets out the rationale for the collection as a whole, and the significance and scope of trans studies, in the Middle Ages and beyond. It includes concise coverage of key scholarship in the field, contextualizing the volume and its chapters accordingly. It concludes with a chapter-by-chapter snapshot of the collection as a whole, explaining the thematic structures underpinning the volume’s analytical work.
This volume presents an interdisciplinary examination of trans and genderqueer subjects in medieval hagiography. Scholarship has productively combined analysis of medieval literary texts with modern queer theory — yet these works explored questions of gender almost exclusively through a prism of sexuality, rather than gender identity. This volume moves beyond such limitations, foregrounding the richness of hagiography as a genre integrally resistant to limiting binaristic categories, including rigid gender binaries. The collection showcases scholarship by emerging trans and genderqueer authors, as well as the work of established researchers. Working on the vanguard of historical trans studies, these scholars demonstrate the vital and vitally political nature of their work as medievalists. This volume enables the recreation of a lineage linking modern trans and genderqueer individuals to their medieval ancestors, providing models of queer identity where much scholarship has insisted there were none, and reestablishing the place of gender non-conformity in history.
Language matters, both in terms of what we say and how we say it. Our words can do real violence to those about whom we speak. This violence reflects the broader socio-cultural oppressions which marginalized communities face as a daily reality. Simultaneously, hateful language supports such oppressions, as a vehicle by which bigoted ideologies re-circulate and gain ever more traction in the public imagination. A considerable amount of violence has been done, and is being done, to the trans, genderqueer and intersex communities by disrespectful, othering, and offensive language. This violence is routinely perpetuated at a group level (comments about the community in general) and at an individual level (comments about specific individuals).
Some wield discriminatory language knowingly, using their words as dog whistles for transphobia and queerphobia. Others, however, use disrespectful language unknowingly – due to ignorance of the offensive nature of certain terminology. Nevertheless, language is always political, and linguistic choices serve to re-inscribe, consciously or not, certain paradigms. The gender binary is a cultural construct, which is supported by normalized language which serves simultaneously to obscure alternative possibilities whilst reinforcing existing hegemonies. We provide this language guide as a resource, offering succinct suggestions as to the usage of respectful, inclusive, and non-violent terminology when talking about the trans, genderqueer and intersex communities, be that on a personal or group level.
The Introduction sets out the rationale for the collection as a whole, and the significance and scope of trans studies, in the Middle Ages and beyond. It includes concise coverage of key scholarship in the field, contextualizing the volume and its chapters accordingly. It concludes with a chapter-by-chapter snapshot of the collection as a whole, explaining the thematic structures underpinning the volume’s analytical work.
Roundtable remarks: Medieval/Trans/Medieval: Identities, Intersections and Affinities.
Participants include Lee Colwill (University of Iceland, Reykjavík) and Blake Gutt (University of Cambridge)