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Up The Social Ladder: How Chinese Merchants Excelled Under The New Values Of Ming-Qing China, James B. Townsend 2023 University of Tennessee at Chattanooga

Up The Social Ladder: How Chinese Merchants Excelled Under The New Values Of Ming-Qing China, James B. Townsend

Armstrong Undergraduate Journal of History

Ming China was a socially volatile period of Chinese history. Social distinctions were blurred as the merchant class rose to power to challenge old Confucian ideals in a commerce-based society. This paper examines what paved the road for the merchant class to rise, and how the non-elite empowerment shifted China's attitudes towards consumption and commerce.


Remix The Manuscript: Transcription Tools Dataset 2.0, Michelle Warren, Arielle Feuerstein 2023 Dartmouth College

Remix The Manuscript: Transcription Tools Dataset 2.0, Michelle Warren, Arielle Feuerstein

Other Faculty Materials

The document posted here is an annotated dataset of digital tools for transcribing handwritten manuscripts. Release 2.0 was created in 2022-23 by Arielle Feuerstein as part of the ongoing project "Remix the Manuscript: A Chronicle of Digital Experiments.” The file attached here contains the dataset as completed on June 28, 2023 along with credits for prior contributors.


A Presence Of P____ And W__Th, Riley Wilson 2023 Rhode Island School of Design

A Presence Of P____ And W__Th, Riley Wilson

Masters Theses

This body of work examines the involvement of association as it relates to our cultural interpretations of natural phenomena. Flowers and animals, both real and imagined, have been used as symbols for human morality since the beginning of human history. Two sources with which I drew inspiration from are medieval bestiaries and the Victorian practice of flower language. By combining elements from these references, I aim to pair this idea about the human need for classification with my own considerations about my identity. In combination, I also aim to highlight the responsibility that is intrinsic to curiosity. When faced with …


Soul Furnace / فرن الأرواح, Isa Ghanayem 2023 Rhode Island School of Design

Soul Furnace / فرن الأرواح, Isa Ghanayem

Masters Theses

“This is the good washing, this is (the washing) which separates the dirty body from the pure body. This is like silver mixed with lead, it is separated from it by this (process): one makes for it a cupel of bones, which is what is called the “head of the dog” and of which the common name is kūja-which is the crucible—and this must be made of burnt bones. One melts the silver in it, one gives it a strong fire: the cupel will absorb and receive the lead, the fire will make its subtle (part) fly away and extirpate …


Obscene Pedagogies: Transgressive Talk And Sexual Education In Late Medieval Britain, Jenny C. Bledsoe 2023 Northeastern State University, Broken Arrow, Oklahoma

Obscene Pedagogies: Transgressive Talk And Sexual Education In Late Medieval Britain, Jenny C. Bledsoe

Medieval Feminist Forum: A Journal of Gender and Sexuality

No abstract provided.


Holy Matter Making Holy Meaning: Fashioning Memory, Community And Dissimilar Similitude In Middle Dutch Sister-Books And The Book Of Margery Kempe, Godelinde G. Perk 2023 University of Oxford (Faculty of Medieval and Modern Languages & Somerville)

Holy Matter Making Holy Meaning: Fashioning Memory, Community And Dissimilar Similitude In Middle Dutch Sister-Books And The Book Of Margery Kempe, Godelinde G. Perk

Medieval Feminist Forum: A Journal of Gender and Sexuality

The Middle Dutch sister-books and The Book of Margery Kempe are fifteenth-century vernacular texts by women chronicling their female subjects’ conversion and arduous attempts at a holy life. They share an (auto)hagiographic enterprise and formal and thematic features, including a display of rags and riches by the vitae’s subjects and a desire for mnemonic engagement on the part of the readers with the text. This article is the first to present the Diepenveen and Deventer sister-books and the Book as conversation partners. I draw on two main conceptual tools: 1) medieval memoria and 2) the notion of “dissimilar similitude” …


Gender And Voice In Medieval French Literature And Song, Joseph P. Derosier 2023 Beloit College

Gender And Voice In Medieval French Literature And Song, Joseph P. Derosier

Medieval Feminist Forum: A Journal of Gender and Sexuality

No abstract provided.


Female Reception Of Stained Glass Images Of St. Anne In Late Medieval York: Women, Mothers, And Wives, Susanna Wyse Jackson 2023 University of York

Female Reception Of Stained Glass Images Of St. Anne In Late Medieval York: Women, Mothers, And Wives, Susanna Wyse Jackson

Medieval Feminist Forum: A Journal of Gender and Sexuality

This article explores the depiction of St. Anne in the late medieval stained glass of three York parish churches. Focusing on two iconographic subjects, St. Anne teaching the Virgin Mary and St. Anne with her extended family, it argues that the representation of St. Anne in these contexts speaks to the conscious orientation of iconography towards female members of the laity. Images of St. Anne may have served to reinforce specific roles and values by providing a focus for performative identification. In addition, they reflect women’s status within the family, the parish, and society as a whole. This under-explored area …


Studying Gender In Medieval Europe: Historical Approaches, Jessica E. Zisa 2023 University of California, Santa Barbara

Studying Gender In Medieval Europe: Historical Approaches, Jessica E. Zisa

Medieval Feminist Forum: A Journal of Gender and Sexuality

No abstract provided.


Selecting Authority: The Compiler And Female Mystical Sources In Speculum Devotorum, Caitlin J. BranumThrash 2023 University of Tennessee, Knoxville

Selecting Authority: The Compiler And Female Mystical Sources In Speculum Devotorum, Caitlin J. Branumthrash

Medieval Feminist Forum: A Journal of Gender and Sexuality

The fifteenth-century Speculum devotorum, or Mirror to Devout People, is best known for incorporating the texts of mystical women into its narrative of the life of Christ, likely because it has an explicitly stated female audience—a nun of Syon. Rather than considering how the female audience may have perceived the female sources in Speculum devotorum, this article investigates the compiler’s views of his female sources based on how he incorporates them into his work. I argue that the compiler treats his female sources as full auctores, but he only includes their works when he addresses what he considers female …


"Oiez Mon Aventure": Cuer D'Acier's Nonbinary Gender In Perceforest, Brooke Heidenreich Findley 2023 Pennsylvania State University, Altoona

"Oiez Mon Aventure": Cuer D'Acier's Nonbinary Gender In Perceforest, Brooke Heidenreich Findley

Medieval Feminist Forum: A Journal of Gender and Sexuality

The character of Cuer d’Acier, or Heart of Steel, in the 15th century French romance Perceforest, has a complex gender identity that does not fit easily into a gender binary. First appearing as the courtly maiden Neronés, the character later lives and is read as a man. The romance uses both “he” and “she” pronouns to refer to Heart of Steel, often using both in the space of a single paragraph or even a single sentence. While Heart of Steel is again dressed as a woman at the end of the romance, the character’s own actions and statements …


Book Of The Body Politic, Renate Blumenfeld-Kosinski 2023 University of Pittsburgh

Book Of The Body Politic, Renate Blumenfeld-Kosinski

Medieval Feminist Forum: A Journal of Gender and Sexuality

No abstract provided.


Christine De Pizan: Life, Work, Legacy, S.C. Kaplan 2023 University of California, Santa Barbara

Christine De Pizan: Life, Work, Legacy, S.C. Kaplan

Medieval Feminist Forum: A Journal of Gender and Sexuality

No abstract provided.


Medieval Feminist Forum: A Journal Of Gender And Sexuality 58.2 (2023), 2023 Western Michigan University

Medieval Feminist Forum: A Journal Of Gender And Sexuality 58.2 (2023)

Medieval Feminist Forum: A Journal of Gender and Sexuality

No abstract provided.


The Fight Against The Threat Of Witchcraft And Paganism In Anglo-Saxon England, Russell I. Knapp 2023 Taylor University

The Fight Against The Threat Of Witchcraft And Paganism In Anglo-Saxon England, Russell I. Knapp

Lux et Fides: A Journal for Undergraduate Christian Scholars

Unlike the general assumption that England was completely Christianized after Augustine’s mission to the island, witchcraft and paganism thrived all throughout the Christian period of Anglo-Saxon history. Sources condemning witchcraft and paganism increased during the Danish raids in the mid-ninth century and beyond due to an increased sense of a perceived threat of paganism. King Alfred himself reacted to this threat by doing everything he could to strengthen his people in their Christian beliefs through education reform and his law code. The Church battled against the perceived threat through penitentials–which they used to discourage pagan practices. Lay-people fought against …


Legends Of Light: Crafting Middle Grade Fantasy In The Tradition Of Catholic Philosophy And Medieval Visual Culture, Bernadette Lamb 2023 Washington University in St. Louis

Legends Of Light: Crafting Middle Grade Fantasy In The Tradition Of Catholic Philosophy And Medieval Visual Culture, Bernadette Lamb

MFA in Illustration & Visual Culture

This essay promotes the writing and illustrating of middle grade literature that mirrors the wonder-inducing experiences of leafing through an illuminated manuscript and stepping into a Gothic cathedral. An examination of Catholic medieval visual culture moves into a discussion on its underlying philosophy and theology, which are profoundly centered on relational healing and the dignity of the human person. Christian writers including St. Pope John Paul II, C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkien, Josef Pieper, Madeline L’Engle, Dr. Bob Schuchts, Makoto Fujimura, and Andrew Peterson inform an exploration of mercy, forgiveness, and love as self-gift in the context of illustration and storytelling …


Dies Legibiles Iii, 2023 Smith College

Dies Legibiles Iii

Dies Legibiles

Thank you for reading the third volume of Dies Legibiles! We’ve had an exciting semester, as our core editorial team was composed entirely of students who were new to the journal. Though this came with a certain amount of trial and error, it also brought a sense of passion and drive that served us well: we received more submissions this year than ever before. Many of our submissions came from outside Smith College and the Five College Consortium—including several international submissions! We are thrilled to expand our outreach and cover a wider array of perspectives and topics.


Femininity In Medieval Scandinavia: How Paganism Forged Gender Equality, Erin M. Caffey 2023 Winthrop University

Femininity In Medieval Scandinavia: How Paganism Forged Gender Equality, Erin M. Caffey

Graduate Theses

The brutality of the Vikings and the conquests of medieval Scandinavian men have often garnered the majority of interest from the media, the armchair historian, and the scholar alike, with the pursuits and lives of their female counterparts seldom discussed. Medieval Scandinavian women’s lives though, when examined, are just as enthralling as those of the men. And while their stories are not necessarily as full of bloodshed or glory, the lives of women, those seen in both mythology and memory, provide an insight into the secular and religious foundations of medieval Scandinavian communities. Through an examination of various mythological texts, …


An Ideal Monarch: The Piety, Masculinity, And Kingship Of King Louis Ix Of France, Tell Joyner 2023 Utah State University

An Ideal Monarch: The Piety, Masculinity, And Kingship Of King Louis Ix Of France, Tell Joyner

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

King Louis IX of France, who ruled from 1226 to 1270, is widely considered to have been one of the greatest European kings of the Middle Ages. His rule was long remembered as an ideal period of good government and prosperity, and future kings sought and were expected to emulate him for centuries. Historians have often discussed the key role that the king’s pious exercise of his kingship played in his reign. In particular, historians have discussed the role that his belief in the twin missions of saving his subjects and making France into a Christian kingdom played in his …


Women And Religion In The Mongol Empire, Karlie Barnett 2023 University of Arkansas

Women And Religion In The Mongol Empire, Karlie Barnett

History Undergraduate Honors Theses

Aspects of the Mongol Empire have been well studied in academia, but these analyses, like much of our recording and analysis of world history overall, have largely excluded women. This thesis seeks to contribute to the effort to restore women to Mongol history, focusing on how the relationship between Mongol women and religion impacted the development of the Mongol Empire and Eurasian religions during the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. With a focus on elite women due to the nature of the sources, I draw upon historical chronicles, traveler accounts, artwork, and contributions from scholars in this field to assert that …


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