Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Intellectual History Commons

Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

History of Christianity

Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences

Publication Year

Articles 1 - 2 of 2

Full-Text Articles in Intellectual History

Crusader Orientalism: Depictions Of The Eastern Other In Medieval Crusade Writings, Henry Schaller Jan 2018

Crusader Orientalism: Depictions Of The Eastern Other In Medieval Crusade Writings, Henry Schaller

Summer Research

This paper examines the ways in which different texts (crusade chronicles, French epic poems, and crusade sermons) written during the early Crusades and Crusader States created a coherent portrait of the East. It compare the ways Edward Said’s Orientalism, which examines colonial texts, and the effect their portrait of the East had on European identity, with texts of the Crusades. These texts cast the Orient into a place that was the antithesis of Christendom, defining what it meant to have a Christian, European white identity. This was done through representations of: threatening sexuality, skin color, unlimited wealth, and a fictional …


Ladder To Heaven: An Evaluation Of Twelfth Century Latin Catholic Non-Dichotomous Spiritual Gender Identity, Helen W. Tschurr Jan 2017

Ladder To Heaven: An Evaluation Of Twelfth Century Latin Catholic Non-Dichotomous Spiritual Gender Identity, Helen W. Tschurr

Summer Research

In the 1970s, historian Richard Southern argued that the period of reform in the Twelfth Century solidified a patriarchal state in the medieval period, and since his publication (continuing into the current tradition), historians have agreed with this thesis that the period of centralization and codification within the canon tradition existed antithetically to female empowerment and agency, and solidified the authority and normatively of heterosexual, dominate, masculinity. When discussing the canon celebrations and successes of women in the Twelfth Century, historians use the term “token,” ascribing their ability to survive in a state which denounced their agency to circumstances such …