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Articles 1 - 14 of 14
Full-Text Articles in Medieval Studies
“The Atmosphere That Supports Life On Earth”: An Ecocritical Approach To Tolkien’S Arda, Elizabeth Anne Turello
“The Atmosphere That Supports Life On Earth”: An Ecocritical Approach To Tolkien’S Arda, Elizabeth Anne Turello
Seton Hall University Dissertations and Theses (ETDs)
Ecocriticism speaks to the relationship between the environment and literature, a progressively vital topic of discussion. What is often overlooked, however, is the necessity of the theory’s applicability to stories of speculative fiction; that is, ones existing outside the realm of the real world or, as is the case with the father of modern-day fantasy J.R.R. Tolkien, a mythology set in the ancient days of our world (“Arda”). At first, it may seem contradictory to learn about our surroundings through fictionalized ones seemingly irrelevant to Earth’s own; this apparent contradiction is not valid, though, as the relationship between humans and …
Knighthood In The Wilderness: Ecocritical Readings Of Nature And Chivalry In The World Of Sir Gawain And The Green Knight, Dajana Memko
Knighthood In The Wilderness: Ecocritical Readings Of Nature And Chivalry In The World Of Sir Gawain And The Green Knight, Dajana Memko
Theses and Dissertations
Many interpretations of the Green Knight portray him as a personification of nature or as nature’s embodiment. Ecocriticism, however, challenges a more anthropocentric approach, calling into question deeply ingrained ideals of chivalry and human dominion over nature. The Green Knight is a hybrid creature whose striking features mark his otherness; yet, through his familiarity, he challenges the knight of Camelot and asks them to consider their chivalric identities as well as the nature of their Trojan ancestry and legacy. Among them, Gawain is forced to confront his identity as he ventures into the wilderness of Wirral, and his interactions with …
Desire Lines: Reading Queerly Through The Forests Of Medieval Love Literature, Brianna Skye Oliver
Desire Lines: Reading Queerly Through The Forests Of Medieval Love Literature, Brianna Skye Oliver
Graduate Theses and Dissertations
This dissertation conducts queer eco-sensitive readings of a selection of medieval love texts in Middle English and Old French. Informed in turns by the works of feminist, queer, and ecocritical scholars, each chapter engages with a different iteration of literary queerness by bringing the representation of natural spaces and objects (especially the forest) to the fore and reading through nature depicted in the texts. The readings all share a broad goal of inviting modern audiences to play with desire and its manifestations within each text to make meaning and compel intimacy between the work and its current audience. Chapter 1 …
Medieval Weathers: An Introduction, Michael J. Warren
Medieval Weathers: An Introduction, Michael J. Warren
Medieval Ecocriticisms
Introduction to the first volume of Medieval Ecocriticisms.
“Out Of The Mother . . . And Home To The Mother”: Essays On Medieval Literature And Climate Crisis, Rachel Kuhr Smith
“Out Of The Mother . . . And Home To The Mother”: Essays On Medieval Literature And Climate Crisis, Rachel Kuhr Smith
Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers
No abstract provided.
“Compassion And Benignytee”: A Reassessment Of The Relationship Between Canacee And The Falcon In Chaucer’S “Squire’S Tale”, Melissa Ridley Elmes
“Compassion And Benignytee”: A Reassessment Of The Relationship Between Canacee And The Falcon In Chaucer’S “Squire’S Tale”, Melissa Ridley Elmes
Medieval Feminist Forum: A Journal of Gender and Sexuality
Among its many elements, Chaucer’s “Squire’s Tale” includes an emotionally-charged dialogue between two aristocratic female figures: the human daughter of a king, Canacee, and the wounded falcon she meets in the wood. Scholars have debated the nature of this relationship in interspecial, gendered, and specifically feminist and ecofeminist terms. This essay provides a brief retrospective on some of the most recent scholarship examining their relationship—van Dyke (2005); Kordecki (2011); Crane (2012); and Schotland (2012 and 2015)—leading into a reassessment in two parts: first, that the affinity- and experience-driven bond these female figures develop supports a reading of this scene that …
Greening Gawain : Connecting Environmental Damage And Masculinity In Sir Gawain And The Green Knight., Austin Putty
Greening Gawain : Connecting Environmental Damage And Masculinity In Sir Gawain And The Green Knight., Austin Putty
College of Arts & Sciences Senior Theses
This paper explores medieval environmental attitudes through a historical reading of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, the study of which provides a blueprint for what may be a method of combating climate change denial at its cultural roots, which I will argue in this paper links to an outdated mode of European warrior masculinity. This paper will demonstrate the connections between hegemonic masculinity and environmental degradation at work as a discourse in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight through chivalric behaviors, as well as a burgeoning environmental conscientiousness at play that undermines it. The conflict between Gawain and …
Water, Prestige, And Christianity: An Ecocritical Look At Medieval Literature, Cortney Nicole Lechmann
Water, Prestige, And Christianity: An Ecocritical Look At Medieval Literature, Cortney Nicole Lechmann
UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones
This thesis examines four medieval works, Beowulf, Pearl, The History of the Kings of Britain, and Lancelot, the Knight of the Cart from an ecocritical perspective. Specifically, it looks at how water affects the human culture described within each work, how the characters and their culture affect the water in return, and how they position themselves in regard to nature. This examination includes any relevant influences which affect the characters’ perception of the various bodies of water, such as the religion, technological advances, and historical background of the time period during which the authors wrote each work. It discusses each …
Insensate Oysters And Our Nonconsensual Existence, Karl Steel
Insensate Oysters And Our Nonconsensual Existence, Karl Steel
Publications and Research
From the classical era through to the French Enlightenment, oysters were considered the hingepoint between plants and animals. Unable to move, possessing only the sense of sense itself, they were the very figure of bare life. Rather than claiming that oysters should be granted "agency," as the new materialist habit would be, I argue that humans should instead "oystermorphize" themselves, to recognize that our agency is not the dominant condition of our being.
Desert Islands: Europe's Atlantic Archipelago As Ascetic Landscape, Paul Siewers
Desert Islands: Europe's Atlantic Archipelago As Ascetic Landscape, Paul Siewers
Faculty Contributions to Books
A focus on early literatures around the Irish Sea as both archipelagic and ascetic in their engagement of the environment.
Green Worlds And Ecosemiotics, Paul Siewers
Green Worlds And Ecosemiotics, Paul Siewers
Faculty Conference Papers and Presentations
"Overlay landscapes" in Early Insular literatures, and how they connect early medieval cosmology with current-day ecosemiotics..
Ecopoetics And The Origins Of English Literature, Paul Siewers
Ecopoetics And The Origins Of English Literature, Paul Siewers
Faculty Contributions to Books
An ecocritical survey of early English literature, focusing on the "green world" trope.
The Ecosemiosphere: Story And Region In Insular Medieval Literatures, Paul Siewers
The Ecosemiosphere: Story And Region In Insular Medieval Literatures, Paul Siewers
Faculty Conference Papers and Presentations
Reflections on the interrelation of environmental humanities studies, physics and semiotics, as part of an international panel introducing ecosemiotics and biosemiotics to the North American ecocriticism communtiy at large.
Landscapes Of Conversion: Guthlac's Mound And Grendel's Mere As Expressions Of Anglo-Saxon Nation Building, Paul Siewers
Landscapes Of Conversion: Guthlac's Mound And Grendel's Mere As Expressions Of Anglo-Saxon Nation Building, Paul Siewers
Faculty Contributions to Books
An examination of the Old English poem Beowulf as a landscape-text, expressing the Anglo-Saxon project of political hegemony over native peoples and environments.