Futures of Allegory: Medieval and Modern (A Collaboratory)
Sponsoring Organization(s)
Special Session
Organizer Name
Gaelan Gilbert
Organizer Affiliation
Univ. of Victoria
Presider Name
Allan Mitchell
Presider Affiliation
Univ. of Victoria
Paper Title 1
"Look at the strings on the puppet!": Personification as Allegorical Interpretation
Presenter 1 Name
Katharine Breen
Presenter 1 Affiliation
Northwestern Univ.
Paper Title 2
Allegory and the Everyday
Presenter 2 Name
Daisy Delogu
Presenter 2 Affiliation
Univ. of Chicago
Paper Title 3
Experimental Metaphysics: Distributions of Personhood in Middle English Literature
Presenter 3 Name
Gaelan Gilbert
Paper Title 4
The Facial Medium
Presenter 4 Name
Julie Orlemanski
Presenter 4 Affiliation
Boston College
Paper Title 5
Speculative Allegories: Objects and Ecologies in Langland and Spenser
Presenter 5 Name
William M. Rhodes
Presenter 5 Affiliation
Univ. of Virginia
Start Date
10-5-2013 10:00 AM
Session Location
Schneider 1360
Description
Medieval scholarship has been reinvigorated by the so-called nonhuman turn, as exhibited in recent engagements with materiality, objecthood, animality, and monstrosity. Yet almost completely absent from these discussions is the topic of allegory. The session we are proposing revisits the issue of prosopopoeia – personification allegory – to ask whether and how the device of rhetoric can expand the arena of nonhuman agents and material entities. What are some characteristics of the rhetoric? Are there special ecological effects of allegory in different media?
We propose to offer a session that takes stock of current scholarship on medieval political ecology and of the potential for allegory to contribute new voices to the commons. Can allegory’s proclivity for giving voices to the inanimate function as an engine of ethical democracy? Can we recuperate allegorical practices to reconfigure historical agencies and conjecture future communities, beyond anachronism? What are the futures – medieval & modern - of allegory?
Gaelan Gilbert
Futures of Allegory: Medieval and Modern (A Collaboratory)
Schneider 1360
Medieval scholarship has been reinvigorated by the so-called nonhuman turn, as exhibited in recent engagements with materiality, objecthood, animality, and monstrosity. Yet almost completely absent from these discussions is the topic of allegory. The session we are proposing revisits the issue of prosopopoeia – personification allegory – to ask whether and how the device of rhetoric can expand the arena of nonhuman agents and material entities. What are some characteristics of the rhetoric? Are there special ecological effects of allegory in different media?
We propose to offer a session that takes stock of current scholarship on medieval political ecology and of the potential for allegory to contribute new voices to the commons. Can allegory’s proclivity for giving voices to the inanimate function as an engine of ethical democracy? Can we recuperate allegorical practices to reconfigure historical agencies and conjecture future communities, beyond anachronism? What are the futures – medieval & modern - of allegory?
Gaelan Gilbert