Langland's Women
Sponsoring Organization(s)
Gender and Medieval Studies Group; International Piers Plowman Society
Organizer Name
Sarah Wilma Watson
Organizer Affiliation
Univ. of Pennsylvania
Presider Name
Liz Herbert McAvoy
Presider Affiliation
Swansea Univ.
Paper Title 1
Lady Mede's Reading Lesson
Presenter 1 Name
Michelle Ripplinger
Presenter 1 Affiliation
Univ. of California-Berkeley
Paper Title 2
"Yet hadde I levere wedde no wyf to-yeere": Dame Studie as Shrew
Presenter 2 Name
Matthew W. Irvin
Presenter 2 Affiliation
Sewanee: The Univ. of the South
Paper Title 3
Langland's Working Women: The Disappearance of Women's Labor from the A-Text
Presenter 3 Name
Katelyn Jaynes
Presenter 3 Affiliation
Univ. of Connecticut
Paper Title 4
Respondent
Presenter 4 Name
Elizabeth Robertson
Presenter 4 Affiliation
Univ. of Glasgow
Start Date
13-5-2017 3:30 PM
Session Location
Bernhard Brown & Gold Room
Description
The history of scholarship on Langland and women offers numerous paths for new work. Since Helen Cooper’s seminal article, “Gender and Personification in Piers Plowman” (1991), scholars have begun investigations into Langland’s female personifications such as Holy Church, Dame Study, and Lady Mede. Articles such as Ralph Hanna’s “Brewing trouble” (1996), have spurred historical research, helping us to understand the ladies, ale wives, prostitutes, and literate women populating Langland’s poem. In 1998, a special section on gender in the Yearbook of Langland Studies, urged scholars to develop a gender criticism for Piers Plowman, a call that has been partially fulfilled as critics treat not only Langland’s female figures but also consider “the feminine” as a mode of analysis in Langland’s poem.
Despite this varied and exciting body of existing scholarship, much work remains to be done. This panel invites papers that expand upon or challenge the current critical discourse on Langland and women. Some topics might include: Langland and feminism(s), Langland and historical women, the hermeneutics of chastity and virginity in Piers Plowman, and women in Langland, Chaucer, and Gower to name only a few.
Sarah Wilma Watson
Langland's Women
Bernhard Brown & Gold Room
The history of scholarship on Langland and women offers numerous paths for new work. Since Helen Cooper’s seminal article, “Gender and Personification in Piers Plowman” (1991), scholars have begun investigations into Langland’s female personifications such as Holy Church, Dame Study, and Lady Mede. Articles such as Ralph Hanna’s “Brewing trouble” (1996), have spurred historical research, helping us to understand the ladies, ale wives, prostitutes, and literate women populating Langland’s poem. In 1998, a special section on gender in the Yearbook of Langland Studies, urged scholars to develop a gender criticism for Piers Plowman, a call that has been partially fulfilled as critics treat not only Langland’s female figures but also consider “the feminine” as a mode of analysis in Langland’s poem.
Despite this varied and exciting body of existing scholarship, much work remains to be done. This panel invites papers that expand upon or challenge the current critical discourse on Langland and women. Some topics might include: Langland and feminism(s), Langland and historical women, the hermeneutics of chastity and virginity in Piers Plowman, and women in Langland, Chaucer, and Gower to name only a few.
Sarah Wilma Watson