Wounds Visible and Invisible in Late Medieval Christianity
Sponsoring Organization(s)
Special Session
Organizer Name
Hannah Kirby Wood; Johanna Pollick
Organizer Affiliation
Univ. of Toronto; Univ. of Glasgow
Presider Name
Hannah Kirby Wood; Johanna Pollick
Paper Title 1
Open Book, Broken Flesh: The Victoria and Albert Museum's Painted Ivory Devotional Booklet as Simulacral Wound
Presenter 1 Name
Alexa Sue Amore
Presenter 1 Affiliation
Institute of Fine Arts, New York Univ.
Paper Title 2
Somnambulism, Dreams, and Secunda Mors: Fear of the Fissured Soul in Alliterative Romance
Presenter 2 Name
Sonya L. Lundblad
Presenter 2 Affiliation
Univ. i Stavanger
Paper Title 3
Saintly Bodies: Surgery and Religion in Medieval Scandinavia
Presenter 3 Name
Sarah Baccianti
Presenter 3 Affiliation
Queen's Univ. Belfast
Paper Title 4
"Full Febyll and Unwyse": Wounds Physical and Intellectual in Julian of Norwich's Parable of the Lord and Servant
Presenter 4 Name
Julie Paulson
Presenter 4 Affiliation
San Francisco State Univ.
Start Date
10-5-2019 10:00 AM
Session Location
Schneider 2345
Description
This session at the 2019 International Congress on Medieval Studies examines the many valences of wounds in late medieval Christianity, focusing on themes surrounding wounds and wounding both visible (corporeal and/or material) and invisible (rhetorical and allegorical). The image of the wounded body held a central place in late medieval Christian practice and material culture; the wounds of the crucified Christ were tangible reminders of his Passion and served as foci of veneration, while stigmatic saints and maimed martyrs were marked as holy by means of bodily trauma. Papers may also consider the Christian response to physical injury, in the form of saintly intervention through healing miracles and medical intervention through the establishment of hospitals and provision of care by religious orders.
Moving beyond the ample possibilities for discussion stemming from the theme of “visible” wounds in medieval Christianity, this session also encourages a broad examination of “invisible” wounds within the late medieval Christian context. Examples might range from the accusations of metaphorical violence levied against the mendicant orders by antifraternal critics, to the conceptualization of the Western Schism as a wound to the Church. By exploring wounds both visible and invisible, this session elicits the perspectives of scholars of history, art history, literature, and theology and seeks to expand conceptions of wounds and injury within a late medieval Christian framework. Hannah Kirby Wood
Wounds Visible and Invisible in Late Medieval Christianity
Schneider 2345
This session at the 2019 International Congress on Medieval Studies examines the many valences of wounds in late medieval Christianity, focusing on themes surrounding wounds and wounding both visible (corporeal and/or material) and invisible (rhetorical and allegorical). The image of the wounded body held a central place in late medieval Christian practice and material culture; the wounds of the crucified Christ were tangible reminders of his Passion and served as foci of veneration, while stigmatic saints and maimed martyrs were marked as holy by means of bodily trauma. Papers may also consider the Christian response to physical injury, in the form of saintly intervention through healing miracles and medical intervention through the establishment of hospitals and provision of care by religious orders.
Moving beyond the ample possibilities for discussion stemming from the theme of “visible” wounds in medieval Christianity, this session also encourages a broad examination of “invisible” wounds within the late medieval Christian context. Examples might range from the accusations of metaphorical violence levied against the mendicant orders by antifraternal critics, to the conceptualization of the Western Schism as a wound to the Church. By exploring wounds both visible and invisible, this session elicits the perspectives of scholars of history, art history, literature, and theology and seeks to expand conceptions of wounds and injury within a late medieval Christian framework. Hannah Kirby Wood