CONGRESS CANCELED Antisemitism, Race, and Performance
Description
In the Invention of Race, Geraldine Heng defines race and religion as overlapping and mutually sustaining categories. Writing about the “conflations of religion with race” in the Devisement, for instance, she also proposes that medieval texts themselves merge the two. This session focuses on the relationship between race and religion in the works of Chaucer. Does he distinguish meaningfully between racial and religious identities? Is it accurate, or advisable, for scholars to collapse the categories? What do we gain or lose by doing so? Papers might focus not just on representations of Jewish and Muslim characters, but also Christian ones. Does Chaucer conceive of Christian identity differently than non-Christian identities? How do his definitions resemble or differ from those in use today? Michelle Karnes
CONGRESS CANCELED Antisemitism, Race, and Performance
Fetzer 2016
In the Invention of Race, Geraldine Heng defines race and religion as overlapping and mutually sustaining categories. Writing about the “conflations of religion with race” in the Devisement, for instance, she also proposes that medieval texts themselves merge the two. This session focuses on the relationship between race and religion in the works of Chaucer. Does he distinguish meaningfully between racial and religious identities? Is it accurate, or advisable, for scholars to collapse the categories? What do we gain or lose by doing so? Papers might focus not just on representations of Jewish and Muslim characters, but also Christian ones. Does Chaucer conceive of Christian identity differently than non-Christian identities? How do his definitions resemble or differ from those in use today? Michelle Karnes