Bodies and Disciplines

Brings the insights of cultural studies to medieval studies.

Centered on practices of the body-human bodies, the “body politic”-Bodies and Disciplines considers a fascinating and largely uncanonical group of texts, as well as public dramas, rituals, and spectacles, from multidisciplinary perspectives. These essays consider the way the human body is subjected to educational discipline, to corporate celebration, and to the production of gendered identity through the experiences of marriage and childbirth. Among the topics explored are the “theatrics of punishment,” including legal mutilation; the representation of the body of Christ as social ritual; adolescent misbehavior and its treatment; and conflicting ecclesiastical and lay models of sexual behavior. The contributors also trace the definition of “poor,” “foreign,” and “dissident” bodies, examining private and public issues surrounding social identities.