University College London

Gustave Tuck Lecture Theatre

11-12 June

This interdisciplinary event will explore how different forms and concepts of sexuality are represented and produced in the medieval context though textual, material, archaeological, visual and musical sources. For example, how are sexualities communicated though medieval art and writing? How are material objects used to create, encode and communicate particular identities? Whether absent or present, sexuality in medieval texts is equally telling. From the Anglo-Saxon Wife’s lament to the lamenting lover of 12^th and 13^th century troubadours, the taboos and editing of Apollonius of Tyre, Aelfric’s virgin martyrs, the sexualized devotion of Margery Kempe and the clever ruse of the Anglo-Saxon Judith, the power of sexuality is ubiquitous. Manuscript illustrations abound with scenes of eroticism, as do the carvings on later medieval churches. Sexuality in the Middle Ages is a topic that has steadily started to receive more serious attention from scholars. This conference will explore the significance of these varied (re)presentations of sexualities in literature and visual art looking at agency and voice, power and satire.

Please email [email protected] for any inquiries.