Saints and Sinners: Literary Footprints of Mary and Margaret, Queens of Scots
6th & 7th of October 2016
IASH, University of Edinburgh
With kind support from University of Birmingham CeSMA
Call for Papers
This conference will focus on the two most famous Queens of Scots, St Margaret (d.1093) and Mary (d. 1587), exploring how female threat is represented and – potentially – neutralised in literature and visual culture across the medieval period. To date, little serious academic study of Margaret has been undertaken, and further study into Mary beyond her infamy and demise has been limited. This conference seeks to both promote and explore the two most famous queens of Scots, both in terms of their literary and historical representation and in terms of their impact on the representation of Scottish queenship throughout the medieval period. We wish to encourage study into the way prominent women, especially queens, attracted discussion on medieval gender roles. Margaret and Mary function as opposite sides of the Madonna/Whore, Saint/Sinner stereotypes that dominate female representation in the medieval period and through to the modern age, and this conference would also encourage all submissions that encompass female representation more widely, taking these two opposites as a basis.
Papers can address, but are not limited to, the topics of:
- Historical Context
- Reading and writing female experience
- Female book owners
- Queens as book owners and patrons
- Women and the Church
- Queens and Queenship
- Female literacy in the Middle Ages
- Religious iconography/relics
- Female voice (complaint, lyric, prayer)
- Modern adaptations of the stories
This conference is open to all, particularly current graduate and early career researchers.
We invite abstracts of up to 300 words for 20 minute papers, and a short CV. These should be sent to ssconf2016@gmail.com by the 12th of September 2016. There will be limited financial help available for graduate students and unwaged postdoctoral researchers to assist with travel.
For further queries please contact:
ssconf2016@gmail.com