Medieval Bodies Ignored: Politics, Culture & Flesh

The annual University of Leeds IMS Postgraduate conference, titled 'Medieval Bodies Ignored: Politics, Culture & Flesh', is held at the University of Leeds from 4-6 May 2018.

This interdisciplinary conference will concentrate upon the cultural history of the body, particularly that relating to bodies that are ignored, by either medieval society or modern scholarship. This conference is interested in building up a sensory and somatic understanding of daily corporeal existence in the Middle Ages, with a particular focus on those elements of medieval society that are both seen and unseen. The weary carthorse, the one-legged beggar and the cradle-bound child were all bodies that were ubiquitous and thus/yet invisible; by attempting to access those elements of this landscape that were tacitly understood at the time, but difficult for a modern scholar to access, this conference hopes to encourage a richer understanding of the complexity of medieval life and culture. Through the exchange of ideas, strategies and theories, we will develop a methodological support structure for interdisciplinary cultural studies. 

Topics for this conference include: 

- Marginalised bodies (socially, physically, legally)

- The body politic

- Seeing the unseen

- Knowledge of the body and bodily customs

- Artisans of the body, expanding notions of health and medicine

- The ignored body in space and place (e.g. war, urban/rural, court/cloister)

- Ignored bodies: Dead, dis/abled, sacred, non-human animal, child, supernatural, female, racially "othered", or otherwise overlooked due to status

- Methodological tactics for studying the overlooked body

Abstracts of 300 words for 20 minute papers are due by 28 February 2018. This deadline has been extended to midday on 11 March 2018. 

For more information:  

Website: https://medievalbodiesignored.wordpress.com/. (Registration and further information is available here.)

Email: medievalbodiesignored@gmail.com. (Submit abstracts and queries to this address.)

Twitter: @bodiesignored.