Visiting PhD Student Stephanie Kluge

Stephanie Kluge from Muenster will be a visiting researcher in the IMS for the next two months

Stephanie's project deals with "Religious Polemics concerning Purity, Chastity and Masculinity among Thirteenth Century Franciscans and Dominicans". The focus of her research especially lies on mendicant concepts of masculinity resulting from opposing polemics belonging to the context of the secular-mendicant controversy. Previous research on medieval masculinities has linked specific forms of gendered identity to certain social or religious groups and their specific values and practices. In this context it has also been observed that the tension between competing clerical and lay masculinities seems to be responsible for certain dynamics. For that reason the competition between different groups of chaste men within the medieval church should also be considered a catalyst for the formation of mendicant concepts of masculinity. Discourses on masculinity can be understood as an important arena of negotiation for different religious identities and reflect religious diversity. Stephanie's project combines approaches of medieval masculinity studies, the history of mendicant orders as well as the history of knowledge.

Her stay at Leeds is sponsered by a STSM grant of COST Action Network IS1301 "New Communities of Interpretation: Contexts, Strategies and Processes of Religious Transformation in Late Medieval and Early Modern Europe".