A Cultural History of Disability in the Middle Ages
(Hardback)
Available Formats
Publishing Details
A Cultural History of Disability in the Middle Ages
By (Author) Dr Jonathan Hsy
Edited by Professor Tory V. Pearman
Edited by Professor Joshua R. Eyler
Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
Bloomsbury Academic
17th May 2023
United Kingdom
Classifications
Tertiary Education
Non Fiction
Social and cultural history
Social and cultural anthropology
Comparative literature
362.409
Physical Properties
Hardback
288
Width 172mm, Height 246mm, Spine 16mm
540g
Description
The Middle Ages was an era of dynamic social transformation, and notions of disability in medieval culture reflected how norms and forms of embodiment interacted with gender, class, and race, among other dimensions of human difference. Ideas of disability in courtly romance, saints lives, chronicles, sagas, secular lyrics, dramas, and pageants demonstrate the nuanced, and sometimes contradictory, relationship between cultural constructions of disability and the lived experience of impairment.
An essential resource for researchers, scholars, and students of history, literature, visual art, cultural studies, and education, A Cultural History of Disability in the Middle Ages explores themes and topics such as atypical bodies; mobility impairment; chronic pain and illness; blindness; deafness; speech; learning difficulties; and mental health.
Reviews
This volume stands as a testament to the work being done to connect medieval history to the broader field of disability studies to create a better understanding of disabilities as a transhistorical social construct. * Cer: An Australasian Journal of Medieval and Early Modern Studies *
Author Bio
Jonathan Hsy is Associate Professor of English at The George Washington University, USA. His books include Trading Tongues: Merchants, Multilingualism, and Medieval Literature (2013) and he has published widely on disability issues.
Tory V. Pearman is Associate Professor of English at Miami University, USA. Her previous books include Women and Disability in Medieval Literature (2010) and Disability and Knighthood in Malorys Morte Darthur (2019).
Joshua R. Eyler is Director of Faculty Development and Lecturer in Writing and Rhetoric at the University of Mississippi, USA. His books include How Humans Learn: The Science and Stories behind Effective College Teaching (2018) and Disability in the Middle Ages: Reconsiderations and Reverberations (2010).
