Congressus Comitati

The seventh annual Conference for Medieval Studies, a graduate student conference sponsored by Comitatus, the Purdue Medieval Studies student organization, will be held at Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana from February 20-21, 2009. The theme for this year’s conference is "Saints and Sinners of the Middle Ages."

Ann W. Astell, Professor of Theology at Notre Dame University and author of The Song of Songs in the Middle Ages (1990), Job, Boethius, and Epic Truth (1994), Chaucer and the Universe of Learning (1996), and Eating Beauty: The Eucharist And the Spiritual Arts of the Middle Ages (2006) will be the keynote speaker for this year’s conference.

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Friday, February 20^th

5:00 p.m.
Session I: Saints, Sinners, and Manuscripts
Erin Sweany, Indiana University: “Saints to Sinners, Sinners to Saints: Challenging the Medieval and Modern Categorization of Penance”
Sarah P. Baribeau, Cornerstone University: “An Unknown Coptic Bifolium and Monastic Spirituality”

6:00
Session II: Fictional Mystics
Russell L. Keck, Purdue University: “The Sanctified Soul and the Beatific Vision in Pearl.”
Arthur James Russell, Western Michigan University: “Chaucer’s Saint who Never Was: Virginia's Lost Tale and the Physician's Sinful Moral”

7:00/7:30 – 10:00
Standing Dinner Reception at Home of Graduate Student

Saturday, February 21^st

8:30 – 9:00 a.m.
Continental breakfast in Heavilon Hall’s Grad Lounge

9:15 – 10:30
Session III: Female Mystics
Karen A. Napoli, Arizona State University: “Tensions within, tensions without: The Blessed Christina von Stommeln, Mystic and Beguine of Cologne”
James DeFrancis, University of Notre Dame: “Passionem Filii Mei Imitantes: Hildegard of Bingen’s Theology of Monastic Life in Scivias, Book II, Vision 5”
Hannah Zdansky, University of Notre Dame: “Glossing St. Catherine of Siena: The Hagiographer's Role in Expounding Her Theology of Love”

10:30 – 10:45
Mid-Morning Break

10:45 – 12:00
Session IV: Gender and Dissent
J. Case Tompkins, Purdue University: “Seen and Heard”
Rebekah M. Fowler, Southern Illinois University Carbondale: “Malory’s ‘Clean Maidens’: Monasticism and the Grail Knights”
Joshua Easterling, Ohio State University: “Robert of Knaresborough and the Forms of Authority”

12:00 – 1:30
Lunch at Noodles

1:30 – 2:30
Plenary Session with Ann W. Astell
Plenary Address: “Saints and Sinners”

2:45 – 4:00
Session V: Saints, Sinners, and Politics
Jessica E. Raffelson, Purdue University: “Battle for the Minds of Men”
Gary Lim, City University of New York: “All the King's Bodies: Abjection and Authority in Havelok the Dane and King Horn”
Kathryn McDonald, Cleveland State University: “Sebastian's Arrows: Understanding the Sacred”

Plenary Speaker: Eve Salisbury, Associate Professor of English at Western Michigan University, "Anonymity, Attribution, and the Nearly Known: Medieval Authorship Revisited"

Session 1
Lynne Miles-Morillo, Purdue University, "The Hêliand and His hugi: Towards an Old Saxon Theory of Mind."
Daniel Brielmaier, University of Toronto, "Authority and Mediation in the Acallam na Senórach."
Richard Sévère, Purdue University, "Re-Writing Friendship: The Fear of Homoeroticism in Late Medieval Literature"

Session 2
William Hager, California State University – Long Beach, "Removal from the Court: The Displacement of Chevrefoil from the Tristan Legend."
Arthur J. Russell, Western Michigan University, "Learning to Read Again: Sir Cleges and the Quest for Orthodox Readers."

Session 3
Diana M. Cervone, Indiana University – Bloomington, "Shaping Authorship through the Mise en Page of Christine de Pizan's Epistre Othea Manuscripts: The Importance of Blank Spaces"
Andrew B. Grubb, University of Connecticut, "Buildings as Authors? The Case of English Round Churches."

Session 4
Karen Knudson, Purdue University, "Sparring with Solomon: The Figure and Texts of King Solomon in the Canterbury Tales."
Jenny Lee, Northwestern University, "Ovid's Fama and Auctorite in Chaucer's The House of Fame."
Karen Robinson, Purdue University, "The Betrayal of Readers in the Legend of Good Women."

Session 5
Jill Hebert, Western Michigan University, "Authority on Ambiguity: Morgan le Fay as Author."
Catherine Merritt, Auburn University – Montgomery, "The Arthurian Enchantresses through Time: The Influence of Authorship and Audience."

Plenary Speaker: Patricia Clare Ingham, Associate Professor of English at Indiana University, Bloomington, "Old Worlds and New: the Edges of Novelty and the Limits of Enchantment."

Session 1
Elizabeth Williamsen, Indiana University – Bloomington, "The Boundaries of Betrayal in The Sowdone of Babylone."
Julianne Bruneau, University of Notre Dame - South Bend, "Chrétien's Perceval and the Borders of Britain."

Session 2
Stephen Sweat, University of Arizona, "Faith and Illusion: Boethian Cosmology and Magic in the Franklin's Tale."
Frank Tobienne, Purdue University, "La Historia de La Scientia Toletana en el Siglo XIII, or the Valuation of Magic in Spanish Medieval Literature."

Session 3
A. Arwen Taylor, Indiana University – Bloomington, "The Passion of Piers: Piers Plowman as Embodied Liminality."
Florin Beschea, Indiana University - Bloomington, "Heart and Body: The Relationship Between Moral and Physical Qualities in Three Miracles by Gautier de Coincy."

Session 4
Matthew Brown, University of Notre Dame - South Bend, "Insanity and Bureaucracy: Documentary Practice in Hoccleve's Series and Formulary."
Becky Winn, Indiana University - Bloomington, "'By word formyd in my understonding': Language and Its Reworking in The Shewings of Julian of Norwich."
Susanna Childress, Florida State University, "Dancing Through a Different Minefield: The Public Discourse of Margery Kempe as Subversive Liminality."

Session 5
Allison Scott, Purdue University, "The Royal Couple in Chaucer's Legend of Good Women."
Alex Vance, Purdue University, "The Parallels of Inferno and The Legend of Good Women."
Jesie Martinez, Purdue University, "Reflections of Richard in The Legend of Good Women."

Session 6
Deborah Searcy, University of Miami, "Piers Plowman and the Agency of Salvation."
Molly Martin, Purdue University, "Fleeing the Borders of Romance: Reclaiming Masculinity in Malory's 'Tale of Sir Gareth'."
Lesley Jacobs, Indiana University - Bloomington, "On the Edge of Incest: Power and Violence in the Second and Fourth Branches of the Mabinogi."

Plenary Speaker: Bonnie Wheeler, Professor of English and Medieval Studies at Southern Methodist University and Editor of Arthuriana, "Mastering Literature."

Session 1 (Victorian Arthuriana)
Minjeon Kim, SUNY - Binghamton, "'In Defense of Guenevere' as a political revision."
Diana Lovelace, University of Tennessee, "The Courtly Love Game: Tennyson's Shifting Presentation of the Courtly Love Tradition."
Michael A. Moir, Jr., Catholic University of America, "'For out of the waste lands he had come': The Trials of the Colonial Subject in His Majesty's Service in Tennyson's Idylls of the King."

Session 2 (Arthur Beyond Borders)
Richard Barrett, Indiana University, "Merlin and St. Symeon of Emesa: Myrddin Wyllt as a Celtic Holy Fool."
Daniel Franke, University of Rochester, "Wolfram von Eschenbach’s Parzival and the Courtly Ethic."
Piotr Toczyski, Graduate School for Social Research, Warsaw, Poland, "The Polish Arthurianism's Multiple Traditions."

Session 3 (Arthurian Texts and Readers)
Kristin Bovaird-Abbo, The University of Kansas, "Chaucer’s Arthurian Name-Dropping."
Rachel Kapelle, Brandeis University, "The Ends of Prophecy: Prediction and the Reader of the Morte Darthur."
Alexander L. Kaufman, Purdue University, "The Familial Other in The Awntyrs off Arthure."

Session 4 (The Alliterative Morte Arthure)
Karen Robinson, Purdue University, "What Does It Mean to Be King? Arthur in the Alliterative Morte Arthure."
Debbie Marcum, Cornell University, "Arthur the Conqueror to Arthur the Conquered in the Alliterative Morte Arthure."
Joy Santee, Purdue University, "Geographic Economy and the Giant of Gene in the Alliterative Morte Arthure."

Session 5 (Knighthood and Gender)
Ryan Naughton, Purdue University, "Filling in the Blanks: The Knighting of Lancelot in the Prose Lancelot."
Katherine Tanski, Purdue University, "The Subversive Female Knight: Grant Morrison's Re-Visioning of Gender in Shining Knight."
Richard Sévère, Purdue University, "Silencing Bodies: Recreating “Masculinity” in Les Roman des Silence."

Plenary Speaker: Dr. Claudia Bornholdt, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, "From Holy Man to Saintly Husband: Latin Legends in the Vernacular"

Session 1
Emily Redman, Purdue University, "Listing in Old English Poetry."
Mica Gould, Purdue University, "John Gower's Allegorical Science."
Joy Santee, Purdue University, "The Ethos of Medieval Mappaemundi: Legitimation through Cultural Memory."

Session 2
Karen Robinson, Purdue University, "Cynewulf and Cyneheard: A House Divided."
William Christopher Brown, Indiana University - Bloomington, "Spontaneity & Premeditation in the Chronicles of the Peasants' Revolt of 1381."
Alex Kaufman, Purdue University, "Jack Cade and the London Chronicles of the Fifteenth Century."

Session 3
Christine Dunn, Indiana University - Bloomington, "That you be not counted among the foolish virgins but among the wise": A Look at Jordan of Saxony's letters to Diana d'Andalo."
Gretchen Busl, University of Notre Dame - South Bend, "Feminine Rhetoric of the Body in Medieval Italian Mysticism."
Richard Sévère, Purdue University, "Dinadan in Drag: Heteronormativity Challenged in Malory's Morte Darthur."

Session 4
Eric Serna, Grand Valley State University, "Tending the Garden: The Literary Response to the Evolution of Chivalry."
Michelle Steil, Grand Valley State University, "The Death of King Arthur: The Legend Beyond the Legend."
Brooke Hazael-Massieux, Grand Valley State University, "Plato Dressed Up: Finding Philosophy in the Fabric of the Text in Erec and Enide."
Erica Rude, Purdue University, "The Domestic Economy of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight."

Plenary Speaker: Seth Lerer, Stanford University, "The Social Reception of Medieval Literature."

Session 1
Amy Bosworth, "Inventing History: The Merovingian Franks and Their Trojan Origins."
Eric Carlson, "Financing the Mortgage of Death: Compensation as Ritual Sacrifice."
Mary Maxine Browne, "Quatour Eburnae Imagines: The Mimetic Interior of Late Medieval Devotion."
Diane Fuchs, "Crucifixion Plaque from Rinnagan."

Session 2
Wendy N. Long, "Chaucer's Poetics of Prayer."
Russ Brickey, "Cultivating the Wild Bunch: Chaucerian Dialogues with the Garden Goddess."
Turgay Bayindir, "The Reflection of Class Consciousness in Capellanus' The Art of Courtly Love."

Session 3
Laura Boercker, "Laudine and Yvain: Modern Reconciliations of Love and Marriage in Children's Versions of Chrétien de Troyes' Knight with the Lion."
April Toadvine, "Putting the Cart Before the Horse: Courtly Love and Chivalry in The Knight of the Cart"
Monica Osborne, "I Know Something You Don't Know: Theological Re-Visioning in the Woman's Response to Master Richard's Bestiary of Love."

Session 1
Anthony Mullis, "Charlemagne as Emperor or Chieftan."
William R. Blake, "Arthurian Illuminations and Illustrations."

Session 2
Sarah Martini, "Female Mediaeval Sexuality and the Wife of Bath."
Sarah E. LaDow, "The Wolf Within: George Eliot's Personal Politics."

Session 3
Vicki Willey, "The Axe, the Holly Bob, and the Aghlich Mayster: An (Other) Reading of the Green Knight."
Molly Martin, "The Perilous Impotence of the Male Gaze: The Wolf, the Lion, and Richard de Fournival."