IMC 2014: Sessions

Session 1505: Fragmented Body Politic, III: Habeas Corpus - Producing the Material and Textual Body

Thursday 10 July 2014, 09.00-10.30

Sponsor:	Centre for Medieval Studies, University of York
Organiser:	Laura Crombie, Centre for Medieval Studies, University of York
Moderator/Chair:	Laura Crombie, Centre for Medieval Studies, University of York
Paper 1505-a	Muddy Origins: The Inherent Non-Humanness of Humanity (Language: English) Sophia Wilson, Department of English, King's College London Index terms: Daily Life, Language and Literature - Middle English, Literacy and Orality, Performance Arts - Drama
Paper 1505-b	Disembodied Readers: The Medieval Reader in the Peripheries of the Page (Language: English) Deborah Thorpe, Centre for Chronic Diseases & Disorders, University of York Index terms: Archives and Sources, Daily Life, Local History, Social History
Paper 1505-c	Disarming Iron Man: The Myth of the Pre-Eminence of Metal Armour in 14th-Century London (Language: English) Brad Kirkland, Centre for Medieval Studies, University of York Index terms: Archives and Sources, Charters and Diplomatics, Economics - Urban, Historiography - Medieval
Abstract	This panel explores the concept of the body politic as it relates to readers, audiences, and textual communities in English towns and texts of the 13th to 15th centuries. The papers consider the arming of the urban body, the making and unmaking of bodies, and the materiality of humanity in the 'N-Town Plays' and the involvement of the readerly body with the textual body in a variety of late medieval marginalia. Together the papers provide new interpretations on urban plays, civic readers, and metropolitan guilds through the interpretation of the body.