My work centers on Medieval literature, with a leaning towards Early Modern English literature. I am very much engaged by the rich readings that result when the literature of the past is read through the lens of contemporary theories. For example, for the Middle Ages, 'truth' was never contingent; nevertheless the 'truth' of gender identification can be seen in medieval texts to be wickedly and comically negotiated. Perception, too, 'fixed' by Aquinas and Dante, proves to be shaped, rather, by institutional discourses, and can vary from community to community and period to period. Even meaning itself is constituted not by timeless truth but by language- itself a system of elusive and "excessive signification."
As my interests have evolved, so, too, have my courses, which now take a theme-based approach rather than a chronological one, an approach which seems to elicit the best from my students. Courses which I have developed in the last six years include: "The Theft of Language" (which looked at languages of public discourse across the centuries to discover where women were, and were not, able to appropriate and transform the language of the dominant discourse), "Unruly Women in Middle English Literature," "The Endangered Male and Plotting Women in the Middle Ages," "Language, Gender, and Power," "Women, Money, and Power in Medieval and Early Modern England," and "'Bad' Girls, 'Bad' Women in Medieval and Early Modern England."
My evolving interests are reflected, likewise in my research. From my first book, The Old English Finding of the True Cross, I have crossed disciplines and eras in my book-in-progress, tentatively titled, Speaking as a Woman: Language as the Site of Revolt. There I show how medieval and early modern English women and women characters use certain linguistic strategies to de-'essentialize' the link between gendered practices and identity, allowing them to assert a 'feminist' discourse that countered prevailing ideologies.
In progress, too, is a third book, Religious Language: Privileging Violence towards Women, in which I examine the ways in which the discourse of worship, religious treatises, homilies and liturgies promotes the oppression and abuse of women and children.
Teaching Fields
- English Linguistics
- Medieval Literature
- Women's Studies
Office Hours
FALL 2011
- Friday 1:00-3:30 and by appointment
Teaching Schedule
FALL 2011
- 4410/101 MW 2:00-3:15 DS502
- 4710/101 MW 3:30-4:45 DS502
Research Interests
- English Linguistics
- Women in Medieval Literature
Selected Publications
- The Old English Finding of the True Cross. Suffolk, Eng.: Boydell and Brewer Ltd., 1987. Edition, with linguistic and literary analysis of 11th-century Old English text of the Finding of the True Cross.
- "Evidence for the Knowledge of Greek in Anglo-Saxon England." Anglo-Saxon England 17 (1990) 217-246.
- “The Imagined Woman,” Image Makers and Image Breakers in the Middle Ages. Ed. J. Goering and Francesco Guilliano. Toronto Series, Vol. 6 (2004)
- "'I grab the microphone and move my body:' Volatile Speech, Volatile Bodies and the Church's Attempt to Measure Holiness." The Catholic Church and Unruly Women Writers: Critical Essays. Ed Jeana DelRosso, Leigh Eicke, and Ana Kothe. Palgrave Press, 2007.
- "'Tak al my good [wealth] and lat my body go': Medieval Woman, Money and Power.” Women, Money and Power. Ed. Theresa Earenfight. Palgrave Press, 2008.
Honors/Awards
- British Fulbright Research Award
- National Endowment for the Humanities Award
- Summer Faculty Fellowship Award
- Invited: Fellow of the Departments of Anglo-Saxon Studies and Classics
- Faculty Development Award, Marquette University, 2007
English Department
