This session aims to rethink narratives of cultural change across the late medieval and early modern periods by bringing together several strands of scholarship that fall under the banner of “phenomenology” but are not usually engaged in direct dialogue. Broadly speaking, those interested in historical phenomenology and in embodied cognition have had little to say to those working in the philosophy of religion, political theology, and ethics. Our objective is to bring these various approaches together in order to open up new perspectives on periodization and to reexamine early drama’s role in narratives of secularization and modernization.
We invite papers that take a phenomenological approach (broadly defined) to the moralities and cycle plays, particularly their contested role as both the quintessence and the end of medieval drama, as well as their relationship to the drama of the long sixteenth century. Papers might consider secularization and pluralization, embodied cognition, historical phenomenology, political theology, the history of the senses, and/or the “religious turn” in phenomenology, as exemplified in the work of Jean-Luc Marion, Michel Henry, Robert Sokolowski, and Jean-Yves Lacoste.
Sponsored by the University of Pittsburgh Medieval and Renaissance Studies Program
Contacts: Ryan McDermott (rjm95@pitt.edu) and Jennifer Waldron (jwaldron@pitt.edu)
Deadline for abstracts: Sept. 15, 2013
Complete info available at http://www.academia.edu/4188146/CFP_Drama_Phenomenology_Periodization
