The Cultural Turn In Late Ancient Studies ― Gender, Asceticism, And Historiography

The contributors investigate three key concerns of late ancient studies: gender, asceticism, and historiography. They consider Macrina’s scar, Mary’s voice, and the harlot’s body as well as Augustine, Jovinian, Gregory of Nazianzus, Julian, and Ephrem the Syrian. Whether examining how animal bodies figured as a means for understanding human passion and sexuality in the monastic communities of Egypt and Palestine or meditating on the almost modern epistemological crisis faced by Theodoret in attempting to overcome the barriers between the self and the wider world, these essays highlight emerging theoretical and critical developments in the field.

Contributors. Daniel Boyarin, David Brakke, Virginia Burrus, Averil Cameron, Susanna Elm, James E. Goehring, Susan Ashbrook Harvey, David G. Hunter, Blake Leyerle, Dale B. Martin, Patricia Cox Miller, Philip Rousseau, Teresa M. Shaw, Maureen A. Tilley, Dennis E. Trout, Mark Vessey

Dale B. Martin is Professor and Chair of Religious Studies at Yale University. Among his books areInventing Superstition: From the Hippocratics to the Christians and The Corinthian Body.

Patricia Cox Miller is W. Earl Ledden Professor of Religion at Syracuse University. Among her books areThe Poetry of Thought in Late Antiquity: Essays in Imagination and Religion andDreams in Late Antiquity: Studies in the Imagination of a Culture.