How do you define "feminism"? #3
Feminist Medievalists or Medievalist Feminists or both! (I vote for both).
Welcome to part #3 of “How do you define ‘feminism’”?
“How do you define ‘feminism’” #1 is here.
“How do you define ‘feminism’” #2 is here.
Feminist Medievalists and/or Medievalist Feminists: it depends, as always, on your definitions.
The title of our session says that we are feminists interested in Medieval Studies; the term with which I'm more comfortable says that we are medievalists motivated by feminist politics. I don't want to argue today that one label is better than the other. I simply want to note the difference, to proceed to use the term with which I'm most familiar ("feminist medievalist") and to wonder (hopefully) if the emergence of "medievalist feminist" reflects a generational shift towards more assertive feminist Medieval Studies; if so, it is a shift that I welcome, despite my fuddy-duddy discomfort with the term! Indeed, it is this very shift that I'd like to encourage in my remarks today, for I want to argue that there is a critical need for feminist scholars to begin to take a more central place within Medieval Studies.
The above quote is from Judith M. Bennett’s1 opening remarks from a Roundtable on Medievalist Feminists in the Academy that took place in 1992 at the International Congress on Medieval Studies (ICMS) at Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo, Michigan. All the medievalists I know refer to it amongst themselves at Kalamazoo or even K’zoo when casually speaking or emailing about; ICMS in used in writing although, since there is another International Medieval Congress (at Leeds University in the UK), that risks causing some confusion!
I am not a medievalist (my deep immersion in Tolkien’s Middle-earth from age ten resulted in me becoming an animist, writing a LOT of nature poetry, ongoing rhapsodizing about trees, and waters (especially the ocean). I tried a Chaucer class as an undergraduate and bombed (well, I was auditing and left after a couple of weeks, because the language was impenetrable).
I did, however, hang out and become friends with a number of medievalists in graduate school because they were the others in the literature programs I was in most likely to be fans of (or at least not dismissive of) fantasy and science fiction. The modernists could be real snobs about it, even more so after they decided “magical realism” was this amazing capital-L LITERATURE.2
After getting hired at a university, I eventually collaborated with a medieval historian of religion on various Tolkien projects (co-teaching classes, collaborating on writing articles and grants, giving talks at conferences, including K’zoo). We sort of billed ourselves as the medievalist and the postmodernist illustrating different approaches to Tolkien’s legendarium and its adaptations.
As a result, even in retirement, I having a fantastic time on Substack finding and reading feminist medievalist / medieval feminist Substacks in addition to feminist essays by medievalists in part to keep up with contemporary scholarship on the Middle Ages because “ Tolkien” and his legendarium was identified with the medieval from early on. The identification is related to his own academic specializations and sources and to the fact that the earliest academics to take his work seriously as a focus for scholarship were, not surprisingly, medievalists and folklorists who had a much better sense of what he was doing than some of the modernist critics who were, shall we say, not the best readers of his work (in this case, “best” meaning that they were neither familiar with the medieval sources that Tolkien was drawing from nor the medieval aesthetic that Elizabeth D. Kirk discusses in her 1971 essay on languages and style, and the reason why modernist literary critics (such as Edmund Wilson and Burton Raffel along with others) share as aesthetic that was not Tolkien’s (highly recommend reading Kirk’s essay if you are at all interested in questions of Tolkien’s style which has been criticized as “bad” by a number of critics and academics (Harold Bloom!) (her work is far too seldom cited/quoted by people doing stylistic analysis).3
I think that those of us us doing feminist scholarship on Tolkien (some of whom are, like myself, not-medievalists) can learn a great deal by paying attention to the current state of knowledge about (among other things) women and the Middle Ages which overlaps with gender, sexuality, and queer4 studies in medieval studies as well as with other academic sub-fields!
So, some of the stuff I’ve been reading:
Medieval Feminist Forum: A Journal of Gender and Sexuality5
The Medieval Institute Publications which publishes the journal and scholarly book series started in 1978! Besides the feminist journal, they have a book series on New Queer Medievalisms.
Substacks
A monthly newsletter that aims to reimagine the women that were intentionally erased, minimized, and/or villainized throughout the Middle Ages. History has been male-centric for far too long, and this space seeks to change that while remaining conscious that men are also harmed within patriarchal social structures. It is not women vs. men, it is all of us vs. the patriarchy. (About.)
Are you interested in medieval history but. . .
frustrated by an overwhelming focus on kings and battles?
bored by matter-of-fact presentations of the past?
missing the human connection element to studying our ancestors?
If so, then this is the place for you!
I’m currently studying for a PhD in Archaeology at Oxford, researching the role of women in the social and political developments of 6th- and 7th-century England and France. With a worldwide readership of over 4,400 PLUS featuring regularly in Substack’s top 100 fastest-growing history publications, I share medieval history as you rarely hear it. I combine written and archaeological evidence to share the experiences of overshadowed individuals, ask challenging questions of dominant interpretations, and recommend books and writers doing a wonderful job of unearthing the past.
And combining expertise, a great interview [click on the link not only to read the interview as a whole but also to see the footnotes]:
“Why Feminism Didn’t Exist In the Medieval World: 15th Century Feminist Interview by Holly Brown
Many writers recently have been bold in declaring that feminism didn’t exist in the medieval world. What do you think about this? Does it matter, for the feminist writer, whether it existed then or not?
I think they’re right! The language and intellectual frameworks of feminism did not exist in the medieval world; to imply otherwise would absolutely be anachronistic. But to imply that folks weren’t questioning the dominant culture; that women weren’t seeking realities beyond domination; that the lowest classes didn’t challenge imposed exploitation—which are all feminist actions—is not simply anachronistic, but historically inaccurate. Two truths can exist at any one moment, the human experience is quite expansive. Feminism as a polemic paradigm did not exist, but a proto-feminism which challenged the dominant culture of imperialist patriarchy at individual levels did exist, and has so since the inception of imposed hierarchies and enforced male supremacy.2 As second wave feminist Marilyn French noted, “subjugation generates resentment,” and there has been much subjugation under patriarchy.3
When Christine de Pizan sat to compose The Book of the City of the Ladies (1405), she was seeking to reinstate women into their rightful place within the historical annals while flexing a deep knowledge of literary devices. She was also critiquing the harm imposed by the ideologies of the dominant culture (patriarchy). Just prior to penning her proto-feminist masterpiece, Christine had very publicly engaged in a debate (1401) on the disgusting literary treatment of women within the popular Roman de la Rose, imploring the very highest seat of patriarchal governance, queen regent Isabeau of Bavaria, to take action—which she did!4
Women advocating on behalf of women within a patriarchal society is a long held practice—long before words such as ‘feminism’ or ‘intersectionality’ existed. Hauled in front of French judges in the Autumn of 1322, Jacqueline Felice de Almania fought for women’s personhood and agency in an argument she likely knew was long lost. [italicized text a block quote within the interview]
“In her own defense, Felicie argued fervently for the right of wise and experienced-even if unlicensed-women to care for the sick. With even more spirit she asserted that it was improper for men to palpate the breasts and abdomens of women; indeed, out of modesty, women might prefer death from an illness to revealing intimate secrets to a man.”5
We can now classify these individual acts as proto-feminist because we possess the language and intellectual frameworks to do so, but doing so doesn’t imply some anachronistic inception of feminist polity and I think folks often conflate the two.
In my opinion, the role of the feminist writer, especially the feminist historian, is to challenge the harmful narratives of the dominant culture. And though the women of the medieval world would have never thought of themselves as feminists, their works can be perceived through such paradigms as they inform our own patriarchal reality.
Emily Spinach who does fascinating work on medievalisms (that is, analyzing texts and materials that were created after the Middle Ages but make use of medieval tropes and materials) as well as translating medieval texts—and talking in such amazing ways about language! See “translation: the ruin, anglo-saxon landscapes and bodies, the borders you cross when you become a broken thing”:
I’m loving my Sir Gawain and the Green Knight translation a lot, but one unfortunate side effect is that putting all my translation energy into Middle English means I’m not translating any Old English. I love both very deeply and my PhD is going to involve a healthy amount of both. Middle English might own my heart very slightly more, but I loved Old English first. Choosing who I love more makes me feel trapped in the centre of a weepy teen love triangle. I love haunting elegies and I love King Arthur. You can’t make me choose when I just have so much love in my heart.
One of the things I’m most desperately excited about for my PhD is how many languages there are all together in there. For years people told me they didn’t understand how I’d manage to mash Old English, Middle English and Welsh (and now also Cornish) into one cohesive project. The fact that I’ve managed it is one of the things I’m proudest of.
Most medievalists I know identify very strongly as an Anglo-Saxonist or a Middle English-ist (is there a word for that?), and I just never have. I don’t know what that says about me. Perhaps I’m just very amateurish and still, age twenty nine, don’t have enough language skills to declare myself a specialist in either langauge. But if we’re feeling a bit more charitable towards me, I think I just love the way both look at each other backwards and forwards across time. Like an Old and New Testament, I love how they answer and fulfill each other, creating little callbacks and prophecies that get fulfilled. I love how the Middle English period reinterprets and reimagines Old English. I love, I really deeply love, the fact that even in the high Middle Ages there was still a medieval past lurking beneath English culture. I love alliterative revival poetry and medieval recreations of the earlier Middle Ages.
Shield of Skuld by Irina Manea who is an historian who specializes in Viking history looking at material culture, but also recently posted this great piece on Girl Power, Vengeance, and the Mill of Doom: How to lost your kingdom to slave women which I totally saved to use in my Webs by Women project because its about a Norse poem which features two female stone giants (and is a kickass story as well). Plus, STONE GIANTS!!!!!!!!!
Once upon a myth, the Danish king Frodi (not a hobbit) made a questionable decision: he acquired two enslaved women, Fenia and Menia, from Sweden. Little did he know they were no ordinary captives, but towering descendants of mountain giants. He brought them back not just to toil, but to operate Grotti, a magical millstone with the power to grind out anything the heart desired: gold, peace, happiness, you name it. Sounds idyllic, right? Except Frodi, blinded by his lust for effortless riches like most capitalist profiteers nowadays, demanded nonstop production. No breaks. No mercy. Just endless grinding.
This compelling story is the topic of the Norse poem Grottasöngr. The girls are taken straight to the mill to start working: the king does not even mention rest before hearing the slave-women’s tune. They accordingly set to work: the sound of industry rings out, as they adjust the machine, and the king again orders them to work. The milling, accompanied by the girls’ singing, continues until Frodi’s household is asleep, and the flour begins to emerge. Needless to say, things did not go well from here.
And imagine my astonishment when, while mousing around in the subscription databases some years ago, I found an an essay published in the Medieval Feminist Forum in 1996 by Michael D. C. Drout on “The Influence of J. R. R. Tolkien's Masculinist Medievalism” [click on link to download this short essay] where he points out the problem of students’ ignorance about medieval women:
Because many students inherit their perceptions of medieval literature through Tolkien's interpretations, they are often surprised to find women in the literature they read in their classes. When student perceptions of the Middle Ages clash with what they are taught by contemporary teachers, many students are likely to resent the "intrusion" of gender (among other topics) into their comfortable fantasy world. It seems to me that the challenge for educators concerned with gender is to complicate productively the world view inherited from Tolkien without completely destroying students' familiarity with and love for their idealized (and ideologized) view of the Middle Ages. One way to achieve this complication is to show that men have gender in Beowulf and other texts beloved by Tolkien, that this gender requires them to perform certain roles, and that these requirements often lead, to misuse one of Tolkien's more famous quotes about Beowulf, to "sufficient tragedy" (24)
Drout also argues that “a criticism that excludes women, gender, reproduction, and sex is doomed to extinction. Some critics have chosen such extinction with their eyes open (in unpublished notes dating from around 1937 Tolkien suggests that he may be at the end of the tradition of Old English studies)” (26-27).
I’m sure there are more medieval feminist and feminist medievalist Substacks out there — if you know of any, feel free to link in a comment!
Bennett is one of the founding scholars of feminist history, someone even an English prof who is not a medievalist knew about! This link to Wikipedia covers some of her accomplishments, and publications for those unaware of her work. The second participant in the K’zoo roundtable is Elizabeth Robertson who is an medievalist in an English department. They invited responses, to be published in the Spring 1993 issue, which published one response, by Clare Lees.
I tended to take a lot of British literature, mostly Shakespeare and poetry, in my first MA program; I still remember my office-mate (we were teaching assistants in the department) coming into the office, shoving my pile of sff off my desk onto the floor, and dumping some novels by Gabriel José García Márquez and Jorge Luis Borges in front of me while declaiming that I should stop reading that “garbage” and read MAGICAL REALISM. I advise against that strategy, by the way, since it resulted in me refusing to read anything in that genre. By the time I got to my doctoral program years later, I leapfrogged past Modernism into feminist and gender/queer theorists (so sorta a small-p postmodernist meaning working with theories and texts published after WWII). I tried a few magical realist works by women writers in those years, but they never really grabbed me.
Kirk, Elizabeth D. "'I Would Rather Have Written in Elvish': Language, Fiction and The Lord of the Rings." Novel: A Forum on Fiction, vol. 5, iss. 1, 1971, pp. 5-18.
Judgments of Tolkien's style like Burton Raffel's reflect a comparatively modern assumption that the function of language in any work of art is to force the reader out of the reactions, awarenesses, associations of ideas, and value judgments which he shares with others and to substitute for them sharper, more distinctive, individual, and "original" modes of awareness. Good style is style which drags the reader out of his habitual derivative consciousness and makes him participate in a new one. This is a function of post-Romantic views of the artist as a privileged sensibility whose experiences are not only more intense than those of ordinary men but "original," that is, in degree if not in kind they are really different and more valuable. But this is by no means the only possible view of the artist. Keats himself told his publisher that poetry "should surprise by a fine excess and not by Singularity-it should strike the Reader as a wording of his own highest thoughts, and appear almost a Remembrance." And it is perfectly possible for an artist's concern with language to be concern for language as a medium of communal consciousness and of certain modes of awareness and evaluation to which its existence vis a vis other languages testifies. The artist may dramatize language as the blood and sinews of a culture as distinct from other cultures. Many great novelists have combined this sort of interest in language with the kind Burton Raffel has in mind; one can read Joyce or Jane Austen for either reason. An artist can also be concerned with language almost purely in the second sense. This has been true of most "high styles" of the past, whether they represent the heightening of communal experience in the way that "primitive" formulaic styles do, or whether they involve the highly sophisticated artistry, which may or may not be formulaic, of literary epic.
What Tolkien has done is to attempt a story concerned with language in the communal sense, yet which is as different from epic as it is from the novel. The Lord of the Rings enacts the nature of language. Tolkien has created an entire world in its spatial and chronological dimensions, peopling it with languages which have, in a necessarily stylized and simplified version, all the basic features of language, from writing systems and sound changes through diction and syntax to style. By playing them against one another, he has created a "model" (in the scientific sense of the term) for the relationship of language to action, to values and to civilization.
Diane Watt, a feminist medievalist writing in 2019, criticized the tendency in queer medieval studies that resulted in:
the terminology of both the history of sexuality and queer theory has become gender exclusive: homosexuality has come to mean, in common academic usage, male homosexuality; gay history is gay male history; queer sexualities are all too often queer male sexualities. Women are not given equal weight to men, and the histories of male and female sexualities are still artificially separated. (452)
Watt, Diane. “Why men still aren't enough.” GLQ: a Journal of Lesbian and Gay Studies, vol. 16, iss. 3, 2010, pp. 451-464.
That pattern of exclusion is one I’ve identified in Queer Tolkien studies as well!
The journal was originally titled, a Medieval Feminist Newsletter, and the first issue was published in Summer 1986. The first issue published by the Institute was v. 57 (2021). The journal seems to be completely open access!
I’ve linked to this brilliant post by 15th Century Feminist before, but doing it again: Lord of the Rings: A Feminist Manifesto for the Boys: A practical guide to overthrowing the patriarchy.
What a delight it was to get around to reading this post, especially after our recent discussions — and I’m heartened and stunned (in the best way) to see my translation cited in Emily Spinach’s post that it prompted me to properly set up a Substack account for commenting!
I also enjoyed Diane Watt’s article. I’ve admittedly only become acquainted recently with “queering” texts in the broader sense of non-normativity, so I liked reading about the scholarship that has been done there, as well as the research gap identified.