Women’s Classical Caucus-sponsored panel
Material Girls: Gender and Material Culture in the Ancient World
Organizers: Mireille Lee, Vanderbilt University;
Lauren Hackworth Petersen, University of Delaware
From birth to death, individuals negotiated ancient constructions of gender through their engagement with objects. Articles of dress were essential for communicating and construing gender. Hand-held objects such as walking-sticks or parasols served as “props” for the public performance of gender. Gendered activities such as textile-production and warfare required the use of specialized tools such as the distaff and bronze weapons that were themselves highly gendered. Objects were employed at critical life-stages: the choes used at the anthesteria, for example, or birthing amulets that ensured a successful delivery. Objects were also used to subvert gender ideologies, as for example in Euripides’ Medea, in which the wedding gift of the poisoned robe results in death.
This WCC-sponsored panel will explore the profound relationship between objects and gender. We invite proposals from classicists, archaeologists, and historians working in any period and in any geographical location. Topics include, but are not limited to, the gendered roles of objects in the construction of social status or social roles, in religion, the domestic sphere, politics, and the funerary realm. Possible research questions include: How do objects construct gender in ancient societies? How do objects disrupt conventional constructions of gender? How are objects themselves gendered? What theoretical approaches are most helpful for the interpretation of gender and ancient objects? What role has the reception of ancient objects played in the construction of gender in modern societies? Abstracts of not more than 300 words should be submitted to Chiara Sulprizio (chiarasulprizio@hotmail.com) by March 1, 2017. Please do not identify yourself in the abstract, which will be blind-refereed.