The essays in this volume present new work that in one way or anotherqueers stabilized conceptions of the Middle Ages allowing us to see theperiod and its syste... » 

The essays in this volume present new work that in one way or anotherqueers stabilized conceptions of the Middle Ages allowing us to see theperiod and its systems of sexuality in radically different offcenter andrevealing ways. While not denying the force of gender and sexual norms theauthors consider how historical work has written out or over what might havebeen nonnormative in medieval sex and culture and they work to restore asense of such instabilities. At the same time they ask how this pursuit mightallow us not only to reenvision medieval studies but also to rethink how westudy culture from our current set of vantage points within postmodernity.The authors focus on particular medieval moments Christine de Pizansrepresentation of female sexuality chastity in the Grail romances theillustration of the sodomite in manuscript commentaries on Dantes Commediathe complex ways that sexuality inflected English national politics at the timeof Edward IIs deposition the construction of the sodomitic Moor byReconquista Spain. Throughout their work seeks to disturb a logic that seesthe past as significant only insofar as it may make sense for and of astabilized present. «