List Members who will be in or near Chicago in late September may be
interested in the following:
CENTER FOR RESEARCH IN FESTIVE CULTURE
Seminar 1, Friday, September 28, 2007, 2:00-5:00 p.m.
Newberry Library, Chicago, Illinois
Religion and Festive Culture: Maypoles and Monsters, Early Modern Europe
Graduate Students, Faculty, and the General Public are Cordially Invited
to Attend
Refreshments will be Served.
At the first session of the fall 2007 Research Seminar in Festive
Culture the following two papers will be discussed. The first paper is
currently available by email to correspondents of the Center. The second
paper will be available after September 14th.
James Stokes, Professor of English, University of Wisconsin at Stevens
Point, discusses festive resistance at the local level of villages and
towns to Tudor-Stuart shifts in religious policy. It is a vast subject
which the Reed project (see previous CRFC papers by Hayes and MacElean)
has revealed in appealing and amusing diversity. Professor Stokes draws
especially upon his work in Lincolnshire and Somerset to show how
popular customs—and in particular Maypole dancing—disappeared and
reappeared as localities struggled to maintain their customary pastimes.
Dr. David Sanchez, Technical University, Berlin, discovered years ago a
numer of drawings in the Madrid Municipal Archive, dated 1656-1770,
which depict the tarasca, a dragon with the figure of a woman on its
back. The dragon was paraded in Corpus Christi processions at Madrid;
each year artists submitted proposals for the appearance of the tarasca
and accompanying figures (harlequins, acrobats, musicians, dancers who
moved alongside). These drawings and the satiric-burlesque functions of
the tarasca within a solemn religious festivity are the subject of Dr.
Sanchez’s paper.
+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=
The seminar will devote 90-minute round-table discussions to each of
these papers, with a brief break between them. The papers will be
briefly introduced, not read, by Professor Stokes and Dr. Sanchez.
Please send your request for a copy of the papers to Molly Schultz,
secretary of the seminar, at the Newberry Library
([log in to unmask]). Requested papers will be sent to your email
address. If you do not have an email address, send your mailing address
to Molly Schultz, Newberry Library, 60 West Walton Street, Chicago, IL
60610-7324, or to me: Samuel Kinser, History Department, Northern
Illinois University, DeKalb, IL 60115 ([log in to unmask]).
Please note: Under the auspices of the CRFC, Professor Stokes will
lecture on a topic similar to that of the seminar paper at northern
Illinois U on Sept. 27th at 11:15 a.m. Everyone is welcome. The Center
expresses its thanks to the History Department and to External
Programming, College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, NIU, for their aid in
arranging this lecture.
--
Abigail Ann Young (Dr), Associate Editor/ Records of Early English Drama/
Victoria College/ 150 Charles Street W/ Toronto Ontario Canada
Phone (416) 585-4504/ FAX (416) 813-4093/ [log in to unmask]
List-owner of REED-L <http://www.reed.utoronto.ca/reed-l.html>
http://www.reed.utoronto.ca/ => REED's home page
http://www.reed.utoronto.ca/stage.html => our Web guide
http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~young => my home page
