Medieval Beasts

Undergraduate / Graduate

From fables to bestiaries, in the margins of medieval manuscripts and at the center of animal narratives, animals abound in medieval literature. Transformations from human to animal form (or vice versa), friendships between animals and humans, the anthropomorphization of animals, invite us to interrogate the relationship between animals and humans, and to put into question the boundary (if indeed one can be defined) between the two. In this course we will read a variety of medieval texts as well as modern critical theory in order to gain a better understanding of the textual, narrative, hermeneutic, and ethical roles that animals play in medieval literature, and in our contemporary critical posture vis à vis the natural world.