Turner, Victoria (2013) Performing the self, performing the other : gender and racial identity construction in the Nanteuil Cycle. Women's History Review, Volume 22 (Number 2). pp. 182-196. doi:10.1080/09612025.2012.726109

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Abstract

This article focuses on the Old French Nanteuil Cycle of chansons de geste, investigating the nature of medieval identity and its connection to gender, race and religion. The Nanteuil Cycle repeatedly uses disguise as a means of crossing gender boundaries, which allows the repositioning of identity and simultaneously reveals the arbitrariness of cultural categorisation. Although cross-dressing heroines abound in medieval literature, the fourteenth-century Tristan de Nanteuil contains instances where cross-dressing is both gendered and racialised, stretching the malleability of identity to the point that it seems physical form can be altered at will. The article discusses the distortion of genealogies in the Cycle effected by the challenges to the social matrix produced by disguise, with a new relational framework where wives may become fathers and mothers become husbands.

Item Type:	Journal Article
Divisions:	Faculty of Arts > School of Modern Languages and Cultures > French Studies
Journal or Publication Title:	Women's History Review
Publisher:	Routledge
ISSN:	0961-2025
Official Date:	2013
Dates:	Date Event 2013 Published
Volume:	Volume 22
Number:	Number 2
Page Range:	pp. 182-196
DOI:	10.1080/09612025.2012.726109
Status:	Peer Reviewed
Publication Status:	Published
Access rights to Published version:	Restricted or Subscription Access

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