Medieval Work, Worship, and Power: Persuasive and Silenced Voices

Medieval Work, Worship, and Power: Persuasive and Silenced Voices celebrates Sharon Farmer’s significant contributions to the fields of medieval European social, religious, gender, environmental, labor, and interfaith history.

This volume explores and builds on Farmer’s influence through 20 chapters organized across five intersecting topics that capture, chronologically, topically, and theoretically, the scope and trajectory of Farmer’s work. These are (1) Saints, Power, and Piety; (2) Gendered Work; (3) Gender and Resource Management; (4) Women’s Agency and Networks; and (5) Interfaith Tensions and Encounters. At the same time, the chapters themselves reflect the ways in which these fields of inquiry are intertwined, many drawing inspiration from the multiple themes that Farmer has explored. Beyond paying homage to a dedicated and influential scholar, mentor, and teacher, this volume represents current and future directions in the field of medieval history, and how scholars are engaging with unexpected sources and interpreting more familiar sources in new, interdisciplinary ways.

The volume will appeal to medievalists and early modernists interested in how religion, gender, and status shape human connections to each other and their environment. More broadly, it will also be of interest to scholars interested in historical methods.

Abigail P. Dowling is Associate Professor of History at Mercer University in Macon, Georgia. Her work considers the interplay between landscape, natural resources management, and power. Her first edited volume was Conservation’s Roots, co-edited with Richard Keyser.

Nancy Ann McLoughlin is Associate Professor of History at the University of California, Irvine. Her most recent work explores intersections among late medieval understandings of the seven deadly sins, gender, community, crusading, and the environment. She is the author of Jean Gerson and Gender: Rhetoric and Politics in Fifteenth-Century France.

Tanya Stabler Miller is Associate professor of History at Loyola University Chicago. Miller’s research focuses on lay religion, gender, and urban culture, with special emphasis on northern France. She is the author of The Beguines of Medieval Paris: Gender, Patronage, and Spiritual Authority.