HI179: Deviance and Nonconformity in Early Modern Europe

Societies are identified, at least in part, by whom they choose to marginalise. Deviance and Nonconformity explores why and how some individuals and groups were marginalised and persecuted because of differences in their beliefs, gender, ethnicity and behaviour. The early modern period was a time of great social, economic, and religious uncertainty. Conflicts and social tensions created by developments in Europe led to the emergence of new types of deviant and radical groups and new measures to control their behaviour. The module will be structured around a series of case studies of groups and individuals identified as 'deviants' organised around three thematic groupings: non-European deviants; religious and supernatural deviants; and social and medical deviants. Among the topics studied will be Europe's Jews, black Europeans, astrologers, witches, werewolves, atheists, prostitutes, cross dressers, disabled people and mental illness, traveller communities, pirates and bandits.

Though this module focuses on early modern Europe, many of the groups we discuss will be set firmly within the context of wider global developments and economic transformations. Students taking this module will be encouraged to reflect on their own ideas about deviant behaviour and to engage with more recent sociological and political works on the subject of deviance, exclusion and marginalisation. The assessment and readings for this module will encourage students to examine different deviant groups through a comparative framework. A range of resources will be used in weekly seminar preparation including primary source material, podcasts, and blogs, alongside more traditional academic texts.

Aims and outcomes

A detailed knowledge of the different conditions affecting the treatment and marginalisation of deviant groups in early modern Europe, and the political, social and religious contexts affecting their treatment.
Interest led module – for students identify and specialise in the study of groups and individuals that are of interest to them in all aspects of seminar preparation and assessment.
For students to think comparatively about the treatment of different marginal and deviant groups in different times and geographical contexts, reinforced through seminar discussion and the final 3,000-word comparative essay.

Indicative readings

Cary J. Nederman, 'Introduction: Discourses and Contexts of Tolerance in Medieval Europe', in Beyond the Persecuting Society: Religious Toleration Before the Enlightenment (1997).
Alexandra Walsham, Charitable Hatred: Tolerance and Intolerance in England, 1500-1700, introduction (2006).
Jeffrey Richards, Sex, Dissidence and Damnation: Minority Groups in the Middle Ages (2002).
Darren Oldridge, Strange Histories: The Trial of the Pig, the Walking Dead, and Other Matters of Fact from the Medieval and Renaissance Worlds (2005).
Olivette Otele, African Europeans: An Untold History (2020).
Stephen J. Milner, At the Margins: Minority Groups in Premodern Italy (2005).
Johannes Dillinger, 'Terrorists and Witches: Popular Ideas of Evil in the Early Modern Period', History of European Ideas 30 (2004), 167-182.
William J. Bouwsma, 'Anxiety and the Formation of Early Modern Culture', in After the Reformation: Essays in Honor of J. H. Hexter (2016).
Mary Douglas, 'Witchcraft and Leprosy: Two Strategies of Exclusion', Man 26 (1991).