Alterations of the Female Body in The Awntyrs off Arthur and The Wedding of Sir Gawain and Dame Ragnelle.

Researcher: Megan Ibbotson
Supervised by: Dr. Christiania Whitehead
Home department: English Literature
Expected start date: 15/06/2015
Expected end date: 26/07/2015

I am a second year English Literature student with an interest in Medieval and Early Modern literature, and particularly representations of gender and perceptions of otherness. I have chosen to complete a URSS project in the hope that it will provide me with some key research skills, possibly leading towards a career in academia.

I will be looking at the way in which the female body and its alterations are treated in The Wedding of Sir Gawain and Dame Ragnelle and The Awntyrs off Arthur, and particularly what this says about Medieval attitudes to gender, physicality and change. This will require an interdisciplinary approach, and thus I hope to incorporate scientific and doctrinal writings, as well as literary influences, into my research. Finally, I shall be looking at the use of the supernatural in conjunction with the female body within the texts. I hope that my project will provide a useful lens through which the treatment of gender and change within these two often overlooked texts may be read.