Moving Subjects: processional performance in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance

Ashley, Kathleen and Wim Husken

ISBN 10: 9042012552 / ISBN 13: 9789042012554

Published by Rodopi, 2001

About this Item

Seller Inventory # 006838

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Moving Subjects: processional performance in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance
• Publisher: Rodopi
• Publication Date: 2001
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 9042012552
• ISBN 13: 9789042012554
• Binding: Soft cover
• Condition: Very Good

About this title

Synopsis

Procession, arguably the most ubiquitous and versatile public performance mode until the seventeenth century, has received little scholarly or theoretical attention. Yet, this form of social behaviour has been so thoroughly naturalised in our accounts of western European history that it merited little comment as a cultural performance choice over many centuries until recently, when a generation of cultural historians using explanatory models from anthropology called attention to the processional mode as a privileged vehicle for articulation in its society. Their analyses, however, tended to focus on the issue of whether processions produced social harmony or reinforced social distinctions, potentially leading to conflict. While such questions are not ignored in this collection of essays, its primary purpose is to reflect upon salient theatrical aspects of processions that may help us understand how in the performance of “moving subjects” they accomplished their often transformative cultural work.

Review

a richly detailed and thoughtful study in: "Speculum," Oct. 2004"