Soul, Body, and Gender in Late Antiquity

Including both traditional and underrepresented accounts and geographies of soul, body, gender, and sexuality in late antique history, philosophy, and theology, this volume offers substantial re-readings of these and related concepts through theories of dis/embodiment.

Bringing together gender studies, late antique philosophy, patristics, history of asceticism, and history of Indian philosophy, this interdisciplinary volume examines the notions of dis/embodiment and im/materiality in late antique and early Christian culture and thought. The book’s geographical scope extends beyond the ancient Mediterranean, providing comparative perspectives from Late Antiquity in the Near East and South Asia. It offers critical interpretations of late antique scholarly objects of inquiry, exploring close readings of soul, body, gender, and sexuality in their historical context. These fascinating studies engage scholars from different fields and research traditions with one another, and reveal both change and continuity in the perception and social role of gender, sexuality, body, and soul in this period.

Soul, Body, and Gender in Late Antiquity is a valuable resource for students and scholars of Classics, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, as well as those working on late antique and early Christian history, philosophy, and theology.

Stanimir Panayotov is Assistant Professor in Philosophy at the School of Advanced Studies, University of Tyumen, Russia. Most recently, he is a co-editor of Black Metal Rainbows (PM Press, 2023), and editor of O–Zone: An Ecology of Objects (Punctum Books, forthcoming 2024).

Andra Jugănaru (PhD in Medieval Studies) is Assistant Professor at the Faculty of History, University of Bucharest, Romania. Her current research interests involve the use of network theory in the research of late antique epistolography, and her other research interests are late antique monasticism and hagiography.

Anastasia Theologou is a PhD Candidate at the Department of Medieval Studies in the Central European University, Vienna, Austria, with a thesis on Plotinus and Sympatheia. Her research interests focus on ancient cosmology, psychology, and epistemology, and the ancient philosophical tradition in Medieval philosophy.

István Perczel is Professor in the Department of Medieval Studies at Central European University, Vienna, Austria. He has extensively worked on late antique and patristic philosophy. One of his research projects is on Christian Platonism and Byzantine theology, and he has worked on Syriac Christianity.