Always Here: Non-Binary Gender, Trans Identities, & Queerness in the Global Middle Ages (c. 250-1650)

Queer, trans, intersex, non-binary, genderfluid, and gender-nonconforming people and sources are abundant in the premodern textual, artistic, and artifactual record, and studies of gender and sexuality in the medieval period are flourishing as never before. Yet, work on the LGBTQIA+ Middle Ages remains limited especially in our classrooms and in sharing our work with nonacademic queer and trans communities. Many important sources remain out of reach for students, and an alarming amount of queer and trans medieval and early-modern history is not available and its existence routinely denied-to LGBTQIA+ people beyond academia. Even researchers and teachers dedicated to pre- and early-modern gender and sexuality frequently remain siloed according to language and region: Latinists speak primarily to Latinists, Arabists to Arabists, and so on, while scholars of the Americas are often absent from conversations among scholars of premodern Africa and Eurasia. Thus, despite recent growth and successes, the study of the queer and trans pre- and early modern remains disturbingly fragmented and vital sources inaccessible to many.

In our own historical moment, members of the LGBTQIA + community face frightening and rising levels of violence and oppression. So what are we, as scholars of the medieval and early-modern periods, to do? Binghamton University's Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies (CEMERS) seeks to bring together researchers dedicated to the study of non-binary gender, trans identities, and queerness during the premodern period broadly defined, to share research and discuss the challenges of LGBTQIA+ scholarship. We invite proposals for papers and panels for CEMERS' 2025 conference, Always Here: Non-Binary Gender, Trans Identities, and Queerness in the Global Middle Ages (c. 250-1650). The conference will include plenary lectures by Leah De Vun (Rutgers University) and Pernilla Myrne (University of Gothenburg), as well as plenary roundtables dedicated to translation and pedagogy. We hope to facilitate conversations between scholars across disciplines and geographic and linguistic boundaries, with the purpose of moving beyond academic silos to build a broad, truly global, and ideally collaborative textual and theoretical basis for future research.

For information, contact Bridget Whearty at [email protected].

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