NCID-2569
Peggy McCracken
Anna Julia Cooper Distinguished University Professor of Medieval French Literature
University of Michigan
Education/Degree:
1 French literature French literature (Yale University)
About
I am a scholar of medieval French literature and culture and my earlier research focused on gender and sexuality, and I currently investigate medieval understandings of what it means to be human and on the categories through which humanity is defined and denied.
Current Work
Peggy McCracken's research explores the ways in which medieval authors rewrite metamorphosis stories from antiquity (that is, stories about people turning into animals, plants, stones, or even elements) in ways that describe the precarity and persistence of the human. That is, medieval authors represent humanity as something that can be lost (because of some kind of transgression, or because of sin, or for some arbitrary reason), but that also endures, particularly in the form of affect or emotion. I am interested in the way that these representations of the fragility of human being intersect with identity categories like race, sexuality, and gender.
Research Area Keyword(s)
gender, Affect theory, posthumanism, sexuality, embodiment