Author: Alison Langdon File Type: pdf The essays in this interdisciplinary volume explore language, broadly construed, as part of the continued interrogation of the boundaries of human and nonhuman animals in the Middle Ages. Uniting a diverse set of emerging and established scholars, Animal Languages questions the assumed medieval distinction between humans and other animals. The chapters point to the wealth of non-human communicative and discursive forms through which animals function both as vehicles for human meaning and as agents of their own, demonstrating the significance of human and non-human interaction in medieval texts, particularly for engaging with the Other. The book ultimately considers the ramifications of deconstructing the medieval anthropocentric view of language for the broader question of human singularity. **Review This diverse and useful collection of essays takes us deeper into the critical animal turn of medieval literature by addressing compelling cases of verbal and bodily languages in nonhumans. Most imperatively, the book at points bravely pursues a broader acknowledgment of animal utterance as it contests the now outmoded human ownership of language. (Lesley Kordecki, Professor of English at DePaul University, USA) Animal Languages in the Middle Ages now arrives in timely fashion to remind us thatthe Middle Ages already witnessed a similar outpouring of interest in animal semiotics. Surveying saints lives and hawking manuals, verse romances and veterinary treatises, this volume demonstrates that medieval attitudes toward animal consciousness were more complex, more nuanced, and in some ways more accurate than the modern animal science that has supplanted them. (Bruce Boehrer, Bertram H. Davis Professor of English, Florida State University, USA) Animal Languages in the Middle Ages attends to gesture, to avian Latins, to the attentiveness required to train falcons and horses, and even to lions as emotional therapists. With cases that span the Middle Ages, ranging from Persia to Iberia, in a host of languages, human and otherwise, this collections on-the-ground picture of the shared worlds of humans and nonhumans utterly demolishes the false belief that medieval people, as a whole, thought of animals only as nonlinguistic, passive tools. (Karl Steel, Associate Professor, Brooklyn College and the Graduate Center, CUNY, USA) Assembling established and emergent voices in the field of medieval literary and cultural studies, Animal Languages offers a vivid exploration of interspecies codependence across a range of disciplinary perspectives. Rather than approaching nonhuman animals as mere topics of discourse or tropes in medieval thought, this textured collection richly explores modes of communication beyond human speech or writingincluding the body language of horse hooves, otter breath, canine faces, and modalities of touch, smell, gesture, and motion. Animal Languages is paradigm-shifting in its linguistic, cultural, and textual range, addressing Latin, Old English, Anglo-Norman, early and late Middle English, Old French, and Arabic and Persian literary traditions. (Jonathan Hsy, Associate Professor of English at George Washington University, author of Trading Tongues Merchants, Multilingualism, and Medieval Literature) From the Back Cover The essays in this interdisciplinary volume explore language, broadly construed, as part of the continued interrogation of the boundaries of human and nonhuman animals in the Middle Ages. Uniting a diverse set of emerging and established scholars, Animal Languages questions the assumed medieval distinction between humans and other animals. The chapters point to the wealth of non-human communicative and discursive forms through which animals function both as vehicles for human meaning and as agents of their own, demonstrating the significance of human and non-human interaction in medieval texts, particularly for engaging with the Other. The book ultimately considers the ramifications of deconstructing the medieval anthropocentric view of language for the broader question of human singularity.

Author: Jacob Albert Berg File Type: pdf This volume in honour of Johannes van Oort, formerly University of Utrecht, presently Professor of Patristics and Gnosticism at the Universities of Nijmegen and Pretoria, and past-President of the International Association of Manichaean Studies (IAMS), brings together a rich variety of studies on Augustine, Manichaeism, and other Gnostic currents, thus reflecting the honorand s research interests. The unique collection is divided into four sections I. Studies in Augustine Confessions, Sermons, Letters & De Haeresibus Augustine on Grace & Pluralism Augustinian Gnosis II. Studies in Manichaeism Origins & Myth Doctrines & Cult Diffusion & Art III. Studies in Manichaeism and Augustine Doctrines Polemics & Debates with Manichaean Contemporaries IV. Studies in Other Gnosticism Gnosticism and Apocryphal Texts Sources of (Ps.) Hippolytus Refutatio the Gospel of Judas Modern Yesidi Gnosticism. The 35 studies are preceded by an overview of Prof. van Oort s scholarly activities and publications **Review The editors of this volume state that their purpose is to produce a volume that is both a Festschrift and an inspiring collection of studies. In both these aims they succeed admirably.[...]This volume forms a fitting tribute to the work of Johannes van Oort, and each essay is a carefully crafted celebration of a topic that resonates with the research of the scholar being honoured. The essays will appeal to a variety of different audiences, but all share a richness and depth of scholarship that makes this an outstanding collection. Paul Foster, The Expository Times 122 (12) ... a large number of interesting contributions, written by a a great many leading scholars. Gijs Martijn van Gaans, Vigiliae Christianae 66 (2012) ... should have a place in every research library Birger Pearson, Religious Studies Review 37 (2011) About the Author Jacob Albert van den Berg, Ph.D. (2009) in Theology (cum laude) at the Radboud University of Nijmegen, is minister in the Refomred Church in the Netherlands (Groningen). Annemare Kotze, D.Litt. (2003) in Latin Literature, University of Stellenbosch, is a Lecturer in Latin, Greek and Ancient Cultures at the University of Stellenbosch. Tobias Nicklas, Dr. theol. (2000), Habilitation (2004), is currently Professor of New Testament Studies at the University of Regensburg, Germany. Madeleine Scopello, Doctor in Classics and Philosophy, University of Turin HDR, University of Sorbonne, Paris, is Directeur de Recherche at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique at the University of Sorbonne, Paris.