Medieval Woman's Song: Cross-Cultural Approaches (The Middle Ages Series)

__Medieval Woman's Song__ brings together scholars in a range of disciplines to examine how both men and women contributed to this art form. Without eschewing consideration of authorship, the collection deliberately overturns the long-standing scholarly practice of treating as separate and distinct entities female-voice lyrics composed by men and those composed by women. What is at stake here is less the voice of women themselves than its cultural and generic construction. __Medieval Woman's Song__ brings together scholars in a range of disciplines to examine how both men and women contributed to this art form. Without eschewing consideration of authorship, the collection deliberately overturns the long-standing scholarly practice of treating as separate and distinct entities female-voice lyrics composed by men and those composed by women. What is at stake here is less the voice of women themselves than its cultural and generic construction.

The number of surviving medieval secular poems attributed to named female authors is small, some of the best known being those of the trobairitz the female troubadours of southern France. However, there is a large body of poetry that constructs a particular textual femininity through the use of the female voice. Some of these poems are by men and a few by women (including the trobairitz); many are anonymous, and often the gender of the poet is unresolvable. A "woman's song" in this sense can be defined as a female-voice poem on the subject of love, typically characterized by simple language, sexual candor, and apparent artlessness.

The chapters in Medieval Woman's Song bring together scholars in a range of disciplines to examine how both men and women contributed to this art form. Without eschewing consideration of authorship, the collection deliberately overturns the long-standing scholarly practice of treating as separate and distinct entities female-voice lyrics composed by men and those composed by women. What is at stake here is less the voice of women themselves than its cultural and generic construction.

The number of surviving medieval secular poems attributed to named female authors is small, some of the best known being those of the trobairitz the female troubadours of southern France. However, there is a large body of poetry that constructs a particular textual femininity through the use of the female voice. Some of these poems are by men and a few by women (including the trobairitz); many are anonymous, and often the gender of the poet is unresolvable. A "woman's song" in this sense can be defined as a female-voice poem on the subject of love, typically characterized by simple language, sexual candor, and apparent artlessness. The chapters in Medieval Woman's Song bring together scholars in a range of disciplines to examine how both men and women contributed to this art form. Without eschewing consideration of authorship, the collection deliberately overturns the long-standing scholarly practice of treating as separate and distinct entities female-voice lyrics composed by men and those composed by women. What is at stake here is less the voice of women themselves than its cultural and generic construction. Contents 5 List of Abbreviations 7 Introduction 9 1. Sappho and Her Daughters: Some Parallels Between Ancient and Medieval Woman's Song 23 2. Ides . . . geomrode giddum: The Old English Female Lament 37 3. Women's Performance of the Lyric Before 1500 55 4. Ca no soe joglaresa: Women and Music in Medieval Spain's Three Cultures 74 5. Feminine Voices in the Galician-Portuguese cantigas de amigo 89 6. Sewing like a Girl: Working Women in the chansons de toile 107 7. Fictions of the Female Voice: The Women Troubadours 135 8. The Conception of Female Roles in the Woman's Song of Reinmar and the Comtessa de Dia 160 9. Reason and the Female Voice in Walther von der Vogelweide's Poetry 176 10. Ventriloquisms: When Maidens Speak in English Songs, c. 1300–1550 195 Notes 213 List of Contributors 269 Index 271 A 271 B 272 C 273 D 275 E 276 F 276 G 277 H 278 I 278 J 279 K 279 L 280 M 280 N 281 O 282 P 282 Q 283 R 283 S 284 T 285 U 286 V 286 W 286 X 287 Y 287 Z 287 Acknowledgments 288