Conference Presentation

[See the Conference Program for reference.]


Panel 1: Unruly women and gendered formations of national identity


I acted in the role of a respondent, and provided two pre-written questions, and one spontaneous question.  Note, this does not mean my questions were necessarily posed and answered, merely that I came prepared as per the conference regulations.


Q1: How effective would you consider your novel to its contemporary readers based on the author’s “goals.”  By goals, I mean it seems that all three novels contain moral or instructive purpose, either explicitly mentioned in their preface/introduction or within the story itself.


Q2: The theme of education, albeit in various forms, seems to run throughout all three of your texts.  In Female Quixotism, it is the education of young girls, in “Rosenglory” it is the education of the public about the consequences of seduction, and in Rachel Dyer, it is the education of the public about the danger of linking external and internal appearances and virtue.  Do you think these novels are working on a public/private or personal/national level?


Spontaneous Q:  [I will update this after our conference.]
Panel 2: Unruly women, gender boundaries, and crossing


I acted in the role of presenter, alongside Blake and Mark.


Thesis: Preserved in Moore’s handwritten commonplace book are bonds of female friendship in the form of verse and prose, authored by women for women.  The book itself, by virtue of its genre, is a transgressive object – colonial women in the eighteenth century adapted and repurposed the commonplace book for their own uses, using it to circulate knowledge amongst themselves. These bonds of intimacy, contained within a newly feminized genre and expressed in a language of affection, create a female homosocial space in which the lesbian continuum functions as a measuring rubric.  


Intervention in current scholarship: I think my use of the lesbian continuum, as a rubric for the female homosocial space, is what differentiates my approach from others’ research on the commonplace book in our field.  The lesbian continuum opens up a world of possibilities, which are now freed from the constricting and unproductive binary of hetero/homosexuality.  The focus is now on female-female relationships instead of through a filter of men. 


Example from paper:
For my example, I want to share with you all some lines from the opening entry in Moore’s commonplace book, Hannah Griffitts’s “An Essay on Friendship,” a poem.


The poem, we are told, is written because “The Friend requires, & friendship does demand, / At least th’ attempt from my inferior Hand.”  


While I describe the social Joys we find
In Hearts cemented & the friendly Mind,
The strong Affection & the watchful Care,
The feeling Pity & the ardent Pray’r.
I paint the mutual Love, the melting Eye
And all the Beauties of the tender Tye.—
—Friendship, my Friend’s an Union of the Soul
Expands its Flames & spread’s throughout the whole.
The greatest Blessing we enjoy below,
From this pure Stream untainted Pleasures flow,
So fix’d this Friendship & so firm its Love,
‘Tis only rival’d by the bless’d above,


Notice the language of intimacy present in the poem – hearts cemented, strong affection, feeling pity, mutual love, and tender tie.  We are told friendship is a union of the soul and has spreading influence, described as flames.  Friendship is the greatest blessing while alive on Earth, and is a pure stream of untainted pleasure; its only rival is Heaven itself.  This language continues throughout the rest of this poem, and appears in more friendship entries by Hannah Griffitts, Susanna Wright, and Elizabeth Graeme Fergusson.  Their vision of friendship is one of love, tenderness, devotion, strength, commitment, and support, and it is beautiful, touching, and lovely.  It was truly my pleasure to explore the female homosocial space these women created, and to examine the ways in which the lesbian continuum existed in Milcah Martha Moore’s Book.
Panel 3: Theorizing unruly women: performance and masquerade


I acted in the role of panel chair, but thought it best to be prepared with “emergency” questions, just in case.  Also, I couldn’t help myself, I really enjoyed hunting down connections between the three papers.


Q1:  All three of your texts deal with prisons or jails, in one shape or another.  Zach’s texts feature actual jail cells, whereas Lesley’s and Lindsay’s texts portray the Catholic convent as a prison.  Do you think the levels of surveillance are equal throughout, or would you argue that one is worse than another?


Q2: Mad Jane Ray offers a physical, bodily resistance in addition to verbal resistance.  Rachel Wall provides verbal and religious resistance, and Rebecca Reed offers a literary resistance (she won’t keep her mouth shut; publishes her story + the appendix as “proof”).  Who would you vote for as the most unruly character, if you had to pick?