Contextualizing Gender in Early Christian Discourse

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Contextualizing Gender in Early Christian
Discourse

• Caroline Vander Stichele
• University of Amsterdam

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(No Transcript)
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Pre-history
Her Masters Tools? 2005
Contextualizing Acts 2003
Mapping Gender 2007
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Contextualizing Gender

• Contextualizing- in the context of early
  Christianity how it intersects with other
  parameters of identity, such as ethnicity,
  class,- within the larger context of the
  Greco-Roman world

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• Gender- gender, sex, sexuality-
  gender-critical how gender works in early
  Christian texts ? historical analysis ?
  rhetorical analysis ? ideology-critical analysis

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Early Christian Discourse

• Early Christian- NT apocryphal writings-
  main focus on Acts and Paul
• Discourse- focus on textual material- relation
  between discourse and power

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Thinking Beyond Thecla

• Thinking of Thecla reconstructing a history of
  women
• Thinking with Thecla women are used (by men) as
  a means to communicate
• Thinking beyond Thecla- to broader issues of
  gender in antiquityand the relevance thereof
  for our time

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Content

• Chapter 1 Introducing a Gender-Critical Approach
• Chapter 2 Contextualizing Gender in the
  Greco-Roman World
• Chapter 3 Gendered Boundaries in Early
  Christianity
• Chapter 4 Gender and Biblical Scholarship
• Chapter 5 Reading for Gender

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1. Introducing a Gender-Critical Approach

• Discourse and the Social Production of Knowledge
• Sex, Gender and Politics
• Colonial Contexts and Gender
• History and Discourse
• Concluding Contextual Observations

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2. Contextualizing Gender in theGreco-Roman World

• Discourse and the Meaning of Sex
• Models for Understanding Sex
• From the Politics of the Body to the Body
  Politic- Physiognomy as Politics of the Body-
  Gendering Bodies- The Body Politic- Bodies in
  Empire

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3. Gendered Boundaries in Early Christianity

• Canonical and Conceptual Boundaries
• Cultural Boundaries
• Social Boundaries
• Boundaries of Empire

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4. Gender and the Modern Interpreter

• Gender and the Rise of Modern Scholarship-
  Racializing Biblical Discourse- Gendering
  Biblical Discourse
• Gendering Biblical Scholarship

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5. Reading for Gender

• Ways of Reading- the world behind the text- the
  world in the text- the world in front of the
  text 1 Corinthians 112-16
• Reading Assumptions and Strategies Acts 181-17

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InterseXions

• Gender sex - sexuality
• Gender and other markers of identity such as
  ethnicity/race, class, etc.
• Gender in early Christian and Greco-Roman
  discourse
• Past and present perceptions of gender
• Gender-critical and other ideology-critical
  approaches

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Dis-closure

• Exposing the power of discourse
• The ethics of politics
• Re-visioning early Christian discourse
• Crossing boundaries
• Engaging our world
• Creating space for difference

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Done