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Female characters as modes of knowing in late imperial dialogues : The body, desire, and the intellectual life
La Valle, Dawn Teresa
La Valle, Dawn Teresa
Author
Abstract
From the Socratics to Augustine, men used women’s voices in philosophical dialogues to speak as experts on the body, especially in three aspects: birth, the physical details of death, and erotic desire. These connections were inaugurated by Plato and Xenophon. However, a changing anthropology, and especially the belief that the body persisted after death, led certain Christian authors to increase the role given to female characters. When the body was revalued and brought into the centre of philosophical focus, women’s voices moved from reported speech into direct speech. Simultaneously, late ancient Christian authors reflected on the inherent connection between erotic desire and the genre of the dialogue itself, matching their subject to their form. Using female characters in their dialogues helped male authors come to know certain things that using male voices could not do as well, by thinking through specific topics ‘like a woman’; the female, with her culturally embodied nature, became a model of an ideal life which insisted on the persistence of the body, even in the afterlife.
Keywords
philosophical dialogue, women, female speakers, Methodius of Olympus, Gregory of Nyssa, Macrina, Thecla, embodiment, resurrection of the body, Platonism
Date
2023
Type
Book chapter
Journal
Book
The Intellectual world of late antique Christianity : Reshaping classical traditions
Volume
Issue
Page Range
347-365
Article Number
ACU Department
Institute for Religion and Critical Inquiry
Faculty of Theology and Philosophy
Faculty of Theology and Philosophy
Collections
Relation URI
Event URL
Open Access Status
Published as green open access
License
File Access
Open
Controlled
Controlled
Notes
© Cambridge University Press & Assessment 2023
This research was supported by the Australian Research Council’s Discovery Early Career Research Award, “The Female Voice in Ancient Philosophical Dialogues (DE220100854).
This Author's version is free to view and download for private research and study only. Not for re-distribution or re-use. © Dawn LaValle Norman
This research was supported by the Australian Research Council’s Discovery Early Career Research Award, “The Female Voice in Ancient Philosophical Dialogues (DE220100854).
This Author's version is free to view and download for private research and study only. Not for re-distribution or re-use. © Dawn LaValle Norman