Performing Maternity in Early Modern England features essays that share a common concern with exploring maternity's cultural representation, performative aspects and practical consequences in the period from 1540-1690. The essays interrogate how early modern texts depict fertility, conception, delivery and gendered constructions of maternity by analyzing a wealth of historical documents and images in conjunction with dramatic and non-dramatic literary texts. They emphasize that the embodied, repeated and public nature of maternity defines it as inherently performative and ultimately central to the production of gender identity during the early modern period.

About the Author
Kathryn M. Moncrief is Associate Professor of English at Washington College, Maryland, USA. Kathryn R. McPherson is Associate Professor of English at Utah Valley State College, USA.


Book Information
ISBN 9781138251854
Author Kathryn R. McPherson
Format Paperback
Page Count 264
Imprint Routledge
Publisher Taylor & Francis Ltd
Weight(grams) 353g