Why are there so many monstrous races at the edges of the world?

Medieval Europe had a special kind of genius for imagining that the world beyond its borders was full of strange creatures that no one in their right mind would want to meet on a dark night. If you couldn’t see it with your own eyes, the logic went, it was probably teeming with things that …

Why are there so many monstrous races at the edges of the world? weiterlesen

Othering and Otherness in the Late Middle Ages: Constructing the Exotic and the Threatening

As humans, we instinctively fear the unknown, often turning abstract fears into tangible symbols to regain control. Monsters are among the most enduring symbols humans have conceived to embody fears and unknowns. As Jeffrey Jerome Cohen explains in Monster Theory, ‘The monster is continually linked to forbidden practices, in order to normalize and to enforce. …

Othering and Otherness in the Late Middle Ages: Constructing the Exotic and the Threatening weiterlesen