Conference report
Sep. 27th, 2008 09:26 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
serindeSo, this conference, hight Accessorizing the Renaissance Body.
A few general impressions:
1) A lot of gender-studies people are somewhat wack, and think everything's a nail for their hammer.
2) I see NYU uses Sodexho for their caterers, too. Oh those plastic pastries.
3) If something is of little interest or uninterestingly presented, I can keep awake if I force myself to take notes. <--- important for future grad school aspirations
3a) It's gotten a lot harder to take notes by hand! I'm so used to doing it on a laptop these days. I think that, if my grad school aspirations are realized, this is what an Eeeeeeee would be good for.
i. The Paper On Starched Accessories: This was far more grist to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
nedlnthred's mill than mine. The concentration was less on the actual production (though it was interesting to learn that the average fancy ruff would have to be picked apart and de-pearled for cleaning, and then reassembled; how mind-bogglingly labor intensive) and more about the influence of immigrants, particularly immigrant women, from the Low Countries on this particular industry.
ii. Papal Accessories: I expected this to be a giant snoozefest but it was fascinating. I did not know about the Pope's red shoes (though I did know about the foot-kissing) (did you know Pope Serpentor re-introduced both of those?). Much of the paper was particularly about Clement VII, who I have more of a nodding acquaintance with than most Popes from reading The Stars Dispose, so I had something to hang the information on.
iii. Early Modern Scissors: This was awesome. The speaker was excellent, too (and not just for the English accent, cough cough). He had several images of scissor ghost images where someone, presumably the bookbinder, had left his snips inside a book and they'd rusted away, leaving scisson prints on, e.g., Shakespeare's First Folio. He also had many images from going through the V&A's considerable collection; the difference between English scissors & cases and, say, French or Spanish ones is marked.
i. Busks & Bodices: Obviously I have some knowledge of busks from reading up on this stuff, and this was more for them as didn't; but I still learned entertaining things, like the kind of poesy lovers would have engraved on a busk to present to the beloved. Heh. Very well-presented, though it could have done with some images for the unfamiliar to get a better idea of what a busk actually looks like.
ii. Codpieces: Not a lot in the hard-information section, this was more about how codpieces were viewed, and the shift of societal focus from the testicles to the wang. Some hilarious excerpts from 17th c. letters, of tourists viewing Henry VIII's codpiece which was on display in the Tower for a good century. (Not the famous wang-armor; an actual codpiece, which apparently was on a statue of Henry in kingly robes where you step on a plate in the floor and a mechanism is activated to Show You It. Heh.)
iii: Early Modern Dildos: Heh. heheheheheh. Regrettably, most of the images were very late-period (like, into the 18th c), but she had a number of texts from earlier centuries. Descriptions of items that permitted one to squirt warm milk to simulate ejaculation. What will they think of next?
Then lunch, which we had with some of Beth's FIT acquaintances at the Olive Tree Cafe. mmmm hummus.
i. Perfumed accessories: It was fascinating, and well-presented; my main complaint is that I wanted more info. MOAR!. (How did gloves get scented? And was anyone actually killed by gloves impregnated with poison, or was that the urban legend of the day?)
ii. Pearls: Not a lot new here for me, unfortunately. I knew most of this from my own reading. But it was kind of funny to learn that Elizabeth Tudor, Mary Stuart, and Catherine de'Medici were in a squabbly bidding war over a pearl parure.
iii. Handkerchiefs and iv. Veils: I was really hoping for a lot out of both of these papers, but there really wasn't much there there. A bunch of nebulous glorp about what things might or might not have meant. I started falling asleep.
I had a big quibble with the title of this session, since what are the rest of the sessions, chopped liver? but apparently this meant "lit crit". To me, that's the opposite of Serious Cat doing Serious Work, but whatever.
i. "A Garment in Translation": Expected this to be a yawner, but I swear this person could present the phone book and make it interesting. It was about Petrarch's translation into Latin of the tale of Griselda, that he sent back to Boccaccio in a letter, and how it differed from Boccaccio's vernacular version.
ii. Accessories and second-handness: The presenter had a clear bone to pick about how everyone concentrates on the historical elite rather than the poor and lowest-classes, and it's a fair cop. So this was some information she'd gathered about what accessories the poor would have access to. Interesting. I think a lot lot lot more could have been said on the topic, where she had some digressions into Richard II and Thomas of Woodstock that I didn't really follow.
iii. "Hamlet's Mourning Garment": Wank wank wank wank wank wank wank wank wank. It wasn't actually about Hamlet's mourning clothes. Or anyone else's. Or anything, really.
At the end, we schmoozed a bit (well, mostly Beth. I'm slowly learning) and we introduced ourselves to the professor who did the "response" closing remarks, who is apparently a Person of Much Note (I think every presenter, or almost every one, quoted his work). I am fairly well convinced that he is actually Doctor Who in a new incarnation.
A worthwhile day, all in all.
A few general impressions:
1) A lot of gender-studies people are somewhat wack, and think everything's a nail for their hammer.
2) I see NYU uses Sodexho for their caterers, too. Oh those plastic pastries.
3) If something is of little interest or uninterestingly presented, I can keep awake if I force myself to take notes. <--- important for future grad school aspirations
3a) It's gotten a lot harder to take notes by hand! I'm so used to doing it on a laptop these days. I think that, if my grad school aspirations are realized, this is what an Eeeeeeee would be good for.
i. The Paper On Starched Accessories: This was far more grist to
nedlnthred's mill than mine. The concentration was less on the actual production (though it was interesting to learn that the average fancy ruff would have to be picked apart and de-pearled for cleaning, and then reassembled; how mind-bogglingly labor intensive) and more about the influence of immigrants, particularly immigrant women, from the Low Countries on this particular industry.ii. Papal Accessories: I expected this to be a giant snoozefest but it was fascinating. I did not know about the Pope's red shoes (though I did know about the foot-kissing) (did you know Pope Serpentor re-introduced both of those?). Much of the paper was particularly about Clement VII, who I have more of a nodding acquaintance with than most Popes from reading The Stars Dispose, so I had something to hang the information on.
iii. Early Modern Scissors: This was awesome. The speaker was excellent, too (and not just for the English accent, cough cough). He had several images of scissor ghost images where someone, presumably the bookbinder, had left his snips inside a book and they'd rusted away, leaving scisson prints on, e.g., Shakespeare's First Folio. He also had many images from going through the V&A's considerable collection; the difference between English scissors & cases and, say, French or Spanish ones is marked.
i. Busks & Bodices: Obviously I have some knowledge of busks from reading up on this stuff, and this was more for them as didn't; but I still learned entertaining things, like the kind of poesy lovers would have engraved on a busk to present to the beloved. Heh. Very well-presented, though it could have done with some images for the unfamiliar to get a better idea of what a busk actually looks like.
ii. Codpieces: Not a lot in the hard-information section, this was more about how codpieces were viewed, and the shift of societal focus from the testicles to the wang. Some hilarious excerpts from 17th c. letters, of tourists viewing Henry VIII's codpiece which was on display in the Tower for a good century. (Not the famous wang-armor; an actual codpiece, which apparently was on a statue of Henry in kingly robes where you step on a plate in the floor and a mechanism is activated to Show You It. Heh.)
iii: Early Modern Dildos: Heh. heheheheheh. Regrettably, most of the images were very late-period (like, into the 18th c), but she had a number of texts from earlier centuries. Descriptions of items that permitted one to squirt warm milk to simulate ejaculation. What will they think of next?
Then lunch, which we had with some of Beth's FIT acquaintances at the Olive Tree Cafe. mmmm hummus.
i. Perfumed accessories: It was fascinating, and well-presented; my main complaint is that I wanted more info. MOAR!. (How did gloves get scented? And was anyone actually killed by gloves impregnated with poison, or was that the urban legend of the day?)
ii. Pearls: Not a lot new here for me, unfortunately. I knew most of this from my own reading. But it was kind of funny to learn that Elizabeth Tudor, Mary Stuart, and Catherine de'Medici were in a squabbly bidding war over a pearl parure.
iii. Handkerchiefs and iv. Veils: I was really hoping for a lot out of both of these papers, but there really wasn't much there there. A bunch of nebulous glorp about what things might or might not have meant. I started falling asleep.
I had a big quibble with the title of this session, since what are the rest of the sessions, chopped liver? but apparently this meant "lit crit". To me, that's the opposite of Serious Cat doing Serious Work, but whatever.
i. "A Garment in Translation": Expected this to be a yawner, but I swear this person could present the phone book and make it interesting. It was about Petrarch's translation into Latin of the tale of Griselda, that he sent back to Boccaccio in a letter, and how it differed from Boccaccio's vernacular version.
ii. Accessories and second-handness: The presenter had a clear bone to pick about how everyone concentrates on the historical elite rather than the poor and lowest-classes, and it's a fair cop. So this was some information she'd gathered about what accessories the poor would have access to. Interesting. I think a lot lot lot more could have been said on the topic, where she had some digressions into Richard II and Thomas of Woodstock that I didn't really follow.
iii. "Hamlet's Mourning Garment": Wank wank wank wank wank wank wank wank wank. It wasn't actually about Hamlet's mourning clothes. Or anyone else's. Or anything, really.
At the end, we schmoozed a bit (well, mostly Beth. I'm slowly learning) and we introduced ourselves to the professor who did the "response" closing remarks, who is apparently a Person of Much Note (I think every presenter, or almost every one, quoted his work). I am fairly well convinced that he is actually Doctor Who in a new incarnation.
A worthwhile day, all in all.
