Politics, Religion, and Genitalia: Good Conversation Topics

This lecture will look at some of the ways in which politics and religion were discussed publicly in late medieval and early modern Italy. We will focus on how symbols of male and female genitalia were displayed in relation to these themes, and discuss how these came to be linked.

Since 2020, George Ferzoco is based in the Department of Classics and Religion at the University of Calgary, where he is Visiting Fellow in the Calgary Institute for the Humanities. A Toronto native, he completed his B.A. at St. Michael’s College, University of Toronto. With Pier Giorgio Di Cicco, George is the only U of T graduate to hold this Goggio visiting professorship. Previously, with his wife (Prof. Carolyn Muessig), he lived in the United Kingdom for 27 years, teaching mainly at the universities of Exeter, Leicester, and Bristol.  George’s research focuses on late medieval religious culture, especially on official and popular propaganda. He has published on Dante, saints’ cults, (e.g., Hildegard of Bingen, Peter of the Morrone, Catherine of Siena), and manuscripts. He has lectured on such topics (as well as on Federico Fellini) throughout Australia, Europe, and North America, as well as in South Africa.

To attend this lecture, please register at this link.  You will receive a confirmation email one day before the event containing information about joining the lecture.

All times stated in Eastern Time.