CA Public Lecture: Dr Emma-Jayne Graham

Date/Time
Date(s) - 14/11/2018
5:30 pm - 7:00 pm

Location
Lecture Theatre 6, Geoffrey Manton Building

Categories


Please join us for the second event in our Public Lecture series for 2018-19, where Dr Emma-Jayne Graham (The Open University) will be giving a talk entitled ‘Mother’s  Touch? Making Sense of the Swaddled Infant Votives of Roman Italy’

Dr Graham has kindly provided the following abstract:

Visitors to one of the many shrines or sanctuaries of Republican central Italy would have found its sacred spaces littered with votive objects dedicated to the divine. Amongst the bronze statuettes of deities, terracotta models of human figures, heads, animals, and a host of internal and external body parts (so-called ‘anatomical’ votives), the visitor might also recognise a number of terracotta representations of very young babies wrapped in swaddling bands. This paper aims to make sense of these infant votives in multiple ways. Firstly it will examine their form, function and the possible meanings that were attached to them, including their connection with one of the very earliest rites of passage in the life-course. Secondly, it will explore what these objects reveal about the lived, sensory experience of making a votive offering that was both like and unlike a real baby, and why that might matter for the performance of both religion and gender.

This talk will be held in Lecture Theatre 6 of the Geoffrey Manton Building at Manchester Metropolitan University.

We hope to see many of you there!

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