Women of the Crusades: The Constructedness of the Female Other, 1100–1200
Jeson Ng
Histories of the Crusades have moved away from characterising conflict as a civilisational clash between Christianity and Islam, highlighting instead porousness religious geopolitical boundaries in Iberia Levant. Yet twelfth-century sources Old French Arabic rarely present such nuanced view outright. Reflecting on constructedness motif female Other, I argue that these texts enacted reinforced Christian–Muslim dualism face contrary realities coexistence, fascination even temptation. Religious difference was constructed reconstructed through prism racial forms, thus facilitating perpetuation military conflict. In particular, white, sensual Christian woman used to exclude enemy repeated attempts construct coherent in-group identity was, for all that, under constant threat destabilisation.
Al-Masaq: Journal of the Medieval Mediterranean