This interdisciplinary one-day conference explores the relationship between letters and bodies in the long eighteenth century, and the information that can be found about ‘embodiment’, or experiences of the body, in letters. What can letters add to our understanding of eighteenth-century bodies? How did letters allow people to ‘embody’ activities such as work and love? How did the form and style of letters shape the knowledge about the body that they communicated? As material objects themselves and often carried on the person, what relationship did letters have with the body? What was the metaphorical role of bodies in letters in the eighteenth century? How were letters used to represent different groups, such as women and the poor? How did letters allow dispersed people to maintain intimacy?
This conference is organised by Sarah Goldsmith (Leicester), Sheryllynne Haggerty (Nottingham) and Karen Harvey (Birmingham) as part of the Midlands Eighteenth-Century Research Network (MECRN).
We are the grateful recipient of funding from the Economic History Society and the Royal Historical Society.
Call for Papers: The deadline for the call for paper was 25 February 2019.
Epistolary Bodies: Letters and Embodiment in the Eighteenth Century 