Gabriela Andrea Faundez Rojas (Department of History)
Gabriela Faundez Rojas’s dissertation, “Conquest and Hagiography: Rewriting Saints after the Norman Conquest,” is a sophisticated and nuanced study of Anglo-Saxon hagiographies. It demonstrates how seemingly minor shifts in the content, structure, or topics of medieval hagiographies reflect larger cultural, political, social, and religious changes unfolding in the wake of the Norman Conquest of 1066. Thoroughly interdisciplinary, “Conquest and Hagiography” draws from historical, literary, and religious studies to make an important argument about the survival of early medieval religious cults into the twelfth century, which were embedded within the changing landscape of a post-Conquest world. The dissertation is notable for the skilled, close readings of source texts, the rich theoretical frameworks it brings to bear on the archive, and a deep engagement with secondary literature. With clear, succinct prose and a careful eye toward changing histories, “Conquest and Hagiography” is an important work that is sure to attract scholarly attention.
