Homosexuality Heterosexuality: Concepts Of Sexu...
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Journal of the History of Sexuality 15.1 (2006) 14-29 Muse Search Journals This Journal Contents [Access article in PDF] Heterosexuality as a Threat to Medieval Studies James A. Schultz University of California, Los Angeles Medievalists know that if they claim to have found \"homosexuals\" in the Middle Ages they will provoke cries of outrage, and nothing else they say will be heard. So they avoid the term. Thus Allen Frantzen, on the very first page of Before the Closet: Same-Sex Love from \"Beowulf\" to \"Angels in America,\" declares categorically: \"I call this a book about 'same-sex love' because the obvious choice, 'homosexuality,' is, for periods before the modern era, inaccurate. 'Homosexuality' and 'homosexuals' were not recognized concepts in the Middle Ages.\" Apparently, the same is not true of \"heterosexuality\" and \"heterosexuals.\" Frantzen does not hesitate, throughout his volume, to oppose \"same-sex relations\" to \"heterosexual relations.\" 1 The result is a Middle Ages that would make Pat Buchanan jump for joy, one from which all the homosexuals have been banished and only heterosexuals remain.
This should give one pause. If homosexuality was not a \"recognized concept\" in the Middle Ages, then heterosexuality wasn't either. This in itself is not a reason to argue against its use: much of the best work in medieval studies relies on concepts that were not recognized in the Middle Ages. And, in any case, to insist that medieval scholarship limit itself to medieval concepts in their medieval meanings is to insist on an impossibility. I want to argue against the use of heterosexuality in medieval studies not as a matter of high principle but as a practical matter because of the damage it does. 59ce067264