Life during the 16th century in France afforded few opportunities for women to make
their
voices heard. Its rigidly patriarchal culture expected them to be dutiful wives, mothers
and
daughters, not opinionated politicians, poets and painters, like their male counterparts.
But buried in the pages of manuscripts, annotating the margins, exists a historical
record
that, until recent decades, had gone undiscovered. Here, women could take part in
literary
production, if only privately and tangentially.
鈥淟iving in a patriarchal world, women learned to creatively negotiate a landscape
that
forbade them from writing,鈥� Brigitte Roussel, associate professor of French, said.
Brigitte Roussel
Through the evaluation of personal correspondence, diaries, annotations and a miscellany of other vehicles of communication, Roussel鈥檚 research brings attention to the strategies employed by women writers in the 16th century to demonstrate their intellect and morality in a society which discouraged their individuation.
An ARCS grant of $500 in 1995 allowed her to travel to Lyon, France, which provided greater cultural context to examine primary documents from Renaissance women writers. In 2004, she also received a $4,500 URCA grant to facilitate her research regarding Pernette du Guillet鈥檚 poetry.
Roussel has published works on the influence of love, sexuality, religion and the objectification of women in the literary enterprise, as well as the conventions and generic risks made by women writers in the 16th century in France. To Roussel, this exploration of literature provides depth to individual authors and further contextualizes the culture from which their works were born.
鈥淏rilliant women writers were not isolated in their exceptionality,鈥� she said. 鈥淭hey
interacted with a strong and multifaceted tradition which made them a part of the
transfer
of knowledge for the next generation.鈥�
A cultural transplant herself, Roussel understands the significance of language in
developing intercultural competency and empathy.
鈥淚f you seek to understand the world in which you live, there is no better starting
point than
language,鈥� she said. 鈥淚t forces you to engage in a form of thinking that develops
your ability
to both understand and be understood by others.鈥�