Gender & Sexuality in the Afterlives of Byzantium: An Online Roundtable with Roland Betancourt, Allison Leigh, and Roman Utkin, Borderlines Open School for Advanced Cross-Cultural Studies Online, December 4, 2020, 4:00–5:30 pm (ET)

In his recent book, Byzantine Intersectionality (Princeton University Press), Roland Betancourt looks at the history of sexual consent, reproductive rights, trans lives, same-gender desire, and race in the medieval world. Focusing on the Byzantine Empire, his research stands at the crossroads not only of many modern Christian traditions, including Greek and Russian Orthodoxy, but also of the cultural and artistic heritage of European and Slavic worlds.

In this roundtable, Betancourt is joined by Allison Leigh and Roman Utkin to discuss the long, rich, and complex histories of gender and sexuality in the afterlives of Byzantium, focusing on the key role that the Empire has played in the Slavic worlds. This discussion will apply the implications and conclusions of Betancourt’s research to complicate and enrich an understanding of the Slavic tradition. 

Roland Betancourt is Professor of Art History and Chancellor’s Fellow at the University of California, Irvine. 

Allison Leigh is Assistant Professor of Art History and the SLEMCO/LEQSF Regents Endowed Professor in Art & Architecture at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette. 

Roman Utkin is Assistant Professor of Russian, East European, and Eurasian Studies and Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at Wesleyan University. 

Advance registration required.

This event is hosted by Borderlines Open School for Advanced Cross-Cultural Studies, and co-sponsored by the Art History Department at the University of California, Irvine.