Founded in 1956, Penn State University Press publishes rigorously reviewed, high-quality works of scholarship and books of regional and contemporary interest, with a focus on the humanities and social sciences. The publishing arm of the Pennsylvania State University and a division of the Penn State University Libraries, the Press promotes the advance of scholarship by disseminating knowledge—new information, interpretations, methods of analysis—widely in books, journals, and digital publications.
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Silence, much like speech, serves as a potent form of communication, capable of strategic deployment. In this study, Edwin D. Craun delves into the significant silences woven into the fabric of public life, as depicted in late Middle English literature.
From Philadelphia to Erie, and from the shale fields to the coal mines, Keystone Poetry celebrates the varied landscapes and voices of Pennsylvania. This collection brings together the work of 182 poets who, with keen eyes and sharp language, commemorate the hometowns, history, traditions, and culture of the Commonwealth. Organized ......
Where does love come from? What is at the core of romantic attachment? Does our upbringing play a part, or is falling in love a magical, uncontrollable process? Are we doomed to repeat the same mistakes over and over, or can we break unhealthy cycles and learn new ways to love? These are the questions asked in Heartcore, an award-winning graphic ......
A Tale of Two Surrogates explores the complicated emotional, medical, legal, and ethical issues surrounding assisted reproduction. Based on more than a decade of ethnographic research conducted by a sociologist and an anthropologist, this book presents, in an accessible graphic novel format, the intertwined stories of two fictional women who ......
A Tale of Two Surrogates explores the complicated emotional, medical, legal, and ethical issues surrounding assisted reproduction. Based on more than a decade of ethnographic research conducted by a sociologist and an anthropologist, this book presents, in an accessible graphic novel format, the intertwined stories of two fictional women who ......
Trauma is an inescapable condition of Chaucer's works. From the ravaging of Troy and the abandonment of Dido to the devastating aftereffects of sexual assault, Chaucer portrayed the most unsettling, searing aspects of human experience. While the term "trauma" was not part of Chaucer's vocabulary, the author was assuredly aware of its causes and ......
In 1510, nine men were tried in the Archbishops Court in York for attempting to find and extract a treasure on the moor near Mixindale through necromantic magic.
On May 4, 1380, Cecily Chaumpaigne filed a quitclaim with the Chancery in Westminster, releasing the poet Geoffrey Chaucer from any prosecution de raptu meo (on account of my rape). This legal document, lost for centuries, has haunted Chaucer studies since its rediscovery in 1873. Over the past 150 years since it reemerged, many Chaucer scholars ......
The Women of Algiers in Their Apartment is arguably Eugene Delacroix's best-known work from his trip to Morocco in 1832, and the attention scholars have paid to it has obscured a crucial fact about Delacroix's Moroccan subjects: most of his paintings of North Africa depict men rather than women. After serving as a diplomat's companion on a ......
