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Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Nuns'
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1
Cheng, Wei-Yi. "Buddhist nuns in Sri Lanka and Taiwan." Thesis, SOAS, University of London, 2004. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.411794.
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Van, Hyning Victoria. "Cloistered voices : English nuns in exile, 1550-1800." Thesis, University of Sheffield, 2014. http://etheses.whiterose.ac.uk/6308/.
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This thesis uproots the long-standing assumption that English Catholic nuns living in exile between 1550 and 1800 produced little or no literature, or at least none worth reading. All twenty-four English exilic convents enabled literary production by nuns and their confessors. This work focuses on St Monica's, founded in Louvain in 1609, and the English Convent of Nazareth, founded by St Monica's nuns in Bruges in 1629: both houses produced a vibrant body of literature that is exceptional as well as indicative of broader English convent culture. This thesis extends the bounds of what has been written about convent literature by examining the ways in which nuns used and subverted chronicle, epistolary and autobiographical genres to achieve complex self-expression. It makes extensive use of archival material and offers new and original contributions to the field of early modern literature by identifying hitherto anonymous writers and exploring the significance of little-known convent texts; analyzing self-writing, chorography and biography by anonymous authors (Chapters 1 and 2); reappraising the epistolary discourse of a relatively well known author-nun (Chapter 3); exploring the Augustinian self-fashioning of a Catholic convert (Chapter 4), and finally, by demonstrating how a nun could use chronicles, letters and governance manuals as tools for reform and to accrete and solidify her own power (Chapter 5). Taken together, the authors and texts examined here open a window onto the richness of convent authorship at St Monica's and Nazareth and suggest ways in which literature from other monastic communities might be approached. Questions posed by Fran Dolan (2003) and Sylvia Evangelisti (2007) in their work on early modern Catholic women writers and nuns have served as a useful starting point: why (to paraphrase) did these women write in the ways they did?
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Dansereau, Noëlla. "La correspondance de Marie de l'Incarnation, un contexte, une personnalité, et un discours de persuasion." Thesis, National Library of Canada = Bibliothèque nationale du Canada, 2001. http://www.collectionscanada.ca/obj/s4/f2/dsk3/ftp04/MQ57856.pdf.
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Henley, Carmen Ortiz. "The Women of Little Gidding: The First Anglican Nuns." Diss., The University of Arizona, 2012. http://hdl.handle.net/10150/223380.
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This dissertation examines the lives and material production of the early modern women known as the Nuns of Little Gidding, Mary Collett Ferrar (1603-1680) and Anna Collett (1605-1639). The religious community at Little Gidding, Huntingsonshire (now Cambridgeshire), founded in 1626 by Mary Woodnoth Ferrar and her son Nicholas, housed forty-some members of the extended Ferrar, Collet, and Mapletoft family and their retainers. They devoted their lives to prayer, Bible study and memorization, contemplation, acts of charity, and the production of several unique Bible concordances or harmonies (as well as some Bible histories) of which fifteen are extant. Women were central to the spiritual life of the community, in particular, Mary and Anna who took vows of chastity. They were also the primary creators of the concordances, a task that entailed cutting up printed Bibles, reorganizing the text according to a complex scheme devised by Nicholas Ferrar. The resulting harmonized Gospel suppressed the discrepancies and differences in the four canonical accounts and produced a single, seamless narrative that preserved every detail of the originals. Close study of the relationship between image and text in the Gospel harmonies shows that the women sometimes chose particular images not to illustrate but rather to undermine the authority of the biblical narrative. Images might restore women to an account that minimizes, trivializes, or elides their importance in the life of Jesus. Thus, while their explicit task was to harmonize the Gospel accounts, the women were surreptitiously "deconstructing" them to reveal their discord.
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Tho, Annhaug. "Selected translations and analysis of 'Further biographies of nuns' /." Oslo : Department of Culture Studies and Oriental Languages, Universitetet i Oslo, 2008. http://www.duo.uio.no/publ/IKOS/2008/75053/a.tho.xFurtherxbiographiesxofxnunsx.pdf.
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Dillinger, Kathryn. "Protestant Nuns as Depictions of Piety in Lutheran Funeral Sermons." TopSCHOLAR®, 2011. http://digitalcommons.wku.edu/theses/1130.
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Protestant nuns, Stiftsdamen, fulfilled a unique role in early modern Lutheran society. This papers focuses on the implied social roles and expected virtues of Protestant nuns [Stiftsdamen] in the works of male Lutheran pastors who supported Protestant theological positions that promoted marriage as the proper place for women, and yet who also praised unmarried female monastics in funeral sermons [Leichenpredigten]. Lutheran pastors wrote funeral sermons for both Stiftsdamen and married women, funeral sermons display similarities or differences between what virtues, characteristics, and displays of piety for women. A comparison will also be made between funeral sermons for Stiftsdamen and those written for Catholic nuns by Catholic clergy. Convent necrologies, written by Catholic abbesses will also be used to compare what virtues were expected of female religious. Also included is an examination of nuns’ writings about theology, their doctrinal reasons for remaining Catholic, leaving the cloister, and adapting their convent life to fit Lutheran teachings.
Damenstiften preserved access for women to positions of authority and self empowerment. These women were, however, different from earlier female religious communities and from Catholic nuns living in other Lutheran areas. Protestant Stiftsdamen had more contact with outside society than cloistered Catholic nuns due to the desire of Lutherans to incorporate these women into their communities. An analysis of the perception of Stiftsdamen by Lutheran pastors and the nuns' consciousness of their own position, duties, and piety is the cornerstone of this new research on gender and religion in early modern Germany. The perpetuation of Protestant convents into the seventeenth century is only briefly documented by historians who focus instead on the religious experience of women in Germany during and directly following the Reformation. Catholic examples of female piety will contribute to the understanding of female religious and their role in society at large. In conclusion, this research displays how Stiftsdamen were praised for the same virtues as early modern married Protestant women and Catholic nuns in funeral sermons, but were not specifically praised as female religious by male Lutheran pastors.
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Owens, Sarah Elizabeth. "Subversive obedience: Confessional letters by eighteenth century Mexican colonial nuns." Diss., The University of Arizona, 2000. http://hdl.handle.net/10150/284123.
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Eighteenth century colonial Mexico hosted a wide number of religious women who put quill to parchment and wrote spiritual letters to their confessors. These texts display impressive subversive rhetorical strategies, five of which are the focal point of this dissertation. The three nuns studied in this dissertation are Sor Maria Coleta de San Jose (?-1775), Sor Sebastiana de la Santisima Trinidad (1709-1757) and Sor Maria Anna de San Ignacio (1695-1756). Chapter one examines the spiritual and literary European foremothers of eighteenth century colonial religious women. This chapter examines the life and letters of Radegund (518-587), Hildegard of Bingen (1098-1179), Catherine of Siena (1347?-1380), and Saint Teresa of Avila (1515-1582). Their writings all demonstrate early signs of subversive rhetoric that can be detected centuries later in the nuns' letters examined in this study. The second chapter is divided into two sections. The first part provides an overview of colonial Mexico with a particular emphasis on Mexican nuns and their letters. The second half of the chapter carves out a viable discursive space for nuns' spiritual letters. This section revises and reinterprets the colonial literary canon from a variety of theoretical perspectives including feminist theory and cultural studies. The last three chapters are each dedicated to one of the three Mexican nuns mentioned above. Their letters are analyzed according to the following rhetorical strategies: (1) the rhetoric of humility, (2) the description of penance, (3) the description of fasting, (4) the retelling of visions with Christ, and (5) the retelling of visions with Saint Teresa or the Virgin Mary. In conclusion, due to their precarious situation as religious women under the ever vigilant eye of a patriarchal and misogynist society, these nuns opted to incorporate these strategies within their spiritual letters. Sor Coleta, Sor Sebastiana and Sor Maria Anna deliberately placed subversive rhetorical strategies within their letters in order to express otherwise controversial or questionable ideas.
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Ma, XiaoLu. "The Last Foreign Nuns in China Screenplay: An Exegesis to ‘The Last Foreign Nuns in China’ Screenplay: the Significance of Lost History, Docudrama and Co-production." Thesis, Griffith University, 2012. http://hdl.handle.net/10072/366574.
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This is an exegesis of the docudrama screenplay of The Last Foreign Nuns in China. It introduces the historical background of this screenplay, emphasises the significance of docudrama and analyses the pros and cons of film co-production. With the exception of the introduction and the conclusion, there are three parts to this exegesis.
Part one, Chapter 2 focuses on the literature and history review. It examines the history and literature of the Catholic Church in China and the background of the incidents. It not only highlights the relationship between the Chinese government and foreign missionaries, but also provides a historical context in which to observe the development of attitudes towards foreign missionaries in China. Three historical moments have been included: missionaries and the new technology - the Golden Age of Christianity and the Chinese Rites Controversy; the Church’s development after the Opium Wars and ‘rice bowl’ Christians.
These historical moments, as well as the historical figures, have been chosen carefully in order to summarise the positive and negative social impacts on various aspects of Chinese history. The screenplay gives the audience a brief but comprehensive understanding of the performance of the Catholic Church in ancient and contemporary history.<br>Thesis (PhD Doctorate)<br>Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)<br>School of Humanities<br>Arts, Education and Law<br>Full Text
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Lee, Nicolette. "Tōkeiji's business : the agency of nuns in the early modern period." Thesis, University of British Columbia, 2013. http://hdl.handle.net/2429/44899.
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This thesis explores the agency of nuns at elite convents by focusing on how they successfully acted within the constraints of social regulations during the early modern period. I use agency as a tool to examine issues of representation and authority of the nuns in response to arguments that stress nuns are marginalized in the broader study of Japanese Buddhism. This thesis explores that the study of nuns is not about uncovering marginalized representations, but evaluating the agency and authority of nuns as relative to their contemporaries, such as other monks and public authorities. I primarily focus on Tōkeiji, the famous divorce temple (enkiridera 縁切寺), supplemented by examples from imperial convents (bikuni gosho 比丘尼御所) of the early modern period. Chapter 1 focuses on divorce as a pivotal issue to discuss agency, representation, and authority of the wife who requested divorce and of the abbess who guaranteed the divorce by temple code law. Chapter 2 reexamines the theoretical and actual the power relations within the personnel structure especially in regard to the temple hierarchy. Chapter 3 reviews the significant connection between financial management and influential familial patrons. Chapter 4 explores the multifaceted nature of the temple. I reach the conclusion that a different perspective on approaching the study of nuns at elite convents enables us to move away from the repetitive debate on whether nuns are considered independent. Instead, the approach to assess how the nuns used their resources in their network as ritual specialists, politicians, and businesspeople presents a comprehensive examination of an Edo period nun.
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Trzebiatowska, Marta Krystyna. "Gender, religion and identity : Catholic nuns in twenty-first century Poland." Thesis, University of Exeter, 2007. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.445444.
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Hodgson, Andrea Mary Elisabeth. "The Frankish church and women from the late eighth to the early tenth century : representation and reality." Thesis, King's College London (University of London), 1992. https://kclpure.kcl.ac.uk/portal/en/theses/the-frankish-church-and-women-from-the-late-eighth-to-the-early-tenth-century--representation-and-reality(742a084a-f171-4baa-b266-7040a7063b32).html.
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Brower, Lori. "Canoncial developments in papal cloister for nuns from 1917 to the present." Theological Research Exchange Network (TREN), 1998. http://www.tren.com.
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Adachi, Mami. "Nuns and nunneries in the cultural memory of early modern English drama." Thesis, University of Birmingham, 2016. http://etheses.bham.ac.uk//id/eprint/6745/.
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The Reformation had exposed ideas of female religiosity, ridiculing the contested site of the gendered bodies of nuns. Nevertheless, memories of pre-Reformation religion could not be easily destroyed. Nuns and nunneries are memorialised in a range of early modern English texts, among which this thesis identifies a number of tropes featuring nuns in historiography and drama. The first two chapters examine works by authors with differing agendas, John Foxe and Raphael Holinshed (Chapter 1), and John Stow and William Dugdale (Chapter 2), which can be regarded as memory banks of nun tropes. The next three chapters focus on tropes featuring nuns in drama from the mid 1580s to circa 1640. Chapter 3 examines references or allusions to dramatic nuns, which are generally stereotypical, suggesting the onset of cultural forgetting. Chapter 4 explores plays featuring nuns as characters, where nuns assume various roles, sometimes demonstrating a mix of tropical and innovative in a single play. Shakespeare’s utilisation of nun tropes while accommodating the symbolic value of female religious life to artistic needs is treated separately in Chapter 5. These dramatic tropes are seen to draw from and in turn feed into the tropes circulating in the culture of early modern England.
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Watkinson, Caroline. "Engaging nuns : exiled English convents and the politics of exclusion, 1590-1829." Thesis, University of Westminster, 2016. https://westminsterresearch.westminster.ac.uk/item/q14qx/engaging-nuns-exiled-english-convents-and-the-politics-of-exclusion-1590-1829.
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This thesis addresses the communities of English women religious founded after the Reformation on the other side of the Channel from a new perspective. In echoes of contemporary Protestant propaganda, debates about nuns remain too often framed by a discourse around themes such as passivity or the idea of forced vocations. The mere fact that women religious played a role in such propaganda suggests, however, that they also figured in debates about identity and political order. These were, moreover, debates in which nuns themselves could engage. Excluded from the secular world in their cloisters they may have been, but they were nonetheless actors both spiritually and as contributors to the wider Catholic imaginary of post-Reformation England. This is here traced through the succession of crises, from the English Civil War to the Jacobite risings, in which these exiled communities of women religious contributed to Catholic images of their Protestant-dominated homeland and significantly supported the Stuart cause. After 1750, however, with the decline of Jacobitism, the exiled convents played their part in turn in reconfiguring English Protestant images of the Catholic threat, a process that paved the way for the return of most of these communities in flight from the Jacobins of the French Revolution. This thesis thus not only demonstrates that nuns were politically active and engaged, but also contributed to the reshaping of England as an imagined space, both in going into exile in the first place, and in the way they negotiated a new modus vivendi in Britain in the years preceding Catholic Emancipation in 1829.
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Gillson, Gwendolyn Laurel. "The Buddhist ties of Japanese women: crafting relationships between nuns and laywomen." Diss., University of Iowa, 2018. https://ir.uiowa.edu/etd/6113.
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For many people, Japanese life is increasingly marked by precarity. This is often characterized by a lack of social and familial relationships that were the foundation of Japanese society in earlier eras. Buddhism has rarely played a part in addressing these feelings of precarity because Buddhism in Japan is associated with funerals and death. Yet some women participate in and actively create what this dissertation calls “feeling Buddhism,” which combats the feelings of helplessness and social isolation that accompany precarity. Feeling Buddhism is about sensing Buddhism, physically feeling the body perform ritual acts and inhabit sacred space. It is also about the emotions, affects, and feelings that accompany these physical acts. Based in feminist ethnography, this dissertation argues that Japanese women cultivate constructive feelings through Buddhism that enable them to craft deep and meaningful connections with one another. In particular, it focuses on the Buddhist women who belong to the Pure Land Sect or Jōdoshū.
Chapter One traces the history of women’s historical involvement in Japanese Buddhism to show that Japanese women have always been active participants in Buddhism. Chapter Two examines three articles written by Japanese scholar-priests to argue that they are more concerned with praising Jōdoshū and Hōnen than addressing women’s relationship with Buddhism. Chapter Three looks at two Jōdoshū women’s groups in Kyoto and utilizes theories of ritualization and affect to argue that these experiences create new and mend existing relationships though Buddhism. Chapter Four looks at the Jōdoshū nun Kikuchi Yūken and her caring labor with young women in Tokyo to argue that her work ought to be considered a form of socially engaged Buddhism. Chapter Five moves beyond Jōdoshū to examine the International Ladies Association of Buddhism and argues that the women within the organization attempt to cultivate upper-class taste and an appreciation for an internationalization.
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Pedica, Bianca Maria <1986>. "Bessie Rayner Parkes’s Sisterhoods: A Study of Summer Sketches and Historic Nuns." Master's Degree Thesis, Università Ca' Foscari Venezia, 2016. http://hdl.handle.net/10579/8143.
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The English writer Bessie Rayner Parkes (1829-1925) was born into a Unitarian family but embraced Catholicism in 1864. Her father, Joseph Parkes, was an election agent and reformer. Her mother, Elizabeth Rayner Priestley, was granddaughter to the eminent scientist and theologian Joseph Priestley. Her paternal uncle, Josiah Parkes, was an influential engineer.
Parkes was educated in the Unitarian school of William Field and Mary Wilkins. Her outlook was firstly affected by the several travels she had since adolescence. Secondly, it was shaped by inspiring women figures and friendships. The former included Anna Jameson, Harriet Martineau, Florence Nightingale, Caroline Norton and Julia Smith. Some of the latter were Barbara Leigh Smith, Marian Evans, Adelaide Procter and Anthony Ashley Cooper. From late 1850s to mid-1860s, she participated in activities of the women’s movement. She was editor of The English Woman’s Journal and a member of the Society for Promoting the Employment of Women.
Since her late teens, she devoted to journalistic and literary writing. She contributed to the Hastings and St Leonard News, the Birmingham Journal, the Waverley Journal and The English Woman’s Journal. She is the author of fifteen verse and prose books which were published between 1852 and 1900. In several cases, she provides portraits of female work. This theme was important to the women’s movement which strategically fostered the knowledge and recognition of women’s achievements.
On the whole, this thesis begins with an introduction to the authoress in question. Subsequently, it focuses on the autobiographical poem Summer Sketches (1854) and the collective biography Historic Nuns (1898). They respectively provide portraits of artistic and religious sisterhoods. They mirror the collective identity of the women’s movement whose members embraced the ideal of sisterhood in order to develop individual and community potentials.
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Hagerty, Darbee Nicole. "A Feminist Perspective on the Lack of Full Ordination for Burmese Buddhist Nuns." FIU Digital Commons, 2016. http://digitalcommons.fiu.edu/etd/2435.
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This thesis examines the position of Buddhist nuns (thila-shins) in contemporary Burmese society. The Sangha, a branch of the Burmese state, has disallowed them from seeking full ordination as bhikkhunis. Based on interviews and observations conducted in Myanmar in June-July 2015, the thesis examines the current socioeconomic status of thila-shins using a transnational feminist framework. It argues that Burmese Buddhist nuns are not simply passive victims of a patriarchal structure, but agents and actors within their own spaces who have their own agendas. The central questions are: How do thila-shins understand their social, economic, and religious position? How does ordination status affect thila-shins? Is barring thila-shins from seeking full ordination ethical according to Buddhist texts? Special emphasis is given to a rereading of traditional Buddhist doctrine on the issue of reviving full ordination for Buddhist nuns in light of concerns regarding agency present in Third World feminist movements.
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Martin, Tania Marie. "Housing the Grey Nuns : power, religion and women in fin-de-siècle Montréal." Thesis, McGill University, 1995. http://digitool.Library.McGill.CA:80/R/?func=dbin-jump-full&object_id=23201.
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Nineteenth-century Montreal convents are complex, multi-functional buildings. As a form of collective housing, convents provided an alternative urban "space" for women, one in which they were able to realize themselves individually and collectively. This thesis explores the Mother House of the Grey Nuns, typical of Montreal's convents, as a purpose-built environment for women.<br>The research involves the extensive use of a unique documentary legacy preserved in the archives of the Grey Nuns: the architectural drawings and written accounts of Soeur Saint-Jean-de-la-Croix (1854-1921), in addition to the religious community's annals and period photographs. These documents recorded how the nuns organized their own built environment and permit a reconstruction of the convent's spatial arrangements, one hundred years after the fact. Although this building is monumental and designed by prominent Montreal architect Victor Bourgeau, it is only from exploring the perspectives of the users that we can truly see how large institutions operated. The division of the plans, the massing of the convent and its siting, among other aspects, communicate the nuns' distinct way of life, one that questioned the traditional boundaries of public and private imposed by society in turn-of-the-century Montreal, albeit from a limited position.<br>The convent is situated within the larger context of nineteenth-century Montreal, especially its hospitals, schools, asylums, and homes. While it shared many of the distinctive architectural features that characterized these building types, the convent also differed from them significantly in its organization. This thesis is intended to enrich our understanding of convents, the place in history of religious communities and the development of women in Quebec.
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Moreton, Melissa N. ""Scritto di bellissima lettera": nuns' book production in fifteenth and sixteenth-century Italy." Diss., University of Iowa, 2013. https://ir.uiowa.edu/etd/6480.
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This dissertation examines the cultural, intellectual and artistic contributions religious women made in the production of secular and religious books in fifteenth and sixteenth-century Italy. It presents the first comparative study of nuns' book production across Italy and introduces new manuscripts to the canon of nuns' bookwork. Though the scholarship of the last fifty years has increased our understanding of the institutional and individual lives of nuns, little research has been done on their production and exchange of texts. Nun-scribes and manuscript painters produced liturgical, devotional and administrative books for use in-house, as well as for secular and religious communities and individuals outside the walls of the convents. Evidence of their bookwork repositions them as active participants in a rich spiritual, intellectual and artistic life and broadens their sphere of activity and influence to include a wide community of secular and religious patrons, artistic collaborators, scholars, family members, and book-buying clientele.
Through a close examination of the material evidence in their manuscripts, this study illustrates how nuns used the production and exchange of texts to further their individual and institutional goals. This dissertation makes an important contribution to the current understanding nuns' spiritual, artistic and intellectual life and practice and significantly reshapes the current understanding of women's education and learning in Renaissance and early modern Italy (1400-1650).
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d'Elena, Grisel. "The Gender Problem of Buddhist Nationalism in Myanmar: The 969 Movement and Theravada Nuns." FIU Digital Commons, 2016. http://digitalcommons.fiu.edu/etd/2463.
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This thesis uses transnational and Black feminist frameworks to analyze Buddhist nationalist discourses of gender and violence against religious and ethnic minorities in Myanmar. Burmese Buddhist nationalists’ marginalization of the Muslim Rohingya ethnic minority is inextricably linked to their attempts to control Buddhist women. Research includes interviews with U Ashin Wirathu, the leader of the monastic-led nationalist group, the 969 Movement, and with other monks of the organization, as well as with non-nationalist monks, nuns and laywomen. I also analyze Theravada textual discourse as read by my subjects in light of the history of Myanmar to understand the ways the local Theravada tradition has marginalized women and non-Buddhists. By connecting the lack of bhikkhuni ordination and laws hindering Buddhist women from marrying non-Buddhist men with the portrayal of the Rohingya as a threat to the nation, I show how Buddhist nationalists attempt to consolidate power and forestall the democratization process.
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Schrems, Suzanne H. "God's women : Sisters of Charity of Providence and Ursuline Nuns in Montana, 1864-1900 /." Full-text version available from OU Domain via ProQuest Digital Dissertations, 1992.
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Diener, Laura Michele. "Gendered Lessons: Advice Literature for Holy Women in the Twelfth Century." Columbus, Ohio : Ohio State University, 2008. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc%5Fnum=osu1204677363.
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Lee, Yujin [Verfasser]. "The nutritional status of vegetarian Buddhist nuns compared to omnivorous women in South Korea / Yujin Lee." Gießen : Universitätsbibliothek, 2011. http://d-nb.info/1061195910/34.
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Burley, Stephanie. "None more anonymous? : Catholic teaching nuns, their secondary schools and students in South Australia, 1880-1925 /." Title page, contents and abstract only, 1992. http://web4.library.adelaide.edu.au/theses/09EDM/09edmb961.pdf.
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Lynch, Kate. ""For a splendid cause" : Irish missionary nuns at home and on the mission field, 1921-1962." Thesis, University of Nottingham, 2012. http://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/14116/.
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In the years following Ireland's political independence in 1922 the popularity of its missionary movement was unprecedented. This most Catholic of endeavours helped to assert Ireland's difference from Britain. Religious women actively participated in this process. Their medical work and subsequent representations of the mission fields contributed to a rhetoric of Irish nationalism that served to define postcolonial Ireland within a universal, Catholic discourse. However, the location of their missionary spaces, largely in British colonial Africa, brought the sisters into contact with the empire from which Ireland had recently withdrawn. In their encounters with local people, the sisters perpetuated a form of colonialism that will be studied as a seeming contradiction to the Catholic Church's stance against British rule in Ireland. This is conducted through the lens of gender, and exposes the variation in Catholic-informed ideals of femininity in this postcolonial period of Ireland's history. To study these nuns is to explore the gendered and uneven power relations within the Church, their contribution to the expansion of Catholicism and their ambiguous role in empire. By drawing on the scalar connections between varied missionary spaces including the body, convent and domestic home, in both Ireland and Tanganyika, this thesis contributes to broader debates in historical geography and postcolonial theory.
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Gunnarsdottir, Ellen. "Religious life and urban society in colonial Mexico : the nuns and beatas of Queretaro, 1674-1810." Thesis, University of Cambridge, 1997. https://www.repository.cam.ac.uk/handle/1810/272684.
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Booth, Constance Hale. "DEVOTIONAL ART, MEDITATION, AND SENSORY EXPERIENCE: HOW GERMAN NUNS GAINED SPIRITUAL AUTHORITY BETWEEN 1300 AND 1500." Master's thesis, Temple University Libraries, 2018. http://cdm16002.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/ref/collection/p245801coll10/id/537927.
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Art History<br>M.A.<br>In the late Middle Ages, nuns in southern Germany and the Rhineland were strictly enclosed behind their convent’s walls, and they had been stripped of their clerical powers as a result of papal reforms. However, life in such cloistered environments allowed nuns’ affective piety to evolve and flourish in new ways, for example, via the use of devotional images. This paper examines the devotional imagery created and used by nuns in these regions, and how such imagery aided them in developing spiritual authority, as a way of overcoming not only their loss of clerical authority, but also perceived weaknesses and inferiority ascribed to female bodies, minds, and morals by contemporary male theorists and theologians. This study concentrates on a small subset of images – those of the suffering and wounded body of Christ. These include the profusely bleeding and suffering Christ on the Cross, and images that are related to his side wound and the pierced Sacred Heart. Of particular interest is how these nuns used images to stimulate their meditation and imaginative visions, for which women had a propensity in their piety. It was this personal engagement with the images that invoked an intensely gendered and inherently sympathetic relationship with Christ, and also provoked their bodily senses, which thus allowed for a deeper and more salvific experience that put them on a direct path to uniting with God. The results of this study indicate that, due to a confluence of these and other factors, nuns were able to acquire an authority of their own via their ability to establish a close connection with the divine through their gendered alignment with the humanity, flesh and blood of Christ, and through the unique and personal piety they developed. These instances of intimate union with the divine did not go unnoticed by members of the male clergy, who by their gendered nature, were more resistant to imaginative and visionary experiences. Some even saw the heightened and emotional experiences of the nuns as superior to, and more immersive than, their own devotion, thus giving these women a degree of spiritual authority over their male colleagues. Moreover, some religious men were not only aware of this, but also encouraged women in their imaginary and spiritual visions, and sought to learn from them.<br>Temple University--Theses
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Mann, Amy L. "Anis of Dolma Ling: Buddhist doctrine and social praxis through the monasticism of Tibetan nuns in exile." Scripps College, 2009. http://ccdl.libraries.claremont.edu/u?/stc,66.
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Woodford, Charlotte. "'Damit nit alles mit der zeit in vergessenheit khome' : historiographical writings by nuns in German (1450-1720)." Thesis, University of Oxford, 2000. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.340006.
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Kawanami, Hiroko. "The position and role of women in Burmese Buddhism : a case study of Buddhist nuns in Burma." Thesis, London School of Economics and Political Science (University of London), 1991. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.282617.
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Erickson, Lesley. "At the cultural and religious crossroads, Sara Riel and the Grey Nuns in the Canadian northwest, 1848-1883." Thesis, National Library of Canada = Bibliothèque nationale du Canada, 1997. http://www.collectionscanada.ca/obj/s4/f2/dsk2/ftp04/mq24582.pdf.
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Stutz, Teresa Elizabeth. "An embrace of love St. Walburga feast day celebrations and oil rituals /." Online full text .pdf document, available to Fuller patrons only, 2004. http://www.tren.com.
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Dawson, Joyce Ann Taylor. "Ursuline Nuns, pensionnaires and needlework : elite women and social and cultural convergence in British Colonial Quebec City, 1760-1867." Thesis, University of Southampton, 2007. https://eprints.soton.ac.uk/412279/.
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This research is concerned with the Ursuline Nuns of Quebec City, their Convent and school for girls founded in 1639, their boarding pupils, and embroidered textiles stitched by these young women. It focuses on the social and cultural convergence of French- and English-speaking boarders who attended the school during the British Colonial period of 1760-1867, a time in the Convent school's history when it moved from being a unilingual to a bilingual institution paralleling the shift in Quebec's history when the French colony became British. This study considers the interaction of French and English-speaking pupils with the nuns and with each other and their relationship to a collection of textile objects currently held by the Musee des Ursulines de Quebec. The objects selected for study provide examples of embroideries fashioned by pupils during the study period. Analysis of the practices surrounding the creation and use of these objects provides evidence of the convergence of French and English-speaking pupils within the confines of the school. The study also focuses on the impact of nuns and pupils with regard to the social and cultural convergence of the elite French and English speaking populations outside the cloister during the study period. An interdisciplinary methodology developed by the bringing together of diverse primary sources particularly analyses the relationship between the abovementioned practices, the curriculum taught at the school and biographical information attained through the development of a prosopographic database which establishes the eliteness of the pensionnaires. The surprising extent of the cultural duality and religious tolerance found within the school and seen within the objects sheds light on the impact which, as pupils and in maturity, these women may have had on the social and cultural convergence of Quebec's elite Society during the period. It was found that the relationship which the nuns had nurtured from within the cloister at the time of the Conquest and onward with the British Governor and his suite, was an especially significant part of this process. The study has revealed that elite women in British Colonial Quebec faced many challenges and that harmonious co-existence of English and French-speaking women within the small enclosed elite Society in the city was a necessity, not an option. The Ursuline nuns, their pupils and needlework all were shown to play a part in facilitating and encouraging that co-existence. How the Sisters achieved this complex task of supporting the cultural dualism that was at the heart of coexistence was clarified through the analysis of the education, needlework and other life skills provided to their pensionnaires by the Ursulines.
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Dolan, Autumn Huneycutt Lois L. ""We have chosen a few things from among many" the adaptations and suitability of nuns' rules in Merovingian Gaul /." Diss., Columbia, Mo. : University of Missouri--Columbia, 2009. http://hdl.handle.net/10355/6468.
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Title from PDF of title page (University of Missouri--Columbia, viewed on Feb 17, 2010). The entire thesis text is included in the research.pdf file; the official abstract appears in the short.pdf file; a non-technical public abstract appears in the public.pdf file. Thesis advisor: Dr. Lois Huneycutt. Includes bibliographical references.
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McElroy, Nicole Kathleen. ""'The Holy Spirit is Moving and we're not Paying Attention': Social Change, Organizational Dilemmas, and the Future Sustainability of Women Religious"." University of Akron / OhioLINK, 2012. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=akron1353251775.
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Burbee, Carolynn. "Catherine and the convents : the 1764 secularization of the church lands and its effect on the lives of Russian nuns /." free to MU campus, to others for purchase, 2000. http://wwwlib.umi.com/cr/mo/fullcit?p9988715.
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Jack, Gillian. "Sex, salvation, and the city : the monastery of Sant'Elisabetta delle Convertite as a civic institution in Florence, 1329-1627." Thesis, University of St Andrews, 2018. http://hdl.handle.net/10023/12654.
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This thesis reassesses the importance of Sant'Elisabetta delle Convertite, a monastery for repentant prostitutes, in Florence from its foundation in 1329 to 1627 after the Grand Duke became the monastery's protector. Although it was one of the oldest and most populous female houses in the city, historians have tended to underestimate its importance to municipal authorities. This thesis reframes the monastery as a civic institution with a key role in changing municipal responses to prostitution. The thesis makes extensive use of primary source material from the monastery itself, including ricordi (record books), accounts, and contracts, as well as from civic magistrates, particularly the Ufficiali dell'Onestà. Legislative sources from the late thirteenth to the early seventeenth centuries also show how the funding of Sant'Elisabetta reflected the city's changing responses to the regulation of prostitution, and the funding of Sant'Elisabetta. This thesis argues that the monastery of repentant prostitutes was an important civic institution in late medieval and early modern Florence and became so as a result of civic funding provided in consequence of changing municipal strategies to control prostitution. Successive Florentine municipal administrations acted to ensure the monastery's survival and stability in response to petitions from the Convertite claiming poverty. The priors' solutions varied between ad hoc direct funding, portions of the fines and penalties levied by magistrates, and a quarter of prostitutes' estates, redirected to Sant'Elisabetta until ultimately, the monastery would be brought under the direct control of the Grand Ducal administration in 1620. They also restricted admissions to the monastery, which had the effect of ensuring its longevity by preserving its unique place among the city's welfare institutions. By tracing municipal interest and intervention in Sant'Elisabetta delle Convertite, this study contributes to knowledge of the significance of the civic role played by the monastery.
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Phan, Cam Van Thi. "Family ties to Buddhist monks and nuns in medieval China : a biographical and hagiographical study of the Southern Xiao family branch." Thesis, University of British Columbia, 2007. http://hdl.handle.net/2429/32228.
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The roles of kinship and family ties have recently become recognized as a vital
yet unexplored area in the study of medieval Buddhism. This is especially critical in
restructuring the relationship between political and religious spheres, which for the
Sinologist have always been intricately linked to one another. Although there are studies
noting the prominence of family connection in the study of monks and nuns, past studies
have focused mainly on the manipulation and modification of religion by political figures
for solely secular purposes. Not many studies have turned the tables to analyze the
significance of a monk or nun's family background and its intimate influence throughout
his or her religious life; nor have they considered how a layman or laywoman's spiritual
devotion greatly shapes his or her social life and political career.
It is my aim to extend such research and explore on a larger scale the intricate
relationship between monastic and lay family members, in this case Xiao Yu, his
daughters, sons and relatives, ten in all, from the Southern Xiao family branch during the
late Sui to early Tang period. This research serves to prove that the life of a monk or nun,
while determined by that individual's vocation and endeavor, is to a degree also
conditioned by his or her family background, kinship ties and secular acquaintance. This
research, based upon hagiography, epigraphy and relevant materials from canonical and
secular sources substantiates the belief that comprehensive study of the monastic order
should involve analysis of factors beyond the spiritual sphere.<br>Arts, Faculty of<br>Asian Studies, Department of<br>Graduate
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Walsh, Barbara Mary. "A social history of Roman Catholic nuns and sisters in nineteenth and early twentieth-century England and Wales : the veiled dynamic." Thesis, Lancaster University, 1999. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.301257.
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Armacanqui-Tipacti, Elia J. María Manuela de Santa Ana. "Sor María Manuela de Santa Ana una teresina peruana /." Cuzco, Perú : Centro de Estudios Regionales Andinas "Bartolomé de Las Casas", 1999. http://books.google.com/books?id=ZkxfAAAAMAAJ.
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Zangmo, Tashi. "Women's Contribution to Gross National Happiness: A Critical Analysis of the Role of Nuns and Nunneries in Education and Sustainable Development in Bhutan." Amherst, Mass. : University of Massachusetts Amherst, 2009. http://scholarworks.umass.edu/dissertations/AAI3359167/.
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Brunetti, Lydie. "La représentation iconographique des bénédictines et cisterciennes en France aux XVIème, XVIIème et XVIIIème siècles : fondatrices, supérieures et religieuses." Thesis, Paris Sciences et Lettres (ComUE), 2017. http://www.theses.fr/2017PSLEP043.
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Au-delà de la littérature édifiante ou critique des XVIème, XVIIème et XVIIIème siècles, l’image mentale des religieuses bénédictines et cisterciennes passe aussi par la production et la diffusion de représentations iconographiques via de nombreux supports. L’étude menée sur ce media visuel a permis de rassembler un corpus de 1160 références regroupées en une base de données exploitable. Son analyse se développe autour de l’affirmation de l’importance du témoignage historique et documentaire de l’iconographie pour la connaissance des modes de vie et de pensées de ces moniales. Le traitement typologique du contexte de production, des commanditaires et destinataires des œuvres définit les enjeux et objectifs de ces représentations. L’iconographie présente toutes les caractéristiques spirituelles et temporelles de la vie monastique féminine avec les différentes problématiques qui font l’actualité du monde régulier post-tridentin. L’étude se penche aussi sur la représentation des grandes figures fondatrices du monachisme féminin, comme sainte Scholastique, les saintes fondatrices d’abbayes médiévales et les fondatrices modernes de congrégations nouvelles. L’iconographie donne à voir un monde monastique féminin puissant et émancipé avec l’évocation de la sainteté féminine et de son lien privilégié à Dieu. Les portraits de supérieures et de religieuses sont des témoins directs d’un pouvoir temporel et spirituel similaire à celui de leurs confrères moines. L’image de la bénédictine et de la cistercienne à l’époque moderne se révèle orientée et biaisée, utilisée à des fins de propagande, mais les religieuses en tirent toujours le meilleur parti pour conforter leur légitimité<br>Beyond uplifting or critical literature of 16th, 17th and 18th centuries, the mental image of the Cistercian and Benedictine nuns also involves the production and dissemination of iconographic representations via a variety of media. The study on the visual media brought together a corpus of 1160 references grouped into a usable database. His analysis develops around the affirmation of the importance of the historical and documentary witness of the iconography for the knowledge of the modes of life and thoughts of these nuns. The typological treatment of the context of production, sponsors and recipients of art works defines the stakes and objectives of these representations. Iconography features all the spiritual and temporal of feminine monastic life with the various problems which make the topicality of the post-Tridentine regular world. The study also focuses on the representation of the great founding figures of female monasticism as Saint Scholastica, the Holy founders of medieval abbeys and the modern founders of new congregations. The iconography shows a powerful and emancipated female monastic world with the evocation of feminine Holiness and his relationship to God. Superior and religious portraits are direct witnesses of their temporal and spiritual power similar to that of their fellow monks. The image of the Cistercian and benedictine in modern times turns oriented and biased, used for purposes of propaganda, but the nuns always get the best of that to reinforce their legitimacy
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Hughes, P. E. "Cleanliness and Godliness : a sociological study of the Good Shepherd Convent refuges for the social reformation and Christian conversion of prostitutes and convicted women in nineteenth century Britain." Thesis, Brunel University, 1985. http://bura.brunel.ac.uk/handle/2438/4976.
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This thesis is concerned with the transformation of prostitutes and other women in the magdalen asylums, the convict refuge, and the certified inebriate reformatory conducted by a roman catholic order of nuns in nineteenth century Britain. Laundry work came to play a central role in the activities expected of the women admitted to these quasi-monastic houses. Its significance is examined in terms of organisational and symbolic correspondences with the structure and ideology of transformative institutions directed to christian conversion. The thesis initially identifies different organisational forms and the ideology revealed by the long-span history of convent refuges. It goes on to consider the problems that tradition posed in the later institutions. The historical account, ordered around a primary sociological concern with transformation, discloses the struggle between the nuns, the secular authorities, and others, to assert differing ideas of religion, morality, and work. The theoretical discussion examines the structure and process of transformation, and the system of classification and control on which it is based. Moving from the notion of Total Institution, the analysis formulates a sociological model of the refuge as a 'Theopticon'. This provides a stable context for a pattern of transformations ranging from the laundry work to the liturgy. The analysis also deals with the role and status of the long-term transformand in pursuit of christian holiness. The theoretical model is then taken back to analyse the major issues raised by the historical account: the persistence of laundry work in the refuges, the nuns' resistance to public inspection and control, and their refusal to pay wages to the penitent women. The historical data is largely derived from primary sources and includes architectural, statistical, and photographic material, as well as documentary evidence.
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Leonardi, Paula. "Além dos espelhos: memórias, imagens e trabalhos de duas congregações católicas francesas em São Paulo." Universidade de São Paulo, 2008. http://www.teses.usp.br/teses/disponiveis/48/48134/tde-12062008-155236/.
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Esta pesquisa pretende compreender o funcionamento interno e a estrutura de duas Congregações católicas francesas instaladas no Brasil na primeira metade do século XX: as Irmãs da Sagrada Família de Bordeaux e as Irmãs de Nossa Senhora do Calvário. Utilizando como fontes a memória coletiva construída por elas e também as narrativas das próprias religiosas que vieram para o Brasil, recolhidas em crônicas, cartas e entrevistas, acompanhase as práticas desenvolvidas por essas instituições - a recordação, a imitação e a pregação - ao longo de três períodos distintos: o da suas fundações na França, na primeira metade do século XIX; o da sua vinda para o Brasil; e o da fundação de seus colégios na década de 1950. A partir de uma história institucional que se apresenta rigidamente cristalizada e homogênea, esta investigação questiona a imagem que essas freiras construíram de si próprias, no passado e no presente, analisa a margem de autonomia e mudanças possíveis para essas mulheres dentro dessas instituições, delineia quais os percursos traçados por elas em um novo país, aponta quais os conflitos com a sede e explora as possibilidades de reconstrução ou reinvenção das Congregações no trânsito França-Brasil. As conclusões dessa pesquisa articulam-se em torno dos três temas que perpassam todo o trabalho: recordação e mudança, imitação e poder e táticas e estratégias na pregação.<br>This research intends to understand the internal operation and the structure of two French Catholic Congregations installed in Brazil in the first half of the century XX: the Sisters of the Sacred Family from Bordeaux (France) and the Sisters of Ours Mrs. of Calvary. Using as sources the collective memory built by them and also the narratives of the own nuns that came to Brazil, collected in chronicles, letters and interviews, following the practices developed by those institutions - the memory, the imitation and the preaching - in three different moments: the foundations in France, in the first half of the century XIX; the arrival to Brazil; and the foundation of their schools in the decade of 1950. Starting from an institutional history that comes crystallized and homogeneous, this investigation analyze theimage that those nuns built of them own, in the past and in the present, it analyzes the autonomy margin and possible changes for those women inside of those institutions, it delineates which the courses drawn by them in a new country, it show which the conflicts with the headquarters and explores the reorganization possibilities or of to reinvent the Congregations in the exchange France-Brazil. The conclusions of that research pronounce around of the three themes that search all the work: memory and change, imitation and power and tactics and strategies in the preaching.
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Bulanda, Mary Ann. "Identity and spirituality in the life of Edith Stein." Theological Research Exchange Network (TREN) Access this title online Theological Research Exchange Network (TREN), 2005. http://www.tren.com.
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Quinn, Barbara E. "Gathering for holy conversation a spirituality of communal discernment /." Theological Research Exchange Network (TREN), 1998. http://www.tren.com.
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Rükgauer-Flusche, Margarete. "Methode zur Bestimmung der Spurenelementversorgung : Untersuchung bei Patienten mit Diabetes mellitus /." Stuttgart : Ibidem, 2000. http://bvbr.bib-bvb.de:8991/F?func=service&doc_library=BVB01&doc_number=009127343&line_number=0001&func_code=DB_RECORDS&service_type=MEDIA.
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Murphy, Ryan P. "Breaking Through the Glass Cloister: The Sisters of St. Joseph of Philadelphia, Social Justice, and Gender Consciousness After Vatican II." Diss., Temple University Libraries, 2017. http://cdm16002.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/ref/collection/p245801coll10/id/439873.
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Sociology<br>Ph.D.<br>Since the Vatican’s widely-publicized criticism of American Catholic nuns in 2012, religious sisters have risen into the public consciousness. For decades, thousands of religious sisters in the United States have served within a rigid patriarchal Church that does not always recognize their contributions, yet relies on them to carry out its ministries. Through an emphasis on their missions of service to the poor and work for social justice, religious sisters emerged from this contentious situation with Rome as intelligent and dedicated women who lead dynamic lives that often go unnoticed. Through a case study of the Sisters of St. Joseph of Philadelphia, I analyze individual sisters’ lived experiences. In this research, I seek to understand the congregation’s institutional culture to uncover how religious sisters develop strategies to live out their mission of service to the poor and marginalized, and how they continue to advocate for social and structural change in the Catholic Church and in secular society. Specifically, I conducted interviews with 23 Sisters of St. Joseph and analyzed archived writings, letters, and congregational documents dating back to the late 1960s. I submit that over the past 50 years since the Second Vatican Council (Vatican II), the Sisters of St. Joseph actively embraced gender consciousness and social justice as a means of empowerment toward social change, despite the institutional pressures within the Church and society that discourage this. I argue that the progressive spirit and commitment to social justice indicative of a feminist orientation created a dissonance between religious sisters and Church leadership, while simultaneously increasing their integration into secular society. Ultimately, I contend that their congregational mission of unity and reconciliation, their status as sisters in a religious community, and privilege as educated women allows the Sisters of St. Joseph to be courageous risk-takers in advancing social and structural change in both the Catholic Church and the world. In addition to the 23 semi-structured interviews, I used qualitative content analysis to explore the congregation’s primary archival documents, especially those published from the periodic general chapters just after Vatican II through the most recent chapter in summer 2014. These chapter meetings are called roughly every five years, during which time the Sisters of St. Joseph elect congregational leadership and articulate the community’s organizational vision and direction. At each chapter’s conclusion, the congregation publishes a document(s) that informs its mission and work for the next several years. In addition to these public documents, I was granted access to the Sisters of St. Joseph congregational archives, where I analyzed notes, letters, minutes, voting records, proposals and enactments, and personal recollections of the general chapter meetings. In total, I analyzed nearly 300 documents from the Sisters of St. Joseph congregational archives. In my textual analysis, I used subjective interpretation of language in the text with particular attention placed on its content and contextual meaning in order to identify themes or patterns. Once I identified the major themes, I grouped them into three theoretical areas, which became the empirical chapters 4, 5, and 6 of this study. Chapter 4 argues that the sisters’ move toward active social justice work and advocacy after Vatican II is evidence of lived religion for this congregation. Chapter 5 analyzes how the Sisters of St. Joseph navigate issues of gender and sexuality in the Church, in their congregation, and in society. Chapter 6 looks at how the congregation contends with race and ethnicity within their own community, but also in the lives of the people they serve in their various ministries. Finally, in chapter 7, I conclude by examining how the congregation moved toward a more democratic, corporate structure focused on long-term viability in the decades after the Second Vatican Council. Ultimately, I argue that as the congregation evolved after Vatican II, they broke through what I call a “glass cloister.” Through the renewal process, the Sisters of St. Joseph emerged from decades of restriction as sisters reborn, reclaiming their original congregational focus and eager to live out their lives in service to others. As convent rules loosened and the sisters claimed their voices within the Catholic Church structure and in secular society, the congregation defined itself as a dynamic community of women dedicated to social justice and advocacy for the poor and marginalized.<br>Temple University--Theses
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Cavallo, Bradley. "MATTER(S) OF IMMORTALITY: OIL PAINTINGS ON STONE AND METAL IN THE SIXTEENTH AND SEVENTEENTH CENTURIES." Diss., Temple University Libraries, 2017. http://cdm16002.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/ref/collection/p245801coll10/id/456452.
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Art History<br>Ph.D.<br>By the second decade of the twenty-first century, the preponderance of scholarship examining oil paintings made on stone slabs or metal sheets in Western Europe during the early modern period (fifteenth–eighteenth centuries) had settled on an interpretation of these artworks as artifacts of an elite taste that sought objects for inclusion in private collections of whatever was rare, curious, exquisite, or ingenious. In a cabinet of curiosities, naturalia formed by nature and artificialia made by man all complemented each other as demonstrations of marvelous things (mirabilia). Certainly small-scale paintings on stone or metal exhibited amidst these kinds of rarities aided in aggrandizing a noble or bourgeois collector’s social prestige. As well, they might have derived their interest as collectables because of the painter’s fame or increased capacity for miniaturization on copper plates, or because the painter left a slab of lapis lazuli, for example, partially uncovered to reveal its visually arresting stratigraphy or coloration. Nonetheless, while the lithic and metallic supports might have added value to the oil paintings it was not thought to add meaning. A totalizing theory about this type of artwork, based on a perception of them as if they had only served as conspicuous consumables, therefore overlooks that in other circumstances the stone and metal supports did contribute to the iconographic substance of the paintings. As this dissertation will argue, the introduction of metal and stone supports allowed patrons and painters literally to add another layer of meaning to an oil painting’s imagery. These materials mattered not just as passive receptacles of meaning but as active shapers of significance. Evidence for this hypothesis exists in the historical record in at least three identifiable contexts: Leonardo da Vinci’s Portrait of Ginevra de’Benci (ca. 1474–1478) in relation to the epistemological debate known as the Paragone; funerary monuments in Roman churches inclusive of painted portraits in relation to theories about color and lifelikeness; medallion-shaped, chest plates known as Escudos de monjas (Nuns’ Shields) worn by nuns of some religious orders in Colonial Mexico in relation to pre-Hispanic sacral materials. All three of these case studies ultimately concern the paradoxical materialization of the immaterial fame of the painter, the soul of the deceased, and the Christian divine. Observing them in tandem provides an outline of the origins and development of the technique of painting with oils on stone and metal, and consequently broadens our understanding of this wider, early modern phenomenon.<br>Temple University--Theses
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Oliver, Stephanie. "Writing Her Way to Spiritual Perfection: The Diary of 1751 of Maria de Jesus Felipa." PDXScholar, 2011. https://pdxscholar.library.pdx.edu/open_access_etds/309.
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Throughout the colonial period of Mexican history, cloistered nuns wrote spiritual journals at the request of their confessors. These documents were read and scrutinized, not only by the confessors, but also by others in the hierarchy of their Orders. They are important sources of study for historians in that they provide a window into the religious culture of the times and the spiritual mentality of their authors. This thesis will examine one such record, discovered in a collection of volumes at the Historical Franciscan Archive of Michoacán in Celaya, Mexico. The diary covers eleven months of 1751 in the life of a Franciscan nun -- believed to be María de Jesús Felipa who kept such records over a period of more than twenty years. María de Jesús Felipa was a visionary who experienced occasional ecstatic states. Through her contacts with the spiritual world, she pursued her own salvation and that of those most specifically in her charge: members of her own community -- the convent of San Juan de la Penitencia in Mexico City -- and the souls in purgatory. These encounters propelled her into different frames of time and space -- moving her into the past and the future, and transporting her to bucolic and horrific locations. Her diary ascribes meaning to these encounters by tying them to her life and her relationships within the convent. Her diary of 1751 also indicates that this spiritual activity and the records she kept brought her to the attention of the Inquisition. The thesis argues that, because of its cohesiveness of thought and consistency of focus, the diary effectively casts its record keeper as author of her own life story. A close reading reveals the inner thoughts and perceptions of a distinct personality. Her first-person account also reflects the character of Christianity, the impact of post-Tridentine reforms and difficulties in the governance of convents in eighteenth-century New Spain. Although always arduous and often unpleasant, writing provided Sor Maria with an opportunity to establish her integrity, exercise control, and justify her thoughts and actions as she pursued her vocation. Writing under the supervision of a confessor, María de Jesús Felipa was her own person. In its organization and focus, her diary resolutely records a struggle for self-determination within the limits imposed by the monastic vows of obedience, chastity, poverty and enclosure.