Maryann Shenoda

Research interests: Medieval Middle Eastern History, Modern Middle Eastern History, Comparative Gender History, Medieval European History. Medieval Mediterranean History with a special emphasis on medieval Egyptian history. Christian-Muslim relations as well as Jewish-Christian relations in Medieval Egypt. Non-Muslim communities in the medieval Middle East and their histories.

An important aspect of my research is analyzing non-Muslim histories and historiographies in order to understand how subaltern groups selected their historical realities. All too often we only hear one side of the story, considering non-Muslim communities will allow us to have a fuller sense of the medieval Mediterranean and even a wider Egyptian history.

Dissertation Abstract:
This dissertation considers the political and social role of Coptic Christians in medieval Egyptian society during the Fatimid period (969-1171 CE). Copto-Arabic writings of this period lament the Islamization and Arabization of Egypt and Copto-Arabic writers are keen on emphasizing their positionality as victorious martyrs — willing to suffer and die for Christ especially at the hands of Muslims. Nonetheless, this persecution of Christians is not echoed in other sources such as the Judeo-Arabic or Muslim Arabic histories of this time. Have Copto-Arabic histories been neglected when considering medieval Egyptian history? What sense can one make of these persecution narratives? These histories stand to make a very important contribution to the way medieval Egyptian history has been written and thus far comprehended. The Copto-Arabic primary sources and manuscripts examined in this dissertation indicate strong Christian anxieties about Islam, assimilation to Islam, and Arabization. These anxieties are not in response to conversion of Christians to Islam, and as a matter of fact most Coptic historians write about various Muslim converts/martyrs to Christianity during this time. More precisely then, Copto-Arabic histories demonstrate a larger anxiety that Christians will acquire a new Muslim habitus, imitating daily Muslim practices, speaking Arabic instead of Coptic, and no longer being culturally — and physically — different from their Muslim counterparts. Coptic anxieties regarding whether or not Coptic heritage and Copticness will be propagated without the contamination of Islam implicitly make their way into the historical writings of this period. In curious manner, several hagiographies of Coptic popes during the Fatimid period describe the mutilation of male genitalia at the hands of Muslims. How should persecution of pastoral figures be understood in light of Coptic anxieties about Islam? This dissertation considers the gendered aspects of medieval Coptic anxieties toward Islam and the importance of Coptic male genitalia as a signifier of the virility or impotence of the Coptic community as a whole. The literal injury and disfigurement of Coptic Church hierarchs’s reproductive organs, I argue, is indicative of a Copto-Arabic angst, typical of this period, and points to Coptic uncertainty regarding future propagation of heritage, culture, and religious ideologies.

Contact Info

Robinson Hall

35 Quincy Street

Cambridge, MA 02138

mshenoda [at] fas.harvard.edu

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