Anne E. Lester
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- August 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780801449895
- eISBN:
- 9780801462955
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9780801449895.003.0002
- Subject:
- History, European Medieval History
This chapter analyzes the social world from which the new female communities grew and gained support. It details the emergence of four social groups (a non-knighted aristocracy, women, secular ...
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This chapter analyzes the social world from which the new female communities grew and gained support. It details the emergence of four social groups (a non-knighted aristocracy, women, secular canons, and a bourgeoisie) at the same moment that the women's religious movement took shape in Champagne and began to coalesce as Cistercian nunneries. These two events—one sociological in nature and the other religious—were intimately bound. Although the daughters and sisters of townsmen formed the initial groups of mulieres religiosae who would be re-formed as nuns, within a generation the Cistercian nunneries received rents, houses, and income that entangled them in this same changing economic and social world. In turn, as nuns the women prayed and labored for the redemption of these new social groups. The patronage of Cistercian nunneries enhanced the social capital and reinforced networks of the same townsmen and women, just as bonds of kinship and shared social space tied the nuns to the urban milieu and the ideals of the vita apostolica or the embrace of poverty, charity, and penitential piety. What is even more striking, however, is that patronage of the new Cistercian nunneries had the effect of uniting these new social groups with the traditional knightly and baronial aristocracy, who had deep ties to the Cistercian order, creating a community of patrons allied in their combined support for the nuns.Less
This chapter analyzes the social world from which the new female communities grew and gained support. It details the emergence of four social groups (a non-knighted aristocracy, women, secular canons, and a bourgeoisie) at the same moment that the women's religious movement took shape in Champagne and began to coalesce as Cistercian nunneries. These two events—one sociological in nature and the other religious—were intimately bound. Although the daughters and sisters of townsmen formed the initial groups of mulieres religiosae who would be re-formed as nuns, within a generation the Cistercian nunneries received rents, houses, and income that entangled them in this same changing economic and social world. In turn, as nuns the women prayed and labored for the redemption of these new social groups. The patronage of Cistercian nunneries enhanced the social capital and reinforced networks of the same townsmen and women, just as bonds of kinship and shared social space tied the nuns to the urban milieu and the ideals of the vita apostolica or the embrace of poverty, charity, and penitential piety. What is even more striking, however, is that patronage of the new Cistercian nunneries had the effect of uniting these new social groups with the traditional knightly and baronial aristocracy, who had deep ties to the Cistercian order, creating a community of patrons allied in their combined support for the nuns.
Nancy J. Jacobs
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- January 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780300209617
- eISBN:
- 9780300220803
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Yale University Press
- DOI:
- 10.12987/yale/9780300209617.003.0009
- Subject:
- Biology, Ornithology
This chapter focuses on the emergence of recreational birdwatching, an activity of finding, noting, and recording birds by species, often with an emphasis on quantifiable personal achievement. Its ...
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This chapter focuses on the emergence of recreational birdwatching, an activity of finding, noting, and recording birds by species, often with an emphasis on quantifiable personal achievement. Its practitioners are members of the urban bourgeoisie who were estranged from their forebears' vernacular knowledge yet sought out an experience of nature. Recreational birding grew out of ornithology. Through much of the twentieth century there was a continuum between leading ornithologists and gentlemen who wrote for local natural history journals. As ornithology was professionalized and as multitudes of people have developed a more casual interest in birds, the two traditions have moved apart. Recreational birdwatching in late twentieth-century Africa was distinguished from the rest of the world by being the pursuit of the Euro-African minority and expatriates.Less
This chapter focuses on the emergence of recreational birdwatching, an activity of finding, noting, and recording birds by species, often with an emphasis on quantifiable personal achievement. Its practitioners are members of the urban bourgeoisie who were estranged from their forebears' vernacular knowledge yet sought out an experience of nature. Recreational birding grew out of ornithology. Through much of the twentieth century there was a continuum between leading ornithologists and gentlemen who wrote for local natural history journals. As ornithology was professionalized and as multitudes of people have developed a more casual interest in birds, the two traditions have moved apart. Recreational birdwatching in late twentieth-century Africa was distinguished from the rest of the world by being the pursuit of the Euro-African minority and expatriates.
