Motherhood Encountered/in Times of Encounter: Religious Transmission, Preservation, and Adaptation

How can motherhood and mothering serve as critical frameworks into histories and literatures of cross-religious and cross-cultural encounter? This roundtable will bring together four scholars whose work—literary and/or historical—centers around kinship and the body in the religious sphere. How do queer and feminist theories of maternity provide insight into moments of religious crisis, adaptation, and continuity? How have motherhood and mothering shaped patterns of religious transmission and rupture in contexts of encounter—from ancient Israel to the transatlantic Spanish Empire to the contemporary United States? Putting in conversation these distinct landscapes of encounter will shed light on notions of motherhood and mothering in relationship with transmission, religious preservation and adaptation, and the body. How does the site and role of the mother shape the production of religion at moments of upheaval and convergence?