Research team
Expertise
Lieke Smits is a medievalist and art historian, interested in the late medieval religious imagination and devotional practices. She wrote a dissertation on the influence of bridal mysticism on the visual culture of the medieval Low Countries. Her postdoctoral research project is titles 'Spiritual Role-Play as a Tool for Inner Transformation: An interdisciplinary Pioneer Study of a Devotional Practice from the Late Medieval Low Countries'.
Spiritual Role-Play as a Tool for Inner Transformation: A Pioneer Study of a Devotional Practice from the Late Medieval Low Countries.
Abstract
How can art and literature contribute to inner transformation? What creative tools did medieval people use for self-development? This study breaks new ground by exploring a popular, yet understudied, self-development tool from the late medieval Low Countries: the phenomenon of spiritual role-play. In this form of private devotion, God and the human soul were each assigned complementary social roles (e.g. bridegroom and bride, physician and patient) which engaged in meditational interactions, sometimes even involving physical movements and objects. The aim of the proposed project is to understand the transformative potential of spiritual role-play, and its effective use as a tool for self-development, within the context of late medieval Christian meditation practices. This will be achieved through analysis of texts and material objects used in spiritual role-play employing an interdisciplinary approach which combines proven methods from art history and literary history with relevant insights from cognitive psychology. This novel investigation will offer a new understanding of the effects of spiritual role-play on the mind, and of the important roles of art and literature in facilitating and reflecting inner transformation.Researcher(s)
- Promoter: Fraeters Veerle
- Fellow: Smits Lieke
Research team(s)
Funding
- FWO
Project type(s)
- Research Project