CANCELLED: Women and the Humors in Shakespeare’s Plays

Join WSU instructor, Dr. Jennfier Lodine-Chaffey, as she presents, "Women and the Humors in Shakespeare's Plays."

Conceived of as inferior to men, women during the early modern period were frequently referred to as “the weaker vessel.” Beliefs in women’s physical frailness, which were based on understandings of the bodily humors, led to theories about the inability of women to think rationally and control their emotions. This talk will explore Renaissance beliefs about women’s lack of balanced humors and how these ideas influenced British culture and law. Three specific conditions were often associated with women whose bodily humors were not balanced: shrewishness, greensickness, and hysteria. By looking at the treatment of three female characters in Shakespeare’s dramas—Kate in Taming of the Shrew, Juliet in Romeo and Juliet, and Ophelia in Hamlet—we get a better understanding of how gendered understandings of the humors impacted the treatment of and opportunities for early modern women.