Rita Copeland

Sheli Z. and Burton X. Rosenberg Professor

(215) 898-7425
Fax: 
(215) 898-6568
266 Cohen Hall
Office Hours: 
Spring 2020 on leave

Education: 

Ph.D. (Comparative Literature) University of California, Berkeley

M.A. (Comparative Literature), University of California, Berkeley

B.A. (Comparative Literature), University of California, Berkeley

I work across a number of fields and periods, including: medieval literature (English, Latin, French); intellectuals, learning, and literacy in medieval Europe; literary theory from ancient to early modern; the history of rhetoric from ancient to early modern. Usually my teaching combines my interests in antiquity and the Middle Ages-or how the Middle Ages understood antiquity. I recently edited The Oxford History of Classical Reception in English Literature vol. 1, 800-1558.  I am completing a book called Emotions and the History of Rhetoric in the Middle Ages. I was a founding editor of the annual New Medieval Literatures), and I am co-editor, with Jill Ross, of Toronto Studies in Medieval and Early Modern Rhetoric, a new book series from Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies.  With Peter Mack I am General Editor of The Cambridge History of Rhetoric in five volumes (to appear in 2023).

Research Interests: 

Medieval literature (Latin and vernacular)
Intellectuals, learning, and literacy in medieval Europe
Literary theory from ancient to early modern
History of rhetoric from ancient to early modern

Selected Publications: 

The Oxford History of Classical Reception in English Literature vol. 1, 800-1558 (2016)

The Cambridge Companion to Allegory, ed. with Peter Struck (2010).

Medieval Grammar and Rhetoric: The Language Arts and Literary Theory, AD 300 to 1475, ed. with Ineke Sluiter (2009).

Pedagogy, Intellectuals, and Dissent in the Later Middle Ages: Lollardy and Ideas of Learning (2001).

Criticism and Dissent in the Middle Ages (1996).

Rhetoric, Hermeneutics, and Translation in the Middle Ages: Academic Traditions and Vernacular Texts (1991; rpt. 1995).

"Pathos and Pastoralism: Aristotle's Rhetoric in Medieval England"

I am also Genral Editor, with Peter Mack, of the The Cambridge History of Rhetoric in five volumes.

Courses Taught: 

(undergraduate) History of Literary Theory (Ancient to Modern); Ancient and Medieval Epic and Romance; The Romance of Pagan Antiquity
(graduate) Chaucer's Classicisms; Piers Plowman; Introduction to Literary Theory Medieval Education; Medieval Allegory; Medieval Literary Theory; The Sophists:  Ancient Texts and Post-Classical Interpretations (with Ralph Rosen); Commentary and Gloss; Premodern Rhetorics; The Matter of Thebes; Boethius from Late Antiquity to the Early Modern Period