Allen Frantzen
Education and career
Frantzen grew up in rural Iowa and earned a degree in English from Loras College{{cite web |url=http://allenfrantzen.com/ |title=About Allen Frantzen |website=Allen Frantzen.com |accessdate=December 14, 2016 }} and a PhD from the University of Virginia with a dissertation on the literature of penance in the Anglo-Saxon period.{{cite web |url=http://libraprod.lib.virginia.edu/catalog/libra-oa:10627 |author=Frantzen, Allen J, Department of English, University of Virginia |title=The keys of heaven: penance, penitentials, and the literature of early medieval England |publisher=University of Virginia Library |accessdate=December 14, 2016 }} He was a faculty member at Loyola University Chicago from 1978 until his retirement in 2014,{{cite news |author=Rio Fernandes |url=http://www.chronicle.com/article/Prominent-Medieval-Scholar-s/235014 |title=Prominent Medieval Scholar's Blog on 'Feminist Fog' Sparks an Uproar |newspaper=The Chronicle of Higher Education |date=January 22, 2016 }} when he was named an emeritus professor. While there he headed the graduate programs in English from 1984 to 1988 and in 1992 founded the Loyola Community Literacy Center, which is open to the community as well as to students at the university.{{cite web |url=http://www.luc.edu/literacy/allenjfrantzen/ |title=English Tutoring at the Literacy Center |publisher=Loyola University Chicago |accessdate=December 14, 2016 }}
Publications
Frantzen has published introductory works intended for students, such as King Alfred (1986){{cite journal |title=Review:King Alfred by Allen J. Frantzen |author=Daniel Donoghue |journal=Speculum |volume=64 |issue=2 |date=April 1989 |pages=425–27 |doi=10.2307/2851970 |jstor=2851970 }} and {{'}}Troilus and Criseyde': The Poem and the Frame (1993) on Chaucer's Troilus and Criseyde.{{cite journal |title=Review: {{'}}Troilus and Criseyde': The Poem and the Frame by Allen J. Frantzen |author=James R. Sprouse |journal=South Atlantic Review |volume=59 |issue=4 |date=November 1994 |pages=124–26 |doi=10.2307/3201367 |jstor=3201367}} He also co-edited The Work of Work. Servitude, Slavery, and Labor in Medieval England (1994) with Douglas Moffat.{{cite journal |title=Review: The Work of Work. Servitude, Slavery, and Labor in Medieval England by Allen J. Frantzen, Douglas Moffat |author=David A. E. Pelteret |journal=The English Historical Review |volume=111 |issue=444 |date=November 1996 |pages=1235–36 |jstor=575870 }}{{cite journal |title=Review: The Work of Work: Servitude, Slavery, and Labor in Medieval England by Allen J. Frantzen, Douglas Moffat |author=John S. Moore |journal=Albion |volume=28 |issue=2 |date=Summer 1996 |pages=281–82 |doi=10.2307/4052464 |jstor=4052464 }}
His first book was on the subject-matter of his dissertation, The Literature of Penance in Anglo-Saxon England (1983);{{cite journal |title=Review: The Literature of Penance in Anglo-Saxon England by Allen J. Frantzen |author=Paul E. Szarmach |journal=Speculum |volume=63 |issue=2 |date=April 1988 |pages=392–94 |doi=10.2307/2853247 |jstor=2853247 }}{{cite journal |title= Review: The Literature of Penance in Anglo-Saxon England by Allen J. Frantzen |author=Catharine A. Regan |journal=The Journal of English and Germanic Philology |volume=83 |issue=4 |date=October 1984 |pages=553–57 |jstor=27709401 }} he returned to the Anglo-Saxon penitential literature in Before the Closet: Same-Sex Love from 'Beowulf' to 'Angels in America{{'}} (1998), in which, himself a gay man, he argues that contrary to John Boswell's argument, same-sex relations were not tolerated more by the Church before the Norman Conquest, but rather the relationships were not "closeted"; he takes what he calls a "legitimist" rather than a "liberationist" view of the textual evidence.{{cite journal |title=Review: Before the Closet: Same-Sex Love from 'Beowulf' to 'Angels in America{{'}} by Allen J. Frantzen |author=Susan M. Kim |journal=Modern Philology |volume=100 |issue=1 |date=August 2002 |pages=60–63 |jstor=1215583 |doi=10.1086/493150}}{{cite journal |title=Review: Before the Closet: Same-Sex Love from 'Beowulf' to 'Angels in America{{'}} by Allen J. Frantzen |author=Michael W. Twomey |journal=Speculum |volume=77 |issue=1 |date=January 2002 |pages=174–76 |doi=10.2307/2903822 |jstor=2903822 }}{{cite journal |title=Review: Before the Closet. Same-Sex Love from 'Beowulf' to 'Angels in America{{'}} by Allen J. Frantzen |author=Frank Field |journal=The English Historical Review |volume=115 |issue=460 |date=February 2000 |pages=266–67 |jstor=579553 |doi=10.1093/ehr/115.460.266-a}} The book has been described as "groundbreaking".
Frantzen has also published critiques of the field of Old English studies: Desire for Origins: New Language, Old English, and Teaching the Tradition (1990), a study of the history of the field, and Speaking Two Languages: Traditional Disciplines and Contemporary Theory in Medieval Studies (1991).{{cite journal |title=Review: Desire for Origins: New Language, Old English, and Teaching the Tradition by Allen J. Frantzen; Speaking Two Languages: Traditional Disciplines and Contemporary Theory in Medieval Studies by Allen J. Frantzen |author=Debra Magai Dove |journal=South Atlantic Review |volume=57 |issue=2 |date=May 1992 |pages=93–95 |doi=10.2307/3200220 |jstor=3200220 }} The former, in which Frantzen argues that Anglo-Saxon studies are increasingly regarded as hidebound because of the insular approach within the field, attracted much notice. Fred C. Robinson wrote that it "should be read by all medievalists who care about their profession."{{cite journal |title=Review: Desire for Origins: New Language, Old English, and Teaching the Tradition. by Allen J. Frantzen |author=Fred C. Robinson |author-link=Fred C. Robinson |journal=Speculum |volume=68 |issue=4 |date=October 1993 |pages=1119–21 |doi=10.2307/2865535 |jstor=2865535 }} In 1994 Frantzen was the keynote speaker at a conference at the University of California, Berkeley that was published as Anglo-Saxonism and the Construction of Social Identity (1997).{{cite journal |title=Review: Anglo-Saxonism and the Construction of Social Identity by Allen J. Frantzen, John D. Niles |author=Craig R. Davis |journal=The Modern Language Review |volume=95 |issue=3 |date=July 2000 |pages=790–91 |doi=10.2307/3735503 |jstor=3735503 }}
In Bloody Good: Chivalry, Sacrifice, and the Great War (2004) he studied the mythology of chivalry and of imitatio Christi as motivations for participants in World War I.{{cite journal |title=Review: Bloody Good: Chivalry, Sacrifice, and the Great War by Allen J. Frantzen |author=Jeanne Fox-Friedman |journal=Arthuriana |volume=14 |issue=4 |date=Winter 2004 |pages=86–88 |jstor=27870663 |doi=10.1353/art.2004.0067|s2cid=161942030 }}{{cite journal |title=Review: Bloody Good: Chivalry, Sacrifice, and the Great War by Allen J. Frantzen |author=John H. Morrow Jr. |journal=The International History Review |volume=27 |issue=3 |date=September 2005 |pages=640–42 |jstor=40109639 }}
After his retirement, Frantzen wrote a blog post dated September 2015 titled "How to Fight Your Way Out of the Feminist Fog" in which he aligned himself with the men's rights movement against what he argued were the anti-man demands of feminists; this provoked disapproving responses from certain medievalists after it was publicized in early 2016.{{cite web |author=David M. Perry |url=http://www.thismess.net/2016/01/grab-your-balls-and-problem-with-blind.html |title=Grab Your Balls and The Problem with Blind Peer Review |website=How Did We Get Into This Mess? |type=blog |date=January 20, 2016 }}{{cite web |author=Jeffrey J. Cohen |url=http://www.inthemedievalmiddle.com/2016/01/on-calling-out-misogyny.html |title=On calling out misogyny |website=In the Middle |type=blog |date=January 16, 2016 }}Jennifer C. Edwards, '[https://scholarworks.wmich.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2087&context=mff #Femfog and Fencing: The Risks for AcademicFeminism in Public and Online]', Medieval Feminist Forum, 53 (2017), 45–72 (pp. 50–59).Eileen Joy, [https://assets.pubpub.org/zo912qv9/2db66d35-0492-480b-b45e-4195cb20d0fc.pdf CFP: DefenestratingFrantzen: A Fistschrift] punctum, 2020).
Honors
- Guggenheim Fellowship, 1993{{cite web |url=http://www.gf.org/fellows/all-fellows/allen-j-frantzen/ |title=Allen J. Frantzen |publisher=John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation |accessdate=December 14, 2016 }}
- Loyola University Faculty Member of the Year 1991, Master Teacher (College of Arts & Sciences) 1997–98, Faculty Scholar 2000.
- Teaching Excellence Award of the Medieval Academy of America, 2013{{cite web |url=http://www.luc.edu/english/stories/archive/frantzencaraaward.shtml |title=Congratulations to Dr. Allen Frantzen on receiving the Medieval Academy of America's Teaching Excellence Award for 2013 |publisher=Department of English, Loyola University Chicago |accessdate=December 14, 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161214020305/http://luc.edu/english/stories/archive/frantzencaraaward.shtml |archive-date=December 14, 2016 |url-status=dead }}
- Opera Omnia: A Festspiel for Allen J. Frantzen: celebratory conference organized by former students, 2015.{{cite web |url=https://operaomniaconference.wordpress.com/2015/04/10/beane-hall-water-tower-campus-loyola-university-chicago/ |title=Opera Omnia: A Festspiel for Allen J. Frantzen |date=10 April 2015 |accessdate=December 14, 2016 }}
References
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External links
- [http://allenjfrantzen.com/ Personal website]
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Category:American medievalists
Category:Anglo-Saxon studies scholars
Category:Loyola University Chicago faculty
Category:Place of birth missing (living people)
Category:University of Virginia alumni