LUCAS Explains #4: How to break the glass ceiling?

Throughout history, women have been at the forefront of solving crises. Joan of Arc fought the English, Greta Thunberg fights climate change. But what allows some women to raise their voices while others are silenced?

Lieke Smits • April 14, 2020

MOM 3: Blessed Be the Fruit: Why The Handmaid’s Tale’s Sexual Politics Are Not Medieval

23 to 31 March is the Dutch National Week of the Book. For this reason, the month March will be devoted to this year's theme ‘de moeder de vrouw’, as the Month of the Mother (MOM). This week: politics of sex, marriage and motherhood in The Handmaid's Tale.

Lieke Smits • March 19, 2019

A 21st-century Dutch ‘Beeldenstorm’? The Frame of Iconoclasm in Historical Perspective

Over the past week colonial heritage has been the subject of a public debate in the Netherlands, called the 'Beeldenstorm' discussion. Why is this term used and how does it frame a variety of views as iconoclastic?

Lieke Smits • January 24, 2018

Dolls for Adults

Dolls as devotional aids, liturgical props and objects of desire: on the various ways medieval adults interacted with dolls and lifelike sculptures.

Lieke Smits • November 23, 2017

No Sex Allowed and Other Downsides to Growing Old in Early Medieval England

What was it like to grow old in the Middle Ages? Were white hairs a guarantee for respect or were they a pitiable token of endured hardship? Did medieval people long to grow old or did they fear their ever-growing tally of years?

Thijs Porck • April 25, 2016

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LUCAS Explains #4: How to break the glass ceiling?

MOM 3: Blessed Be the Fruit: Why The Handmaid’s Tale’s Sexual Politics Are Not Medieval

A 21st-century Dutch ‘Beeldenstorm’? The Frame of Iconoclasm in Historical Perspective

Dolls for Adults

No Sex Allowed and Other Downsides to Growing Old in Early Medieval England