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| author | Peter Anthony Mena |
| title | Borderlands/La Frontera of the Late Ancient Egyptian Desert: Space, Identity, and the Ascetic Imagination |
| abstract | Historians of late antiquity have noted the potential of Christian hagiography in constructing identities. Here I argue that it is
not only the figure of the saint but also the space of the desert that should draw our attention. The saint and desert work together to produce a transformative identity.
Methodologically this dissertation employs the theoretical insights of Gloria E. Anzaldúa in her now classic, groundbreaking work, Borderlands/La Frontera: The New
Mestiza. By looking closely at three important hagiographies, the Life of Antony, the Life of Paul the Hermit, and the Life of Mary of Egypt, I
show that their descriptions of the desert are replete with spaces and inhabitants that render it a borderland or frontier space in Anzaldúan terms. As a borderland space,
the Egyptian desert comes to function as a device for the creation of an emerging identity--that of the desert ascetic--while simultaneously the desert is created by
emerging desert saint.
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| school | Drew Theological School |
| degree | Ph.D. (2014) |
| advisor | Virginia Burrus |
| committee | Melanie Johnson-Debaufre
Catherine Peyroux |
| full text | PMena.pdf |
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