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Medieval Avatars

Projecting Presence, Performing Emotions

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 February 2026

Carla Maria Bino
Affiliation:
Catholic University of the Sacred Heart

Summary

This Element explores how medieval devotional and disciplinary practices acted as 'immersive technologies' for producing presence and configuring emotions. Through the comparative analysis of Aelred of Rievaulx's De Institutione Inclusarum and the Ordo ad Faciendum Disciplinam of the lay confraternity of Santo Stefano in Assisi, it investigates how the devout subject projected themselves into an imaginal, affective space, where memory, posture, and sensory experience converged to enable a participatory encounter with the divine. Drawing on the concept of the 'avatar' as a psychosomatic projection of the self within visionary and ritual practices, the Element traces how the 'theatre of the mind' redefined the relationship between interior vision, exterior action, and affective identity. By examining the dramaturgies of presence articulated within these memorial plays, this Element sheds light on the role of sensory discipline and emotional posture in shaping embodied devotional experience in the Latin Middle Ages.
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Medieval Avatars
  • Carla Maria Bino, Catholic University of the Sacred Heart
  • Online ISBN: 9781009610759
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Medieval Avatars
  • Carla Maria Bino, Catholic University of the Sacred Heart
  • Online ISBN: 9781009610759
Available formats
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To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Medieval Avatars
  • Carla Maria Bino, Catholic University of the Sacred Heart
  • Online ISBN: 9781009610759
Available formats
×