Reading the Song of Songs in a #MeToo Era

Elaine T. James, Ph.D., is Associate Professor of Old Testament at Princeton Theological Seminary, and the author of An Invitation to Biblical Poetry (2021) and Landscapes of the Song of Songs: Poetry and Place (2017). Simeon B. Chavel, Ph.D., is Associate Professor of Hebrew Bible at the University of Chicago Divinity School. He has published on many aspects of biblical literature and the history and ideas of ancient Israel and Judah, including Oracular Law and Priestly Historiography in the Torah (Mohr Siebeck, 2014).

• List of IllustrationsNotes on ContributorsIntroduction: The Song of Songs and Women’s VoicesElaine James and Simeon ChavelPart 1: The Song of Songs: Literary and Theoretical Approaches1 The Song of Songs and #MeTooCritical Reading, Reparative ReadingElaine James2 Sex in Public in the Song of SongsRhiannon Graybill3 The Speaker of the Song of Songs and Her PublicsSimeon Chavel4 Speaking of the OtherInterest and Love in Song 5:2–8Sarah ZhangPart 2: The Song of Songs in Historical Contexts5 The Song, Cixous, and écriture féminineF. W. Dobbs-Allsopp6 Female Voices in Akkadian Love PoetryMartti Nissinen7 Recovering Women from the Scholars (Even from Me)Deborah Green8 Singing the Song AnewHildegard of Bingen as Interpreter of the Song of SongsKarl Shuve9 Women’s Voices and the Cost of Going PublicSong of Songs, Canonization and Safe SpacesAnna Marsh10 The Gendering of Sexual AgencyCase Studies from Song of Songs 8:5–14 and an Infamous Indian TrialHavilah Dharamraj11 Space and Regulation in the Song of Songs and Contemporary Sexual PoliticsYvonne Sherwood12 Thinking with PinkAffective and Sensate Readings of Marc Chagall’s Song of SongsFiona Black13 How to Read the Work of ‘Great Artists Who Have Done Terrible Things’Feminist and Womanist Biblical Scholarship and the #MeToo Debate on Cultural Texts of TerrorKaren V. GuthIndex