The Applicability of the Intersectional Category “Race” in Late Medieval Jerusalem Pilgrimage Reports

A Historiographical and Didactic Problematisation

Abstract

The perception and construction of difference are anthropological constants, but the categories and mechanisms through which this difference is produced are not. In order to understand these processes historically in the pre-modern era and make them useful for the teaching of contemporary history, this article proposes to establish the concept of intersectionality for the analysis of medieval sources. For this purpose, a late medieval Jerusalem pilgrimage report is used to critically examine the applicability of traditional categories of difference such as race, class, and gender. The article concludes with initial reflections on the potential of the concept of intersectionality as a mediating framework for renewed medieval didactics.