Early Modern Asexualities: Day 1

When and Where

Monday, January 05, 2026 3:45 pm to 6:00 pm
Chapel
Victoria College
91 Charles St W, Toronto, ON M5S 1K5

Description

This conference brings together the historical study of early modernity and asexuality studies as an interdisciplinary academic discipline.

Asexuality studies is a thriving academic discipline, which is invested in understanding how compulsory sexuality organizes society, naturalizing performances of sexual attraction and denigrating or exoticizing sexual indifference or repulsion. By bringing together the study of early modernity and the academic field of asexuality studies, this three-day conference will be the first major academic event to seriously investigate what it means to do asexual history. Fifteen contributors to the forthcoming co-edited collection Early Modern Asexualities will present papers that think through desexualizations and disability, race and colonialism, queer histories, asexual reading, and the long histories of compulsory sexuality. Other events will include an asexual pedagogy roundtable, and a roundtable highlighting local research into historical asexualities.

Speakers

  • Liza Blake, University of Toronto
  • Urvashi Chakravarty, University of Toronto
  • Clarissa Chenovick, Florida Atlantic University
  • Simone Chess, Wayne State University
  • Rachel Ellen Clark, Wartburg College
  • Catherine Clifford, Hastings College
  • Lee Emrich, University of Toronto
  • Ari Friedlander, University of Mississippi
  • Stephen Guy-Bray, University of British Columbia
  • Laura Harris, University of Washington
  • Liesl Jensen, University of Birmingham, Shakespeare Institute
  • Alexandria Morgan, Independent Scholar
  • Ashley “Aley” O’Mara, Independent Scholar
  • Jennifer Park, Glasgow Caledonian University
  • Katherine Schaap Williams, University of Toronto

Registration - In person

Registration - Livestream

Program (PDF)

For more information about the conference, please contact Professor Liza Blake. If you have any accessibility requests or questions about logistic/administrative matters, please contact Dr. Natalie Oeltjen.

Sponsors:

Bonham Centre for Sexual Diversity Studies 
Centre for Comparative Literature, UTSG 
Centre for Renaissance and Reformation Studies 
Department of Classics, UTSG 
Department of English, UTSG 
Department of English and Drama, UTM 
Department of Social Justice Education, OISE 
Department of Visual Studies, UTM 
Outreach, Conference, and Colloquium Fund, UTM 
Department of English, UTSC
JHI Working Group in Asexuality and Aromanticism Studies 
Jackman Humanities Institute
The RISE Centre for Queer and Trans Health, University of Toronto Dalla Lana School of Public Health 
Center for Gender and Sexuality, Wayne State University 
Women and Gender Studies Institute 

Promotional image for the Centre for Renaissance and Reformation Studies conference Early Modern Asexualities, taking place January 5 to 7, 2026 at Victoria College Chapel and online. The graphic features two early modern–style classical figures framing the event title against a purple background patterned with similar figures.

Sponsors

The Centre for Renaissance and Reformation Studies

Map

91 Charles St W, Toronto, ON M5S 1K5

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