"Inkle and Yarico," appearing in an early issue of The Spectator (1711), is a story about gender, commerce, race, and legal standing. It appears many times in many forms across the century, inspiring sympathy for the Barbadian ingénue, Yarico, and indignation at her opportunistic English lover, Mr. Thomas Inkle. It is also, as some critics have noted, a story about stories--in particular, a story about how and when women ought to tell stories. Part disquisition on theories of the emotions and gender in the eighteenth-century, part investigation into an anecdote about anecdotes, this paper will begin to excavate the secret history of indignation in the eighteenth century.
Gender Studies Reseach Workshop
Thursday, February 2
4-5pm
339 O'Shaughnessy
Katie is a fourth-year PhD student and a Gender Studies Graduate Minor student whose work focuses on eighteenth- and nineteenth-century British and Irish literature. She currently co-directs Notre Dame's Seminar in Eighteenth and Nineteenth Century Studies and is a Scholar Advisor to Indiana Humanities.