Intertextual Networks: Reading and Citation in Women's Writing 1450-1850

FAIN: RZ-249825-16

Northeastern University (Boston, MA 02115-5005)
Julia Hammond Flanders (Project Director: December 2015 to March 2022)

Research and online publications by the Women Writers Project (WWP) on the influence of reading practices on literary composition of early modern women writers.

The Women Writers Project (WWP) at Northeastern University seeks funding for a collaborative research project aimed at exploring and theorizing the representation of intertextuality, focusing on the citation and quotation practices of the female authors represented in the WWP’s digital collection, Women Writers Online (WWO). The project will cover three main activities. Members of the team will pursue research projects that contribute to our understanding of intertextuality, engaging with materials from Women Writers Online, and their outcomes will be expressed as public exhibits published in Women Writers in Context. Second, members of the team will produce a series of blog posts on intertextuality which will be synthesized as a final report on intertextuality. Finally, the WWP will extend its encoding of intertextual phenomena to represent quotations, citations, and other intertextual references in the WWO collection, with a comprehensive bibliography of referenced works.

Associated Products

Intertextual Networks: Theorizing and Encoding Textual Connections in Early Modern Women's Writing (Blog Post)
Title: Intertextual Networks: Theorizing and Encoding Textual Connections in Early Modern Women's Writing
Author: Sarah Connell
Author: Julia Flanders
Abstract: This blog post is based on lecture notes from a paper by Sarah Connell and Julia Flanders, part of a panel on intertextuality in early women’s texts at the DH2017 conference.
Date: 8/14/2017
Primary URL: http://wwp.northeastern.edu/blog/dh2017/
Primary URL Description: Blog post site link
Blog Title: Women Writers Project: The Blog
Website: Women Writers Project

New WWP Series on Early Women's Intertextual Networks (Blog Post)
Title: New WWP Series on Early Women's Intertextual Networks
Author: Sarah Connell
Abstract: We are delighted to announce the launch of our new Intertextual Networks series on the open-access Women Writers in Context platform! Intertextual Networks is a three-year research project funded by a generous grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities, focusing on intertextuality in early women’s writing. This collaborative research initiative examines the citation and quotation practices of the authors represented in Women Writers Online (WWO) to explore and theorize the representation of intertextuality.
Date: 8/30/2019
Primary URL: https://wwp.northeastern.edu/blog/intertextual-networks-launch/
Primary URL Description: Link to blog post
Blog Title: New WWP Series on Early Women's Intertextual Networks
Website: Women Writers Project: The Blog

Close and Distant Reading via Named Entity Network Visualization: A Case Study of Women Writers Online (Conference Paper/Presentation)
Title: Close and Distant Reading via Named Entity Network Visualization: A Case Study of Women Writers Online
Author: Sarah Campbell
Author: Zheng-yan Yu
Author: Sarah Connell
Author: Cody Dunne
Abstract: Close reading and distant reading are widely used in digital humanities and can benefit from information visualizations. Digital humanities scholars have curated numerous TEI-encoded textual collections which provide the data necessary for blending both close and distant reading – however we do not have tools to support general users in conducting these blended analyses. In this paper we focus on one such collection: Women Writers Online (WWO). We contribute the design and implementation of a multiple coordinated view network visualization to facilitate close and distant reading in WWO and a transparent view into our iterative design process to help guide future designers and humanists in applying our approach to other textual collections.
Date: 10/21/2018
Primary URL: http://vis4dh.dbvis.de/papers/2018/Close%20and%20Distant%20Reading%20via%20Named%20Entity%20Network%20Visualization%20A%20Case%20Study%20of%20Women%20Writers%20Online.pdf
Primary URL Description: Link to the version of the paper published in the online conference proceedings.
Conference Name: Workshop on Visualization for the Digital Humanities

Allusions in the Age of the Digital: Four ways of looking at a corpus (Article)
Title: Allusions in the Age of the Digital: Four ways of looking at a corpus
Author: Amanda Henrichs
Abstract: This exhibit considers intertextuality in a corpus consisting of the literary works of the Sidney family: Mary Sidney Herbert (Lady Pembroke), Mary Sidney (Lady Wroth), Robert Sidney, and Philip Sidney. In particular, it examines an apparent intertextual gap between Wroth and Pembroke, who are known to have had a close and friendly relationship. By examining this gap through close and distant reading methods, this exhibit explores the larger question of how a shift in methods alters our understanding of historical intertextuality.
Year: 2019
Primary URL: https://wwp.northeastern.edu/context/#henrichs.allusions.xml
Primary URL Description: Link to article
Access Model: Open Access
Format: Other
Periodical Title: Women Writers in Context
Publisher: Women Writers Project

Female Platonics in Pix's The Innocent Mistress (1697) and Centlivres The Platonic Lady (1707) (Article)
Title: Female Platonics in Pix's The Innocent Mistress (1697) and Centlivres The Platonic Lady (1707)
Author: Heather Ladd
Abstract: Mary Pix’s The Innocent Mistress reimagined the stock character of the platonic lady, turning it away from a misogynistic characterization to one of moral strength. Susanna Centlivre’s play The Platonic Lady built upon Pix’s work, showing how platonic love can be figured as a legitimate response to the restrictive gender roles of seventeenth- and eighteenth-century England.
Year: 2019
Primary URL: https://wwp.northeastern.edu/context/#ladd.platonics.xml
Primary URL Description: Link to article
Access Model: Open access
Format: Other
Periodical Title: Women Writers in Context
Publisher: Women Writers Project

Rhetorical Intertextualities of M. R.'s The Mother's Counsell, or Live Within Compasse, 1630 (Article)
Title: Rhetorical Intertextualities of M. R.'s The Mother's Counsell, or Live Within Compasse, 1630
Author: Elizabeth Ann Mackay
Abstract: While mothers’ books are gaining increasing critical attention, M. R.’s The Mothers Counsell has largely been overlooked. The Mothers Counsell provides an excellent example of the intertextual dynamics at play in many mother’s books as a part of commonplacing culture, as such forms gave women a voice to speak to both their daughters and the world at large.
Year: 2019
Primary URL: https://wwp.northeastern.edu/context/#mackay.counsell.xml
Primary URL Description: Link to article
Access Model: Open access
Format: Other
Periodical Title: Women Writers in Context
Publisher: Women Writers Project

To the Most Distant Parts: Writing the World in the WWO Corpus (Article)
Title: To the Most Distant Parts: Writing the World in the WWO Corpus
Author: Samuel Diener
Abstract: This exhibit presents a two-stage, mixed-method study of the Women Writers Online corpus to examine how its authors—primarily focusing on British women writers—engage with place and location. The first stage discusses the methodologies used to identify and isolate the various locations within the corpus as a whole. The second stage examines Eliza Haywood’s 18th-century periodical, The Female Spectator, to present an example of how British women understood their role in Britain’s imperialistic endeavours.
Year: 2019
Primary URL: https://wwp.northeastern.edu/context/#diener.distantparts.xml
Primary URL Description: Link to article
Access Model: Open access
Format: Other
Periodical Title: Women Writers in Context
Publisher: Women Writers Project

Women in Charge and Men in Skirts: William Shakespeare, Hannah Cowley, and Performances of Gender (Article)
Title: Women in Charge and Men in Skirts: William Shakespeare, Hannah Cowley, and Performances of Gender
Author: Tabitha Kenlon
Abstract: This exhibit discusses the ways that Hannah Cowley’s plays A Bold Stroke for a Husband and Who’s the Dupe? reinterpret Shakespearean tropes to comment on gender issues, norms, and power dynamics, and therefore can be fruitfully read in juxtaposition with the works of the Bard.
Year: 2019
Primary URL: https://wwp.northeastern.edu/context/#kenlon.performances.xml
Primary URL Description: Link to article
Access Model: Open access
Format: Other
Periodical Title: Women Writers in Context
Publisher: Women Writers Project

New Visualizations for Intertextual Networks (Blog Post)
Title: New Visualizations for Intertextual Networks
Author: Sarah Connell
Abstract: We are very excited to share two new visualizations developed by Nicole Samay and Ana Pastore y Piontti, Network Science Institute, using data from the Intertextual Networks project. Intertextual Networks is a three-year research project funded by a generous grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities, focusing on intertextuality in early women’s writing. This collaborative research initiative examines the citation and quotation practices of the authors represented in Women Writers Online (WWO) to explore and theorize the representation of intertextuality.
Date: 10/31/2019
Primary URL: https://wwp.northeastern.edu/blog/intertextual-viz/
Primary URL Description: Link to the blog post
Secondary URL: https://wwp.northeastern.edu/blog/category/intertextual-networks/
Secondary URL Description: Link to the set of blog posts on the Intertextual Networks award
Blog Title: Women Writers Project: The Blog
Website: Women Writers Project: The Blog

“The Glory of Our Sexe”: Elizabeth I and Early Modern Women Writers (Article)
Title: “The Glory of Our Sexe”: Elizabeth I and Early Modern Women Writers
Author: Andrew Jeromski
Author: Kristen Abbott Bennett
Abstract: Early women writers took up Queen Elizabeth I’s words, ideas, and legacy in a variety of fashions. This exhibit investigates the entwined intertextual networks and historical contexts surrounding the queen to explore how women writers adapted and adopted her memory.
Year: 2020
Primary URL: https://www.wwp.northeastern.edu/context/#bennett.glory.xml
Primary URL Description: Direct link to the article
Secondary URL: https://www.wwp.northeastern.edu/context/
Secondary URL Description: Link to the Women Writers in Context series
Access Model: Open access
Format: Other
Periodical Title: Women Writers in Context
Publisher: Women Writers Project

The “Seeds” of Intertextuality in Seventeenth-Century Women’s Writing: Craft, Philosophy, and Politics (Article)
Title: The “Seeds” of Intertextuality in Seventeenth-Century Women’s Writing: Craft, Philosophy, and Politics
Author: Megan Herrold
Abstract: The word “seeds” serves as a valuable intertextual test case for exploring women’s dissemination of knowledge. The word functions differently in different situations, with linkages to the Bible, herbal practice, and materialism, among other topics.
Year: 2020
Primary URL: https://www.wwp.northeastern.edu/context/#herrold.seeds.xml
Primary URL Description: Direct URL for the article
Secondary URL: http://www.wwp.northeastern.edu/context/
Secondary URL Description: URL for the Women Writers in Context series
Access Model: Open access
Format: Other
Periodical Title: Women Writers in Context
Publisher: Women Writers Project

“‘Context and Connexion’: Encoding Margaret Cavendish in and for the Classroom. (Public Lecture or Presentation)
Title: “‘Context and Connexion’: Encoding Margaret Cavendish in and for the Classroom.
Abstract: Prior to the Cavendish renaissance, Margaret Cavendish—like virtually all early modern women—was excluded from the academic study and teaching of English literature, despite her groundbreaking role as an author and natural philosopher. This systematic erasure has its origins in pedagogical practices developed around the teaching of a canon of male authors and notions of authorship. By gaining a better understanding of this especially bold and productive female author, we also gain insight into problems with equity and representation within higher education. To this end, this panel brings you the paradigm shifting work of Sarah Connell, whose dedication to the Women Writers Online Project (https://www.wwp.northeastern.edu/wwo/) has significantly expanded access to early women writers; and the careful bibliographic and digitization efforts of Liza Blake, whose Margaret Cavendish’s Poems and Fancies, A digital critical edition (http://library2.utm.utoronto.ca/poemsandfancies/) offers the first fully collated and digitized edition of a Cavendish text.
Author: Sarah Connell
Date: 10/23/2020
Location: Virtual webinar
Primary URL: https://www.margaretcavendishsociety.org/post/announcing-the-online-olio-webinars-fall-2020
Primary URL Description: URL for the event announcement and abstract

Textual Re-Modeling: TEI Transformation for Word Embedding Models (Conference Paper/Presentation)
Title: Textual Re-Modeling: TEI Transformation for Word Embedding Models
Author: Sarah Connell
Abstract: This presentation examined the use of text analysis tools in relation to text encoding.
Date: 11/10/2019
Primary URL: https://voices.uchicago.edu/dhcs2019/program/
Primary URL Description: URL for conference program
Conference Name: Chicago Colloquium for Digital Humanities and Computer Science

Mary Moody Emerson’s Almanacks and Women Writers Online: A Casebook on Collaboration. (Conference Paper/Presentation)
Title: Mary Moody Emerson’s Almanacks and Women Writers Online: A Casebook on Collaboration.
Author: Noelle Baker
Author: Sarah Connell
Abstract: This presentation discussed the digital edition of Mary Moody Emerson's Almanacks being jointly produced by its editors and the Women Writers Project; the Almanacks served as an important pilot for encoding complex intertextual gestures within manuscript commonplace books.
Date: 5/25/2019
Primary URL: http://americanliteratureassociation.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/ALA-Boston-2019-30th-Annual-Conference-FINAL.pdf
Primary URL Description: URL for the conference program
Conference Name: American Literature Association

‘How dangerous—sd any thing be ommitted!!!!’: Editing and Encoding the Almanacks of Mary Moody Emerson. (Conference Paper/Presentation)
Title: ‘How dangerous—sd any thing be ommitted!!!!’: Editing and Encoding the Almanacks of Mary Moody Emerson.
Author: Sarah Connell
Abstract: This presentation discussed the encoding of the the WWP's digital edition of the Almanacks of Mary Moody Emerson, which served as a pilot for representing complex intertextual gestures in manuscript commonplace books.
Date: 5/9/2019
Primary URL: https://wmich.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/u434/2019/medieval-congress-program-2019.pdf
Primary URL Description: URL for the full conference program
Conference Name: 54th International Congress on Medieval Studies (Kalamazoo)

Addicted to the Reading of History: Mapping Historiographic Discourse in Women Writers Online (Conference Paper/Presentation)
Title: Addicted to the Reading of History: Mapping Historiographic Discourse in Women Writers Online
Author: Sarah Connell
Abstract: Mapping of intertextual historiographic discourse. No formal abstract available.
Date: 10/26/2017
Conference Name: Sixteenth Century Society and Conference

Intertextual Networks: Theorizing and Encoding Textual Connections in Early Women’s Writing (Conference Paper/Presentation)
Title: Intertextual Networks: Theorizing and Encoding Textual Connections in Early Women’s Writing
Author: Sarah Connell
Author: Julia Flanders
Abstract: Intertextual Networks is an initiative of the Women Writers Project (WWP) at Northeastern University aimed at exploring and theorizing the representation of intertextuality, with a focus on the citation and quotation practices of the authors represented in the WWP’s digital collection, Women Writers Online (WWO). The WWP’s work on Intertextual Networks incorporates several strands: focused projects conducted by individual research collaborators; sustained examination of the modalities of intertextuality as revealed by the work of our staff and collaborators; and a large-scale encoding project creating a bibliography of all the texts named or quoted in WWO, linking the texts in that bibliography with their occurrences in the WWO corpus, and substantially expanding the encoding of intertextual phenomena in our textbase. In this paper, we will discuss the aims and methods of the project, offering models for encoding complex intertextual features and setting out some processes for the systematic application of additional markup to an existing corpus. We will also consider the implications of this project for the larger ecology of digitized collections focused on gender and on women’s writing.
Date: 8/10/2017
Primary URL: https://dh2017.adho.org/abstracts/255/255.pdf
Primary URL Description: URL for conference abstract
Secondary URL: https://dh2017.adho.org/
Secondary URL Description: URL for conference web site
Conference Name: Digital Humanities 2017

‘The Text is Variety’: Contextualizing and Analyzing the Works of Margaret Cavendish with Text Encoding. (Conference Paper/Presentation)
Title: ‘The Text is Variety’: Contextualizing and Analyzing the Works of Margaret Cavendish with Text Encoding.
Author: Sarah Connell
Abstract: This presentation discussed the WWP's use of digital text markup in relation to research on Margaret Cavendish, including the WWP's marking of intertextual reference and self-reference in Cavendish's work.
Date: 6/22/2017
Primary URL: https://856d1722-b008-4d1b-9e3f-5905946ab1f7.filesusr.com/ugd/5c3fb8_dd42d7e054f54c6185b6c9ab7c1167c6.docx?dn=Cavendish%20Schedule%202017-2.docx
Primary URL Description: URL for conference program (Word document)
Secondary URL: https://www.margaretcavendishsociety.org/past-conferences
Secondary URL Description: URL for list of Cavendish Society conferences, including the cited conference,
Conference Name: International Margaret Cavendish Society Conference

In Praise of the Unpredictable: Exploratory Research Methods for Digital Collections (Public Lecture or Presentation)
Title: In Praise of the Unpredictable: Exploratory Research Methods for Digital Collections
Abstract: Using the Women Writers Project as an exemplar, this paper will discuss methods for conducting exploratory research with digital collections and, in particular, for identifying research possibilities that may not have been anticipated by a collection’s original developers. The talk will examine several methods of digital scholarship—including text encoding, data visualization, text analysis at scale, and XML-based transformations—and consider best practices for accessing the rich layers of information available in many digital collections. The paper will conclude with some thoughts on how developers and curators can build collections that will support a broad range of use cases.
Author: Sarah Connell
Date: 2/28/2019
Location: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Primary URL: https://www.hastac.org/opportunities/mit-dh-speaker-series-sarah-connell-praise-unpredictable-exploratory-research-methods
Primary URL Description: URL for event announcement on HASTAC site

‘What Stuff Are You Reading Here?’: Encoding Intertextuality in Early Women’s Texts. (Public Lecture or Presentation)
Title: ‘What Stuff Are You Reading Here?’: Encoding Intertextuality in Early Women’s Texts.
Abstract: None available
Author: Sarah Connell
Date: 2/14/2016
Location: Mahindra Humanities Center, Harvard University

Writing, Reception, Intertextuality: Networking Women’s Writing. (Article)
Title: Writing, Reception, Intertextuality: Networking Women’s Writing.
Author: Sarah Connell
Author: Julia Flanders
Abstract: Reading has received renewed scrutiny in the digital age, a result of the defamiliarization of the medium that has also brought about a rethinking of what is meant by “text,” “book,” and “author.” Fascination with large-scale data analysis has shifted attention toward modes of reading that sample the source to produce a statistical artifact from which we can in turn read clusterings of words, shifts in topic or register, or changing orthographic habits. These remote reading practices, however, fail to capitalize on valuable modeling of the individual text, but more recently researchers have been exploring ways of bringing these two ends of the digital spectrum into closer conversation. This article explores the study of readership and reception of pre-Victorian women’s writing through these emerging digital methods, examining two collections (Women Writers Online and Women Writers in Review) related to early women’s writing with large-scale analytical methods that engage with the detailed textual models in these collections’ metadata and markup.
Year: 2020
Primary URL: https://read.dukeupress.edu/jmems/article/50/1/161/150362/Writing-Reception-IntertextualityNetworking-Women
Primary URL Description: URL for the article
Secondary URL: https://read.dukeupress.edu/jmems
Secondary URL Description: URL for the journal
Access Model: Subscription
Format: Journal
Periodical Title: Journal of Medieval and Early Modern Studies
Publisher: Duke University Press

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