Clementine Pursey

I am a third-year PhD candidate funded by the Learning Anglo-French project, working on the multilingual culture of Lacock Abbey in the fourteenth century. My research focuses on the female monastic reception of Yale University, Beinecke Library, MS Osborn a56, a trilingual manuscript containing language-learning and didactic texts. I am especially interested in connecting with other researchers working on this manuscript and welcome any correspondence on the subject. 

My broader research interests include female agency in legendary histories, pre-modern applications of criticial disability theory, and feminist psychoanalysis. 

Before I joined Exeter, I completed a BA in French and History at Aberystwyth University (2019-23), and an MLitt in Modern Languages at the University of St Andrews (2023-24). 

Previous Conference Papers:

'"La pucele ausi socourez, et en chastete la maintenez": Crusader Courtoisie for English Nuns in L'Ordene de Chevalerie,' International Courtly Literature Society Congress, Université Paul Valéry Montpellier 3, July 2026.

'Nun the Wiser: Moulding Monastics at Lacock Abbey,' Society for French Studies Conference, University of Leicester, July 2026.

'Nun-Fiction: Literary Lessons at Lacock Abbey,' International Congress of Medieval Studies, Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo, May 2026.

'How to Use Powerful Men to Get What You Want: Female Voice and Authority in Wace's Roman de Brut and Roman de Rou,' Society for French Studies Conference, University of Bristol, July 2025.

'"eschuez flatour ki seet flater": Cultivating Thirteenth-Century Female Behaviour in Walter de Bibbesworth's Tretiz,' Society for French Studies Postgraduate Conference, King's College London, May 2025.