Miyashiro, Adam. "Comparative epics: Teaching El Cantar de Mio Cid." Throughlines. www.throughlines.org/suite-content/comparative-epics-teaching-el-cantar-de-mio-cid. [Date accessed].

Comparative epics: Teaching El Cantar de Mio Cid

Expanding and complicating the crusades rhetoric in medieval Europe.

Download the transcript
Adam Miyashiro
Stockton University

The 13th-century heroic narrative, El Poema de Mio Cid, was set in the culturally diverse landscape of the Iberian Peninsula. It takes place in the late 11th century, during the southward expansion of the Kingdom of Castile. When teaching The Cid, it is important to pay close attention to the differences in how Muslims are depicted in this poem, particularly in comparison to how they are represented in La Chanson de Roland. Students are asked: what work is the poem doing within its historical context? How is this text later used to develop a Spanish national identity?

Further learning

Video

Teaching the medieval epic

Teaching The Epic of Sunjata alongside La Chanson de Roland and El Poema de Mio Cid helps students decenter Euorpe and gain a deeper understanding of the complexities of the medieval world.

Adam Miyashiro
Essay

Representations of Muslims in El Poema de Mio Cid

El Poema de Mio Cid, when taught contrapuntally with La Chanson de Roland and The Epic of Sunjata, reveals complex and layered representations of Muslims in the medieval Iberian Peninsula.

‍

Adam Miyashiro

Recommended

Activity

The epic assignment

Dennis Britton's epic assignment asks students to collaboratively write an epic poem, considering the possibilities and limitations of the epic genre for defining who we are—or want to be—in our present moment. 

‍

Dennis Britton
Video

Juxtaposing Chaucer

Seeta Chaganti offers an introduction to her "untimely juxtaposition" method, which places Chaucer's texts next to modern artifacts like film, visual art, and contemporary literature to open new avenues of exploration and discussion with students.

Seeta Chaganti
RaceB4Race Highlight

Muslims and racial profiling in early modern England

Hassana Moosa here draws upon the critical tools of premodern critical race studies and Shakespeare studies to investigate genealogies of early modern race-making as they pertain to Muslims.

Hassana Moosa

Selected annotated bibliography