Dr. Jenny Rytting

Professor

Assistant Chair

Courses Taught

Education

• Ph.D. English; Arizona State University, 2005
  • Dissertation: “Hearing the Word”: Julian of Norwich and the Medieval English Sermon Tradition
• M.A. English; Acadia University, 1996
  • Thesis: “Famous in Legend and Story”: Robin McKinley’s Portrayal of Heroes
• B.A. (Honors), English; Brigham Young University, 1995, Magna Cum Laude
  • Honors Thesis: A Study of Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice from a Perspective of Psychological Type (Or, Six Characters in Search of a Psychologist)

Academic Interests

• Early British Literature
• Medieval Visionary Literature
• The History of the English Language
• Children’s and Young Adult Literature
• Jane Austen and her contemporaries

Scholarly Activity

Edited Collections

• Voaden, Rosalynn, René Tixier, Teresa Sanchez Roura, and Jenny Rebecca Rytting, eds. The Medieval Translator 8. Turnhout: Brepols, 2003.

Articles

• “A Rock-Solid Foundation: Building Personal Construct Systems in Pride and Prejudice.” Persuasions, vol. 45, 2023, pp. 35-47.
• “The Other Siblings in Sense and Sensibility.” Persuasions, vol. 44, 2022, pp. 122-32.
• “Lost Sheep, Lost Coins, and Lost Meanings.” BYU Studies Quarterly. Vol. 60, no. 4, 2021, pp. 41-64.
• “‘Pretty Fairly Divided Between the Sexes’: Jane Austen on Gender.” Persuasions, vol. 41, 2019, pp. 50-61.
• “Jane, Bingley, and the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, Or, the Other Couple in Pride and Prejudice.” Persuasions On-Line, vol. 39. no. 1, Winter 2018.
• “Dialect Translation in the Manuscripts of The Reeve’s Tale.”  The Medieval Translator15. Ed. Alessandra Petrina and Monica Santini.  Turnhout: Brepols, 2013.  247-62. With Patricia L. Drews.
• “Cognition and Recognition in King Lear IV.vii.” Quidditas 31 (2010): 233-38. Web.
•  “The Christian Context of Julian of Norwich’s ABCs.”  Mystics Quarterly 34.3-4 (2008): 71-84.
• “Parallel Parables: Julian of Norwich’s Lord and Servant and the Biblical Good Samaritan.”  The Medieval Translator 10.  Ed. Jacqueline Jenkins.  Turnhout: Brepols, 2007.  95-107.
• “In Search of the Perfect Spouse: John Gower’s Confessio Amantis as a Marriage Manual.”  The Dalhousie Review 82 (2002): 113-26.  Reprint in Poetry Criticism 59 (2005): 106-13.
• “Pearl and the Translation of Scriptural Paraphrase.”  The Medieval Translator 8.  Ed. Rosalynn Voaden, René Tixier, Teresa Sanchez Roura, and Jenny Rebecca Rytting.  Turnhout: Brepols, 2003.  281-93.
• “Jane Austen Meets Carl Jung: Pride, Prejudice, and Personality Theory.”  Persuasions: The Jane Austen Journal On-Line, vol. 22, no. 1, Winter 2001.

Encyclopedia entry

• “An A.B.C.” The Chaucer Encyclopedia. Edited by Richard Newhauser. Wiley-Blackwell, 2023.

Translations

• “An English Translation of ‘Forunderligt at sige.’”  Grundtvig Studier, 2012, pp. 145-48.
• “A Disputacioun betwyx þe Body and Wormes: A Translation.”  Comitatus vol. 31, 2000, pp. 219-34. Reprint in An Introduction to Medieval England, by Jennifer McNabb, U of Toronto P, forthcoming.

Selected Recent Conference Presentations

• “Where in the World is Austen Annotated?” Jane Austen Society of North America AGM: Austen, Annotated. Cleveland, OH. 18-20 October 2024. With Maria Biajoli.
• “Medieval Devotional Practices in Modern Monastic Contexts.” Mid-America Medieval Association: The Medieval Out of Time and Place.  UMKC, Kansas City, MO. 20-21 Sept 2024.
• “Loving-Kindness in Language and Thought.” The Cardiff Conference on the Theory and Practice of Translation in the Middle Ages. Lisbon, Portugal. 17-22 June 2024.
• “A Rock-Solid Foundation: Building Personal Construct Systems in Pride and Prejudice.” Jane Austen Society of North America Annual General Meeting: Pride and Prejudice: A Rocky Romance. Denver, CO. 3-5 November 2023.
• “The Other Siblings in Sense and Sensibility.” Jane Austen Society of North America Annual General Meeting: Sense and Sensibility in the City of Gardens. Victoria, BC. 30 September-2 October 2022.
• “‘Pretty fairly divided between the sexes’: Jane Austen on Gender.” Jane Austen Society of North America Annual General Meeting: 200 Years of Northanger Abbey—“Real, Solemn History.” Williamsburg, VA. 4-6 October 2019.
• “Equally Happy in the City or the Country, Or, The Other Couple in Pride and Prejudice.” Midwestern American Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies Conference: The City in the Eighteenth Century.  Kansas City, MO.  17-19 October 2014.

Invited Lectures

• “A Rock-Solid Foundation: Building Personal Construct Systems in Pride and Prejudice.” Jane Austen Society of North America, Metropolitan Kansas City Region Birthday Tea, Kansas City, MO, 16 December 2023.
• “Overlooked Foils in Austen’s Fiction.” Jane Austen Society of North America, Nebraska Region Birthday Tea, Omaha, NE, 10 December 2022.
• “Jane Austen on Gender: ‘Pretty fairly divided between the sexes.’” Jane Austen Society of North America, Metropolitan Kansas City Region, Zoom, 9 October 2021.
• “‘Pretty fairly divided between the sexes’: Jane Austen on Gender.” Jane Austen Society of North America, Iowa Region, Des Moines, IA, 7 August 2021.
• Discussion leader, “Austen’s Juvenilia: Volume the First,” Jane Austen Society of North America, Metropolitan Kansas City Region, 29 February 2020. With Jenni Frangos.
• Discussion leader, “One by Jane: Northanger Abbey,” Jane Austen Society of North America, Metropolitan Kansas City Region, 28 January 2017.

Other Professional Experience

• Editorial Board Member, BYU Studies, 2021-present
• Reader, Studies in Medieval and Renaissance Teaching, 2012-present
• President, Faculty Senate, Northwest Missouri State University, 2019-2020
• President, Maryville Public Library Board, Maryville, Missouri, 2021-2023
• Trustee, Maryville Public Library Board, Maryville, Missouri, 2015-2024