'His Princess': An ArthurianFamily Drama

AMY S. KAUFMAN

Modesty movements in the United States have begun to rely on afragmented and bowdlerized pastiche of Arthuriana to enforce the chastityof adolescent girls and elevate the status of fathers. The Purity Ball, whichfunctions as the official public ceremony of modesty movements, inscribesthe young girl's body as a holy grail with the power to heal her father'swounded manhood. (ASK)

The 2O12 Republican presidential primaries in the United States haveshifted the entire nation's focus to women's bodies. Anti-abortion

legislation, birth control debates, and public denouncements of individualwomen's behavior are weaving a narrative that insists on the urgency ofregulating female sexuality. Many Americans feel as though this narrative hasarisen from nowhere, a relic of the past or the invention of a few candidateswho represent outliers, who lean so far to the right that they are in danger offalling off a cliff of radical misogyny so backwards, so medieval, that votersare sure to reject them in the November 2012 election. But anyone who hasstudied the extreme right wing of the American evangelical movement overthe last few years and the quiet way that its rhetoric and tropes have permeatedthe corporate and cultural mainstream is far from surprised, and accordingly,far less optimistic about American voters.

Most grocery stores, pharmacies, and airports in the American southfeature a circular rack of books with strikingly medieval covers decoratedin mounted knights, flower-draped princesses, swords, shields, and castles.The covers may resemble Harlequin romance period pieces, but the contentswithin are products of a religious movement whose commercial manifestationsinclude training manuals for being a better Christian using medievalism asone's muse. A few scholars who have studied medieval themes in Americanmasculinity movements (including Susan Aronstein, Laurie A. Finke andMartin B. Shichtman, and myself) have identified a perceived crisis ofmasculine identity that results in the anxious embrace of medievalism infilm, toys, literature, and education.' But over the last few years, the radicalwing of the evangelical movement has made an even more anxious shift fromnurturing masculinity in its men and boys to containing the sexuality of its

ARTHURIANA 2 2 . 3 ( 2 O I 2 )

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adolescent girls as a means of empowering grown men. For in the twenty—firstcentury, it seems a growing number of fathers find their masculinity 'healed,'their role as head of the household restored, and themselves re-empoweredby taking possession of their daughters' chastity.

Though the amplified focus on female chastity has become a culturalcommonplace in the United States, it originated with the rise of the Americanbiblical patriarchy movement. 'Biblical patriarchy movement' is not a genericterm, nor is it a label made up by feminists. This movement named itself.And as the website for Vision Family Forum, a commercial and spiritualleader in the patriarchy movement, explains, it has emerged in response to aperceived crisis in fatherhood:

The defining crisis of our age is the systematic annihilation of the Biblicalfamily... Minimize the father and the family will perish... .The sad truth is thatbroken and weak families are the norm even within the most conservative anddoctrinally orthodox church assemblies. This is in large part due to the deathof Biblical patriarchy with its emphasis on father-directed vision, leadership,and self-sacrifice.̂

Members of the patriarchy movement commit to father-led householdswith submissive wives. The movement's children are home-schooled by theirmothers, although once boys reach adolescence, they move into Christianschools because of the biblical proscription in l Timothy 2:12, 'suffer nota woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man.'' And biblicalpatriarchy tenet number twenty-three (out of twenty-six) dictates that chastedaughters remain the property of their fathers until the father selects a suitablehusband.•* Young women in this movement are trained to see their virginityas a commodity—not as their possession to protect, but as property ownedand traded by their fathers and future husbands.

The patriarchy movement also elevates the idea of the Middle Ages asan ideal past. The movement itself, however, is less medieval and moreneomedieval, for it appropriates and redefines medieval signs to its ownends and then calls it history, creating not only contemporary doctrinebut a genuine semiotic shift in terms of its members' understanding of thepast.' Sleeping Beauty and the Five Questions, an instructional audio CDnarrated by one of the leaders of the Patriarchy Movement, Douglas WPhillips, exemplifies the movement's conflicted relationship with history'The description of the CD explains that it contains an allegorical story that'challenges fathers on the importance of guarding their daughters' hearts atall costs' ('heart' is a common euphemism for virginity in this movement)and explains 'how to prepare them as a bride.'^The cover features a doctoredversion of Edmund Leighton's famous 1901 painting The Accolade (see Figures1 and 2). Like many Vision Family Forum products, this CD exploits a

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FIGURE I : LEIGHTONS THE ACCOLADE

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eepineBeauty andthe Five Questions

FIGURE 2: PHILLIPS CD COVER

double-refraction of the Middle Ages, a paternally-empowered revision of itsbowdlerized Victorian manifestations. Lei^hzons Accolade hiLS been modifiedto elevate the young man in the painting by raising him above the princesswhile subduing the young woman by positioning her beneath the man andremoving the formidable sword from her hand. The face of a bearded man inLeighton's background has also been brought into prominence, representingthe father who oversees the woman's obedient exchange to her prince. Nolonger a courtly image in which a mystical maiden knights the boy who bowsbeneath her, Phillips' CD cover revises history and art so that they seemto endorse the patriarchy movement's inextricably interwoven messages offemale submission, father rule, and revisionist medievalism. And it is alteredhistories and co-opted images like this that are perfectly suited to permeatemainstream popular culture.

Evangelical femininity, unlike its masculine counterpart, has particularcommercial appeal based on its use of the medieval princess as symboliccollateral. The rituals and products associated with the modesty movementexploit the fact that the princess, a signifier with which most young girls'lives are already alarmingly saturated, can be used to indoctrinate women into

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embracing their role as chaste, obedient property. Bestselling author SheriRose has created Fiis Princess ministries, which along with events, workshops,educational videos, and jewelry, produces the His Princess: Love Letters FromYour King line of books. These books feature inspirational letters from Godto a young woman, 'His Princess,' about how to remain modest and chasteas well as beautiful. The latest installment is entitled Fit for My King: HisPrincess ¡0-Day Diet Plan and Devotional!^ (As if to reinforce the theme offeminine bodily denial, the cover oi Fit for My King\% decorated with an emptyplate.) And then there's Dannah Gresh's Secret Keeper GV/book series and itseducational 'Modesty Project,' which, like His Princess, is part interactivewebsite, part event, and part storefront.'" Gresh's outfit markets books likeSecret Keeper: The Delicate Power of Modesty and orchestrates rallies and eventsaimed at teaching young women how to control their bodies." The SecretKeeper Girl^t\>úxz even contains a convenient 'Truth or Bare Fashion Tests!'page, which helps girls judge whether their outfits (and presumably, the outfitsof their peers) are too revealing.'^ Despite their empowering language. HisPrincess and Secret Keeper Girl focus on the physical and moral constrictionof a young girl's sexual potential.

Both Secret Keeper Girl and His Princess also place female children withinan allegorical story in which they are princesses meant to submit to God,their 'King.' And make no mistake—it is an erotically charged submission,in which a young woman's good behavior is cast as the reciprocal feminineresponse to His courtly overtures. Secret Keeper Girl Intern Laura Bryanposted this assessment of a Secret Keeper rally on the organization's blog:

What a night Secret Keeper Girls! What a blast learning about God's Truth! Itis so fun every night telling the gids that they are the beautiful maiden in the'Prince and the Peasant.' Seeing the reactions on your faces is PRICELESS!That story is so true girls, Jesus left His home in heaven to come to earth towoo you. The question is, how are you going to respond?''

As the Secret Keeper Girl website explains amidst pink and green floralembellishments, the Modesty Project grooms young women to view theirbodies as prizes to be awarded to a man in marriage: 'A Secret Keeper Girlvalues modesty, she surrounds herself with wise friends and she embracesGodly beauty. So, she keeps the deepest secrets of her beauty for just oneman.''-* But if Jesus has 'come to woo' the Secret Keeper Girl, for whom,precisely, is she meant to keep the deepest secrets of her beauty? Thesemovements, after all, do not condone lifelong chastity, but the preservationof one's 'secret' for the man in one's life, a hypothetical future man who is fartoo often conflated with a very material, present man, the young girl's father.

It is the twenty-third tenet of biblical patriarchy, and its correspondingeducational products and rituals for girls, that seems to be permeating

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mainstream America. The importance of fathers guarding their daughters'virginity is such a popular message that millions of books, films, pieces ofjewelry, t-shirts, and even underpants have been sold to promote it. Butmodesty paraphernalia also combines the erotics of female submission with anemphasis on the role of the father in the containment of his daughter's chastity.Amidst the patriarchy movement's chaotic neomedievalism lurks a moresinister semiotic confusion, the ambiguous amalgamation of God the Father,God the Suitor, a young woman's future husband, and the biological father.The prince of classic Disney fame has been displaced as an inappropriate sexualobject and replaced by God/the Father/your King, a figure who symbolizesthe omnipotence of fatherhood via his medieval monarchical manifestation.And it is the public and increasingly common formal ritual of the patriarchymovement, an event called the Purity Ball, that officially seals the transferof a young woman's sexuality into the hands of her father, who is cast as anempowered archetypal knight, king, and courtly suitor.

SOME ENCHANTED EVENING

The Purity Ball is a medieval-themed prom at which daughters pledge theirvirginity to their fathers, who promise to 'cover' it, cherish it, and keep itsafe until it can be passed to a suitable husband. Individual purity balls areheld in cities and towns all over the United States as annual events and theirnumbers are growing.'' The ball was developed in 1998 by Randy Wilson ofGenerations of Light Ministry in Colorado Springs, but the phenomenonhas spread all over the United States and is extending beyond nationalborders: a group called the Fatherhood Foundation is even trying to launchpurity balls in Australia."^ While the mainstream media has focused on theincestuous overtones of the event, feminist scholars have been quick to notethe implications of the commodification and exchange of virginity embeddedin the ritual.'^ As Breanne Fahs explains, '[t]hese ceremonies—in whichwomen essentially "matry" their fathers (until their wedding day, when theyare given away), sign chastity pledges, and accept rings or other jewelry thatliterally marks their body as property— situate women and their bodies ina model of sexual commerce.''* And the Purity Ball is the social lodestoneof a community in which the exchange of women is becoming more andmore common: Vision Forum conferences, religious retreats, and the ballsthemselves are used as sites for patriarchal networking, where fathers establishbonds with other fathers and use each other to find suitors for their daughters.''Among some families, the daughter's status as commodity is sealed withmoney: a bride price paid to the father by the suitor is a growing practice.^"

The Purity Ball is the ritual that prepares daughters for a journey into boththe medieval symbolic and their status as collateral by combining mainstream

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princess imagery with the radically conservative rhetoric of female submission.The ritualized colonization of the bodies of daughters enacted at the ball isencoded through the same neomedieval rhetoric, the same romanticizedrelations between princesses and Kings, and the same conflation of God andfathers noted in the commercial products described above. For instance, anadvertisement for the Columbia, South Carolina annual Purity Ball luresyoung readers with the combination biblical and fairy tale caption, 'TheKing is Enthralled by Your Beauty....' Its description of the event is equallyenchanting:

Imagine that just for one night, you are a princess....you carefully dress inyour most magnificent gown, and ride off into the sunset....The Purity Ballwill be an elegant evening where father-figures will rise to the challenge oftestifying their love for their daughters, their desire to protect them, and theircommitment to guiding them in remaining abstinent until marriage."

It may be that the 'King' who is 'enthralled' with the daughter indicatesGod Himself, but this manifests very materially in the young woman's date,her dad, for whom she is 'carefully' dressing and who is riding 'off into thesunset' at her side. An announcement for the Central Illinois 2012 ball is lessseductive and far less ambiguous, eschewing the elevation of the young girl'sbeauty in favor of elevating her chastity, revealing in the process the true aimof the Purity Ball, the empowerment of fathers. Its flowery website decoratedwith girls in tiaras reads.

It is our pleasure to hold high the banner of purity in the midst of a culturethat destroys it....The Bible lays the responsibility of protecting daughtersat the feet of their fathers. We desire to charge men to take up this mantleof responsibility! God thinks the protection of a woman's purity should beextravagant and so do we!"

The Facebook rhetoric casts a daughter's virginity as a quest object to befought for, and this is an empowering quest—not empowering to the youngwoman whose body is in question, but to her adult father who, by virtue ofthis symbolic ritual, comes to own her.

Though the Purity Ball seems to invite the daughter to indulge in thefantasy that she is a medieval princess, the ceremonies at the ball and muchof the formal language therein focus on promoting the father's 'knightly'power, strength, and abilities. Indeed, Purity Ball proponents often revealhow empowering they find the ritual for themselves when they talk aboutthe event. As Kevin Moore, Randy Wilson's second-in-command of thePurity Ball in Colorado Springs explains, '[i]t feels royal. I've never beento Buckingham Palace, okay, but if I had a picture of knighthood and,you know, chivalry and manliness, I wanted her to have that. I want herto have all ofthat for herself'-' But clearly, there is a little something in it

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for Moore too, who has a custom statue on his living room table with hisown face on a muscular medieval knight's body. The statue wields a giant,downward-pointing broadsword that covers the face of the tiny female childhiding between his feet.̂ "* Another father interviewed in the New York Timeswas quite open about his own rewards, saying, '[i]t's also good for me Itinspires me to be spiritual and moral in turn. If I'm holding them to suchhigh standards, you can be sure I won't be cheating on their mother.'^' Thisfather's spiritual strength and his own sexual continence are inextricably tiedto his daughter's sexual purity, a disturbing interdependency that only makessense within a symbolic economy in which virginity is a priceless and fragilecommodity that empowets its owner.

A man's power over his daughter's virginity is troublingly eroticized by thePurity Ball and its accompanying practices. Fathers within this movementembrace their role as courtly suitor, some even taking the daughter on regulardates to ensure her fidelity.^'' Randy Wilson, the founder, believes that a father'splace in his daughter's life is too often usurped by his daughter's sexual interestin other men, even though he believes that interest is fundamentally passive:

There's a core question that the feminine, if you will, the woman has in their[sic] being that needs to be answered, and that is, "[a]m I beautiful? Am Iworthy of being pursued?" Because they do go through that time where theyfeel awkward—they don't feel beautiful. It must be enforced by the father, theman in their life. If they do not get that enforced, reinforced by their father,they will go outside the home to get the answer to that question.̂ ^

The Purity Ball ensures that a woman remains a man's property by 'marrying'her to her father, who can 'enforce' her status as a beautiful object worthy ofpursuit. Indeed, the Purity Ball's closest analogue is that original patriarchalexchange, a wedding, and the event borrows many marital tropes (includingthe wedding cake served as dessert).^* Fathers present their daughters withgifts such as an expensive purity ring intended to be worn until the girl'sactual wedding or a charm necklace consisting of a tiny lock and key. Thedaughter wears the lock and the father takes the key, which he presents to hisdaughter's husband on their wedding day.^' Fathers recite carefully-composedformal verbal oaths when they presents these gifts such as the oath writtenby father Jerry Forte for his own daughter:

[The ring] is in the form of a shield, symbolizing my commitment to protectand shield you from the enemy. Inside the shield is a heart, which is yourheart, which I am covering. Across the heart are a key and a sword—the keyis the key to your heart, which I will safeguard until your wedding day, andthe sword is the protection I pledge to you On your wedding day, I will givethis ring to your husband. I love you, my jewel, my princess.'"

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Weddings may be a decorative inspiration for the Purity Ball, but whatauthorizes the event, the exchange, and the ceremony itself is symbolicmedievalism. Note how medieval imagery in this particular father's oathweaves a web of signs that naturalizes female submission with the weight ofhistory: the shield 'protects' from 'the enemy'; the jewel is a prized possessionof the father's that indicates his royalty and wealth, serving perhaps as adecoration in his crown; the father is 'covering' the girl's heart—and rememberthat 'heart' is a euphemism, for the girl's 'heart' cannot be injured so long asher virginity remains intact; and the key locks the princess in a tower, notuntil she is rescued by her prince but until her father permits her to leave.'The enemy' remains ambiguous. It usually indicates Satan and his forces,but when paired with this father's 'covering' and 'closing' metaphors, it seemsto imply that the father may be shielding the girl against herself.

Randy Wilson, the ball's founder, introduces the covenant ceremony, atwhich all the fathers present take a group oath, with a sermon that encodes thegirl's body as the both the erotic territory and reward for their fathers' battles:

I've read in the Word that the enemy comes to kill, steal, and destroy, buttonight we, as men, will stand between his evil schemes and life and freedomfor our daughters. Our daughters are waiting for strong fathers to cherishthem and express their worth and value. They are waiting for you to stop andlook in their eyes. This generation of fathers can, and I believe, will take backterritory that the enemy has stolen.''

This is how the commodification and exchange of daughters 'heals' brokenmen: by casting them as heroic conquerors. Crusaders taking back the holyland of their daughters' bodies from 'the enemy,' which might be Satan,sin, feminism, or some combination of the three. The intense ritualizationof the Purity Ball event celebrates a transfer of erotic power from girls tomen, which also reveals the motivation for reinstating an archaic system ofpatriarchal exchange. This ritual does not pretend that a father has automaticdominion over his daughter's chastity; instead, it recognizes that conquestof the commodity itself supplies a man's power. And that power is the onething guaranteed to heal the wound to patriarchy left over from that thigh-piercing spear hurled by human rights; in short, female virginity is the biblicalpatriarchy movement's Holy Grail.

THE HOLY GRAIL

The core symbolism of the Purity Ball is not merely medieval; it draws onArthurian semiotics to interpret the daughter's virgin body as an objectimbued with the power to heal wounded fathers, and through them,patriarchy itself. Though the minor details of each event will vary dependingon the organization and location, most Purity Balls contain three ceremonialelements that encode the dance as a quest for the daughter's pure, intact

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body, a body that promises to heal the man who claims it, visually inscribingthe passage of a girl's chastity into the hands of her father and God as thesurrender of redemptive blood that will heal a wounded king. The firstelement is called the 'cross dance,' in which young girls—younger than thesexually maturing daughters who serve as their fathers' dates—parade into theballroom wearing white tutus and carrying a giant cross. They erect the crosson a stand, cover it with white drapes and a crown of thorns, then perform adance around their offering. The ceremony is otherworldly. Like the randomgrail maidens in Malory's Morte Darthur, the anonymous dancers evoke thecommencement of a healing miracle from God. Charlie Gillis, who coveredthe story for Maclean's, points out that the dance around the cross seems likenothing so much as a fertiliry ritual around a giant phallus.'^ Yet one can alsorecognize Christian symbolism that sets the stage for a sacrifice, the Christlikeshedding of blood that heals.

Every Purity Ball features the group covenant described in the previoussection, which Randy Wilson's website calls '[o]ne of the most memorablehighlights of the ball.' The covenant seems inspired by medieval chivalricoaths, but the fathers' promise of protection in this covenant thinly veils thefact that the ceremony celebrates a man's own empowerment in exchangefor his daughter's surrender:

Our daughters are princesses, and they are covered by the authority andheadship of their fathers. We pray a wall of protection around our girls thatthey would not give in to a moment that will destroy their lives. Father, guardthe feminine, vulnerable, dependent spirits that You created in them."

The fathers' physical contact with their daughters during the covenant, as wellas the act of encircling and enclosing them, also indicate that the father's verbaloath of protection is accompanied by the silent surrender of the daughter tothe prison he and the other men in his community create around her body:

The fathers stand in the middle of the ballroom and form a circle around theirdaughters standing all aglow in their lovely ball gowns. The fathers place theirhands on their daughters, and together we pray for purity of mind, body, andsoul for generations to come."

Being declared a princess at this event means undergoing a ritual act ofsubmission for the social and generational good, the strength of the familyand the community. Although patriarchy movement leaders claim that aman's 'Biblical Headship' is supposed to include servant leadership, nothingin Purity Ball rhetoric actually encourages fathers to be Christlike. Instead,it is the daughters who are called to sacrifice.

The sacrifice of virgin blood is symbolically realized during the thirdstep of the ritual, when daughters must pass through an archway of crossedswords held by other men. The girls, carrying white flowers, are led through

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the swords by their fathers. Then the daughters kneel beneath the swordsand yield their flowers to the foot of the cross. Wilson's Generations of Lightwebsite exacerbates the confusion between God and the family father duringthis ceremony: 'The daughters silently commit to live pure lives before Godthrough the symbol of laying down a white rose at the cross, as we believethe purity of the daughters rests on the shoulders of the fathers.'" Theflower of female purity is sacrificed under the supervision of the medievalphallus—the swords wielded by other fathers in the community—whitepetals collecting on the ballroom floor like spilt blood.'*^ Flowers stand forchastity in this symbolic economy, just like everywhere else, but they alsostand for something more: a magical power, a virginity that heals. In fact.Randy Wilson's three daughters elaborate on this floral symbolism in theirrecent book. Purely Woman: Awakening the Heart of God through Pure Livingin Our Generation, which features a single white water lily on its cover. Theirintroduction explains the image:

The most interesting thing about the water lily is that it is used to purify thewater from poisonous heavy metals. It can also serve as mini-waste treatmentplants [sic] for wastewater from household or industrial sources. God'smiraculous design for this flower is a striking picture of our call to purity.'''

Striking, indeed: the girl's chaste body, her 'flower' equated to a flower, is itselfa healing vessel, one that 'filters out' the world's toxins and channels God'sgoodness. But the flower in this analogy exists only to purify the world forothers. God put it here, the Wilson sisters imply, merely to heal what is tainted,spoiled, or weak. The father may promise to protect his princess, but it is hisdaughter's body that serves as the vehicle for his redemption. Her sacrificedpower cleanses him of sin. The Purity Ball transforms the girl's virgin bodyinto a holy relic that imbues her father with power; her blood will heal herfather, her King, by restoring the symbolic power of the wounded patriarch,a patriarch who believes he has been castrated by modernity.

HAPPILY EVER AFTER?

The Learning Channel aired a special on purity balls when they first startedmaking headlines in 2008. After the special, one online commentator quipped,'This is like some demented blending of boys playing "King Arthur's Knights,"ceremonial religious vows. Princess Barbie and sex ed all rolled into one. Ick.'"*This comment underscores the obvious pastiche of bowdlerized Arthuriana,religious ritual, and contemporary constructions of femininity on which thePurity Ball relies to 'historicize' itself It constructs a fantasy past in whichall women are beautiful princesses and all men are brave knights, and wherethe adultery and incest inherent in medieval Arthurian legend are ostensiblyerased—ostensibly erased, but not actually.

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The Purity Ball ceremony encodes young women and their virginity withthe collateral status of many of the marriageable woman in Arthurian legend."The patriarchy movement indulges itself in the rhetoric of'hopeful' Arthurianbeginnings: Guenevere traded to Arthur with a table, legions of sacrificedmaidens, Elaine's conception of Galahad for her father. Yet the symboliclexicon of the Purity Ball admits only two available roles: The King and HisPrincess. It celebrates virgins and kings, rendering both sexually maturing boysand sexually mature women invisible. By disappearing the maternal function,teaching girls to submit to the exchange of their virginal bodies between Godand man, sexualizing the 'princess' in the eyes of her father, and practicallybegging the son to fantasize about achieving his father's power, the Purity Ballrecreates incestuous dramas both medieval and Oedipal, setting the stage forequally Arthurian ttagic endings: Morgause's execution by her son, Arthur'sbetrayal by his favorite knight, the king's murder by his own seed.

The mothet's sexuality, equally as powerful as the daughter's, is also equalin its potential for destruction if the woman should reclaim it — and as agrown woman, she may be more inclined to do so. If the biblical patriarchymovement's greatest hope is in the healing power of the virginal daughter, itsgreatest fear is the transgressive power of the adulterous wife. Kathryn Joyce,the authot of Quiverfull: Inside the Christian Patriarchy Movement, an exposéof patriarchal communities in the United States, details at great length theway that these communities demonize adulteresses. Women who lapse areexcommunicated and are inundated with death threats. The recitation andrepetition of biblical verses against 'loose' women are used as communalprophylactics against adultery, such as Proverbs 5:3-5: 'For the lips of a loosewoman drip honey, and her speech is smoother than oil; but in the end sheis bitter as wormwood, sharp as a two-edged sword. Her feet go down todeath; her steps follow the path to Sheol,' a verse that is 'sometimes read aloudeach day a child is growing up, training children of both sexes to despise the"wrong" sort of woman.''*"

The sons of the patriarchy movement, meanwhile, are simultaneouslymarginalized and taught to covet their fathers' masculine authority. The PurityBall itself casts boys as silent voyeurs, as Wilson explains: 'Every year we invitethe sons to attend the Ball to watch the way their fathers treat young women,and have had many attend with their families because we believe this standardis also important for young men to live out in their lives.'"*' While there isno official public ceremony for boys, Wilson describes a family ritual thathe conducts for his own sons when they turn twelve called 'Brave Heart of aWarrior,' which involves 'The Presentation of Symbols,' a purity ring and asword."*̂ The ring is an interesting equalizer, one indicating the importanceof chastity for children of both genders, but it renders a conflicted messageof denial and delay when presented along with the second symbol, a sword

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too big and too dangerous for the son to wield. Wilson recounts the storyof his first son's ceremony: 'At that time the immense sword was almost hisheight. I explained to him that although he could not wage war right nowwith this imposing sword, he would grow into the weight of the swordjust as he would grow into the weight of manhood.'"*' Surely sons who areinstructed to covet the giant phallus, which is simultaneously offered andwithheld, who are instructed to keep themselves chaste and silently watch astheir fathers abandon their mothers to 'court' their sisters, are destined foran Oedipal conflict so severe that even Freud and Mordred would be awedby the implications.

Like the medieval Arthurian legend with which these contemporary ritualsauthorize themselves, the Biblical Patriarchy movement casts shadows thathint at its inevitable destruction. Families bonding under these rigid, ritualisticterms are unlikely to live happily ever after, and the movement itself may bedestined to crumble under the desires it pretends to circumvent: the adulterouspotential of princesses who find themselves invisible when they becomequeens, the Oedipal desires of the son who lurks in his father's all-powerfulshadow, and the incest inherent in a system that marks all women as sexual,exchangeable, and vulnerable the moment they begin to bud.

MIDDLE TENNESSEE STATE UNIVERSITY

Amy S. Kaufman is Assistant Professor of English at Middle Tennessee StateUniversity where she teaches Early European Literature. She is the author of severalarticles on medieval Arthurian legend and medievalism in popular culture as wellas the editor of the 2010 Year's Work in Medievalism and chair of the medieval andArthurian areas for the National Popular and American Culture Association.

NOTES

A version of this paper was presented at the 23"* International Arthurian SocietyCongress, July 2011, Bristol, UK.

1 See Susan Aronstein, Hollywood Knights: Arthurian Cinema and the Politics ofNostalgia (New York: Palgrave, 2005); Amy S. Kaufman, 'Anxious Medievalism:An American Romance,' The Year's Work in Medievalism 22 (2009): pp. 5-13; andLaurie Finke and Martin B. Shichtman, 'Who's Your Daddy? New Age Grails,'Arthuriana 19.3 (Fall 2009): pp. 25-33. Finke and Shichtman's 'Who's Your Daddy?'and my 'Anxious Medievalism' focus specifically on evangelical Christianity in theUnited States, where we identify a number of medieval themes in the movement'seducational materials and toys.

2 'The Tenets of Biblical Patriarchy,' Vision Forum Ministries, accessed May 20,2010, http://www.visionforumministries.org/home/about/biblical_patriarchy.aspx. The quote retains the capitalization of 'Biblical' used on the website.

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3 For an extensive study of the patriarchy movement, see Kathryn Joyce, Quiverfull:Inside the Christian Patriarchy Movement (Boston: Beacon Ptess, 2009).

4 'The Tenets of Biblical Patriarchy,' Vision Forum Ministries, accessed June 2010.5 For a critical discussion of the differences between medievalism and

neomedievalism, see Katl Fugelso, ed.. Studies in Medievalism XIX: DefiningNeomedievalism(s) (Cambridge: Boydell and Brewer, 2010) and Fugelso, ed..Studies in Medievalism XX: Defining Neomedievalism(s) II (Cambridge: Boydelland Brewer, 2011).

6 See also Kaufman, 'Anxious Medievalism,' p. 6.7 Douglas Philips, 'Description,' Sleeping Beauty and the Five Questions (CD),

Vision Forum, 25 August 2004, accessed 15 April 2012, http://www.visionforum.com/browse/product/sleeping-beauty-and-the-five-questions.

8 A full list of books, products, and events is available at the His Princess MinistriesWebsite, http://sherirose.info.

9 Shed Rose Shepherd, Fit for My King: His Princess ^o-Day Diet and Devotional(Grand Rapids, MI: Revell, 2009).

10 See Dannah Gresh's Secret Keeper Girl Website, accessed June 1, 2011, http://secretkeepergirl .com.

11 Dannah Gresh, Secret Keeper Girl: The Delicate Power of Modesty (Chicago, IL:Moody, 2002).

12 'Truth or Bare Fashion Tests!' Secret Keeper Girl Website, accessed June 1, 2011,http://secretkeepergirl.com/Truth_or_Bare.aspx.

13 Laura Bryan, 'Definitely New Princesses In Defiance, OH!' Bod Squad Blog, SecretKeeper Girl, October 18, 2011, http://blog.secretkeepergirl.com/?p=642.

14 'What is a Secret Keeper Girl Anyway?' Secret Keeper Girl Website, accessed 1 June2011, http://www.secretkeepergirl.com/What_is_SKG.aspx

15 See Neela Banerjee, 'Dancing the Night Away, with a Higher Purpose,' New YorkTimes, 19 May 2008, www.nytimes.com; and Jennifer Baumgardner, 'Would YouPledge Your Virginity to Your Father?' Glamour, 1 January 2007. http://www.glamour.com/sex-love-life/2oo7/o1/purity-balls; accessed 1 June 2011.

16 See Randy Wilson, 'What is a Purity Ball?' Generations of Light Ministry, 2007,accessed April 5, 2011, http://generationsoflight.com. For coverage of the theAustralian movement, see Daniel Emerson, 'Purity Balls Heading Down Under,'The Sydney Morning Herald, 23 July 2008, http://www.smh.com.au; accessed June1, 2011.

17 See Joyce, Quiverfull, p. 225 and Breanne Fahs, 'Daddy's Little Girls: On the Perilsof Chastity Clubs, Purity Balls, and Ritualized Abstinence,' Frontiers 31.3 (2010):pp. 116-42; p. 135.

18 Fahs, 'Daddy's Little Girls,' p. 118.19 Joyce, Quiverfull, p. 231.20 Joyce, Quiverfull, p. 231.21 Purity Ball 2009 Facebook Group, accessed April 5, 2011, https://virww.facebook.

com/group.php?gid=6943i9972OO&v=wall.

ARTHURIAN FAMILY DRAMA J5

22 'Welcome to the 2011 Puritj^ Ball!' Father Daughter Purity Ball, accessed April 5,2011, http://wvvw.purityball.com.

23 Channel 4 News, UK, 'Cutting Edge: The Virgin Daughters,' 25 September2008. accessed May 29, 2011. http://www.channel4.eom/culture/microsites/C/cutting_edge/virgin_daughters.

24 Channel 4 News, UK, 'The Virgin Daughters,' 2008.25 Banerjee, 'Dancing the Night Away,' 2008.26 Channel 4 News, UK, 'The Virgin Daughters,' 2008.27 Channel 4 News, UK, 'The Virgin Daughters,' 2008.28 For an extensive comparison between purit)' balls and weddings, see Baumgardner,

'Would You Pledge Your Virginity to Your Father?' 2007.29 Baumgardner, 'Would You Pledge Your Virginity to Your Father?' 2007.30 Amanda Robb, 'The Innocence Project,' O: The Oprah Magazine, March 2007,

accessed June 15, 2001, http://www.oprah.com/relationships/Father-Daughter-Purity-Balls-to-Promote-Abstinence-Chastity-Pledges.

31 Channel 4 News, UK, 'The Virgin Daughters,' 2008.32 Charl ie Gillis, 'Dad 's Your Prom Da te , ' Macleans.ca, Oc tober 8, 2007,

accessed April 15, 2011, ht tp: / /www.macleans.ca/cul ture/ l i festyle/ar t icle .jspcontent=2007ioo8_uoii3_iioii3.

33 Qtd. in Holly Adams Phillips, 'To Cover Our Daughters: A Modern ChastityRitual in Evangelical America' (master's thesis, Georgia State University, 2009),pp. 6-7, http://digitalarchive.gsu.edu/rs_theses/28; accessed June 1, 2011.

34 Wilson, 'What is a Purit)^ Ball?' 2007.35 Wilson, 'What is a Purit)? Ball?' 2007.36 As Gillis notes of the archways of the swords through which each 'couple' passes,

'anyone with a liberal arts education would have a tough time fending off thephallic associations' ('Dad's Your Prom Date,') 2007.

37 Lauren Wilson Black, Khrystian Wilson, and Jordyn Wilson, Purely Woman:Awakening tbe Heart of God through Pure Living in Our Generation (ColoradoSprings: Generations of Light Publishing, 2007), under 'Introduction,' https://www.generationsoflight.com/userfiles/file/Purely_Women-vi.pdf; accessed June1, 2011.

38 D.M. Carter, comment on 'Purity Balls,' Television without Pity, 14 November 2008,http://forums.televisionwithoutpity.com/index.php?showtopic=3i78799&st=225.Accessed June 1, 2011.

39 For a comprehensive examination of the exchange of women in Arthurian legend,see Dorsey Armstrong, Gender and the Chivalric Community of Malory's MorteD'arthur (Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2003).

40 Joyce, Quiverfull, p. 208.41 Randy Wilson, 'What about Boys,' Generations of Light Ministry, 2008, http://

www.generationsoflight.com/html/boys.html; accessed June 1, 2011.42 Wilson, 'What about Boys,' Generations of Light Ministry, 2008.43 Wilson, 'What about Boys,' Generations of Light Ministry, 2008.

56 ARTHURIANA

IMAGE CREDITS

Figure l: Edmund Blair Leighton. The Accolade. 1901. Wikicommons image, accessedJuly 2011, http://en.wikipedia.org/wild/File:Edmund_blair_leighton_accolade.jpg.

Figure2: Advertisement for Douglas W. Phillips. Sleeping Beauty and the Five Questions(CD), May 2008, accessed April 15, 2011, Vision Family Forum Catalogue, VisionForum website, http://www.visionforum.com/beautifulgirlhood/ productdetail.aspx?productid=3230i&categoryid=53.

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