Daily Archives: 27 September 2018

CFP Cross-cultural comparison in the premodern world

The Oakley Center, which has its home at Williams College, invites paper proposals for ‘The Global Archive of Comparison’, a conference and subsequent edited volume on the history of cross-cultural comparison in the premodern world. The conference will be held at Williams College in Williamstown, Massachusetts (26–28 September 2019) and is organized by Alexander Bevilacqua. Anthony Grafton (Princeton) will deliver the keynote lecture.

Drawing on the study of humanistic traditions from across the globe in the era before 1800, the conference aims to assess the many ways comparison has served in the history of cross-cultural study. Through a series of focused case studies, scholars will ask: what forms of analogy, simile, equivalence, etc., did past thinkers employ, and what kinds of comparisons did these enable? How did such intellectual tools facilitate the transmission of texts, religion, or ideas from one context to another? What did they preclude? The goal is to reconstruct the range of ways that people of the past mediated intellectual traditions through comparative mechanisms. The further aim is to demonstrate the relevance of the premodern world to contemporary reflection on comparison.

The conference welcomes the work of advanced doctoral students and both young and established scholars in the fields of history, religion, philosophy, and literature.a.

Proposals — which should include a 500-word abstract, a brief curriculum vitae, and complete current contact information — should be sent by 15 October 2018 to the conference organizer.

Contact Info: 

Oakley Center for the Humanities and Social Sciences
90 Denison Park Drive
Williamstown, MA 01267

Contact Email: 
ab24@williams.edu
 
URL: 
http://web.williams.edu/resources/oakley/

CFP Medieval and Early Modern Spaces and Places 2019: Experiencing the Court

The early modern court adopted and developed exemplary cultural practices where objects and spaces became central to propagating power as well as places for exchange with other powers. This combination of images, objects, and sounds confronted the senses, making a powerful and distinctive impression of the resident family and the region they represented: flickering candlelight on glass and gold vessels adorned credenze (sideboards); musical instruments announced royal entries or provided entertainment; brightly coloured tapestries covered the palace walls along with paintings of biblical or mythological stories; cabinets displayed antiquities or rarities; perfume burners permeated the air; while the smells and tastes of rare delicacies at the centre of dining tables made for a multi-sensory spectacle.

This year the Open University’s Spaces & Places conference will address the theme of ‘Experiencing the Court’ by exploring the senses and the lived experiences of courtly life, whether based in a particular residence or defined by the travels of an itinerant ruler. The conference will take place at the Open University’s partner institution Trinity Laban Conservatoire on 3 – 4 April 2019.  As Trinity Laban’s King Charles Court was once the site of Greenwich Palace, it is a fitting venue for a conference exploring court life. This annual conference is fundamentally interdisciplinary: literary, musical, architectural, artistic and religious spaces will be the subjects of enquiry, not as discrete or separate entities, but ones which overlapped, came into contact with one another, and at times were in conflict.

The conference will examine life at court and will consider the following questions:

  • How can approaching the court in terms of the senses provide new methodologies for understanding each institution?
  • How were medieval and early modern courtly spaces adapted and transformed through the movement of material and immaterial things?
  • Which particular aspects of political, social and economic infrastructures enabled the exchange of objects and ideas?

Papers that address new methodologies, the digital humanities, object-centred enquiries, cross-cultural comparisons, or new theoretical perspectives are particularly welcome.

Please send a 150 word abstract along with a short biography to Leah Clark (leah.clark@open.ac.uk) and Helen Coffey (Helen.coffey@open.ac.uk) by 15 November 2018.

For further information, see http://www.open.ac.uk/arts/research/medieval-and-early-modern-research/spaces-and-places-2019

 

New Book Series: Critical Emotion Studies (Brill)

Critical Emotion Studies is a peer-reviewed, transdisciplinary series of monographs and edited volumes dedicated to the critical analysis of emotions, meaning that emotions are theorized as contextual, relational, and shifting. While Critical Emotion Studies encompasses a broad and complex range of disciplines and topics of inquiry, it shares three core assumptions: that emotions and reason are not distinct, but are intertwined in all decision-making processes; that emotions, rather than being limited to individual and private experiences, are socially constructed and experienced, particularly through language; and that every culture inculcates a structure of feeling that serves to produce and reproduce dominant cultural values and norms.

The series aims to promote research on issues that are connected to understanding emotions as socially constructed, tied to culture and history, expressed through language and deeply enmeshed in power relations. This may include political and diplomatic approaches, but also those that treat of points of social and cultural convergence, justice, gender, race and ethnicity.

Manuscripts should be at least 80,000 words in length (including footnotes and bibliography). Manuscripts may also include illustrations and other visual material. The editors will consider proposals for original monographs, edited collections, translations, and critical primary source editions.

Authors are cordially invited to submit proposals and/or full manuscripts by email to the publisher Jason Prevost. For more information, see http://www.brill.com/cres

Series Editor: Simon Koschut, Freie Universität Berlin

Editorial Board

  • Karin M. Fierke, University of St. Andrews
  • Emma Hutchison, The University of Queensland
  • William M. Reddy, Duke University
  • Steven C. Roach, University of South Florida
  • Christian von Scheve, Freie Universität Berlin