University of Sydney: Two Papers and Roundtable Discussion – Rethinking the Long Reformation

Rethinking the Long Reformation: Mobile Communities, Elastic Boundaries

Two informal talks and a roundtable.

In these informal presentations, Gary K. Waite (University of New Brunskwick) and Nicholas Terpstra (University of Toronto) will explore the potential of rethinking the Reformation’s value as an analytical tool.

Date: Thursday June 5
Time: 2:00pm-5:00pm
Venue: Common Room, John Woolley Building, University of Sydney
Registration: RSVP is requested, but not required. Please contact John Gagné (john.gagne@sydney.edu.au) to register interest, or for any further information.

Program

  • 2:00-3:30: Informal papers by Gary K. Waite & Nicholas Terpstra –
  • 3:30 to 4:00: Tea
  • 4:00 to 5:00: Roundtable/Discussion

This event is presented by the Department of History and ‘Putting Periodization to Use: Testing the Limits of Early Modernity’, an interdisciplinary research group funded by the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences Collaborative Research Scheme and part of the Sydney Intellectual History Network. For more information please see: http://sydney.edu.au/intellectual-history/ppu/index.shtml

Gary K. Waite (University of New Brunswick), ‘Exile, Emotion, Enlightenment: The Radical Reformation(s) as a Watershed Event’

Waite will examine the radical reformation as a transformational force in redefining attitudes to religion, the cosmos, and the devil. Using the case of a key spiritualist, David Joris (1501-56), Waite will propose that experiences of persecution, exile, and intolerance contributed significantly to what we call the enlightenment, and will suggest the value of blurred periodisations.

Nicholas Terpstra (University of Toronto) ‘Purity, Contagion, Purgation: Redefining (the) Reformation’

Terpstra will propose that by articulating the cultural constituents of the Reformation, we can rethink when the Reformation as a period happened, and in such a way as to make non-Christians (Jews and Muslims) more fundamental to the narrative. The goal of both presentations – as well as the informal roundtable/discussion to follow – is to exert pressure upon the periodisation of the Reformation and to explore new and alternative conceptualisations.