Due to the COVID-19 pandemic the IS-LE activities scheduled for the current year might need to be rescheduled. Please stay tuned to know more about the rescheduling of activities.
Deadline: 15th of April Date: 6th– 9thJune 2023 Place: Stockholm, Sweden
Scientific Coordinators: Kurt Villads Jensen (Stockholm University), Joachim Östlund (Lund University), Jan Loop (Copenhagen University)
Abstract: Over the past decades, Marie Louise Prat’s concept of “contact zone” has made a huge impact on studies of cultural encounters in travel writing and colonial settings. In current historiography contacts between Europe and Islam have mainly been studied in the context of a shared border, with its specific cultural and political dynamics, and thereby produced a certain theoretical/historical knowledge. Much less attention has been paid on how networks, encounters and knowledge were produced in the context of non-contact zones. This is the case for the Nordic region, which is geographically clearly separated from “Muslim Lands”. Nonetheless, imaginary borders were still produced. The aim of this training school is to discuss the dynamics of encounters between Christian Europe and the Islamic world in non-contact zones, particularly, but not only, in Scandinavia in medieval and early modern times. It will study the transmission of objects, texts and people and analyse the ways in which they were interpreted and understood and how they affected individual and collective identities.
Main objectives of the activity: a) To study Late Medieval and Early Modern networks between the Islamic worlds and Europe, with focus on Scandinavia; b) To discuss trade, exchange and mobility of objects and knowledge between the Mediterranean and the Baltic basin; c) To analyse how such phenomena had an effect in the creation of individual and collective identities; d) To develop a student network on long-distance encounters and Islamic legacy in Europe and Scandinavia; e) To promote a dialogue between junior and senior scholars.
Deadline: 15th April 2022 Date: 15th-17th June 2022 Place: Tunis (Tunisia)
Scientific Coordinators: Houssem Eddine Chachia, Gerard Wiegers, Luis Bernabé Pons, Emir O. Filipović, Borja Franco, Antonio Urquízar Herrera and Neila Saadi
Abstract: Over the past decades, there has been a growing interest among scholars in analysing the early modern migration routes and identity spaces in the Mediterranean. The Sephardic and Morisco diasporas are a typical example to study the forced movement of persons, but also of ideas and expertise. The aim of this training school is to discuss those issues from different and complementary perspectives, including social, cultural history, but also heritage and architecture, and to question the integrations of those religious and cultural minorities into Early Modern North African societies: the difficulties of their social assimilation, how their identities developed in this context, their contribution to the development of host societies, etc. Field visits and on-site discussions in Medina of Tunis and Testour will be complemented with conferences and debate sessions, focused on the students’ personal research. The overarching goal is to create a space of debate and exchange among junior and senior scholars, as well as to promote a network of scholars of early modern migration and identities that will bring new perspectives into the field. Students will be asked to prepare one small introduction to a specific monument that will be discussed on those visits, and to make a brief presentation of their own case studies, with a specific focus on problems of research and methodologies, in one of the three panels specified below. The training school is part of the COST-Action “Islamic Legacy: East, West, North South of the Mediterranean (1350-1750)”.
Deadline and details: Students interested to participate in this training school are invited to submit their cover letters and CVs to Dr. Houssem Eddine Chachia (h.chachia@fshst.rnu.tn), Dr. Elena Paulino Montero (epaulino@geo.uned.es) and Dr. Emir O. Filipović (filipovic@europe.com) before 15th April 2022. In addition to the specific standards established by COST Association regarding COVID-19 pandemic, participants in the Training School must also consider the measures adopted by local or national authorities in Tunis.
The training school and materials treat the migration of Moriscos and Sefardic Jews to the Ottoman Empire and Europe. They are supposed to study the acculturation between the immigrants and local societies, but also how each group has established their borders or their spaces of identity.
The migration routes or the context of each migration (forced in the case of the Moriscos and the Sefardic Jews who were expelled from Spain and Portugal, as well optional or voluntary in the case of the Jews of Livorno or even the Moriscos who chose to change their country of residence).
The identity spaces, in the way of the acculturation or the open identity spaces, and the closed identity spaces.
Planned visit to Testour (Morisco town) as a very good example of the acculturation and the conservation of identity.
Dates: January 14-16, 2020. Place: Granada and Córdoba (Spain). Scientific coordinators: Elena Paulino, Borja Franco, Antonio Urquízar and Elena Díez Jorge. Host institution: University of Granada. Partners: UNED. Departamento de Historia del Arte de la Universidad de Granada. Máster Universitario Oficial en Tutela del Patrimonio Histórico-Artístico. El legado de al-Ándalus. CSIC. Unidad Asociada I+D+i UGR al CSIC. “Patrimonio Cultural árabe e islámico”. Scholars involved: Peter Burke, Elias Kolovos, Valentina Živković, María Marcos, Elena Paulino, Borja Franco, Antonio Urquízar, Elena Díez Jorge, and Juan Carlos Ruiz Souza. Number of students: 15
