Scientific Studies Association (ILEM) as a partner of Language Acts and Worldmaking project calls for papers for the conference al-Andalus in Motion: Travelling Concepts and Cross-Cultural Contexts to be held on November 15-16, 2018, hosted by Istanbul Medeniyet University.
The history of Iberia, as both an originator and a product of global colonization, constitutes a field of study for interrogating fundamental concepts of contemporary liberal-democratic societies. The ‘Iberianate venture’ embraces the ‘Al-Andalus’ syndrome (Islamic Andalusia as a model of tolerant co-existence between Christians, Muslims and Jews), the Iberian ‘Black legend’ (repressive Inquisitorial Catholicism, imperial brutality, economic backwardness), and Sefarad (an ambiguous place of home and exile for Iberian Jews). Within the framework of the ‘Traveling Concepts’ strand of Language Acts & Worldmaking, this conference will focus on the many ways in which Al Andalus becomes a figure of thought, a means by which societies, minority groups, and individuals past and present represent and critically engage with questions of religious pluralism, intercultural contact and national identity.
Proposals for papers are invited from across the disciplines with a focus on the cross-cultural circulation of Andalusian and Sephardic ideas and concepts across geographies and histories. Submissions are welcome on any topic related to Al-Andalus and its afterlives including, but not limited to:
• The Languages, cultures, literatures and musics of al-Andalus and its diasporas
• Memory and Identity in the Andalusi and Sephardic diasporas and its diverse contexts of settlement;
• The trajectory of an ideological fascination with Muslim Spain/Al Andalus as a hybrid space, a porous frontier between East and West, Islam and Christendom
• Sephardic and Andalusi heritage industry and cultural tourism;
• Alhambrismo & the Moorish style in Architecture and the decorative arts; material culture, Orientalism and Neo-Orientalism;
• Language encounters between Al-Andalus, Iberia and Sefarad: oralities, scripts, texts, translations;
• The circulation of ideas and representations of Al Andalus from early modern days to the present, in Europe, Latin America, Turkey, and the broader Islamicate world, and their cultural, ideological and political uses;
• Al-Andalus in fantasy and worldbuilding games and virtual reality;
• The cultural and political traction of the chronotopes of al-Andalus in the Christian, Muslim and Sephardic worlds;
• Travel and travellers in al-Andalus/Sefarad/Iberia across time and space;
• Moros y Cristianos festivals, al-Andalus fairs, public history and historical re-enactment;
• Al-Andalus as a combat concept in War on Terror times;
Abstracts (250-400 words) on these or similar… read more