Margins of the Mediterranean, Fall 2018 Mediterranean Seminar Workshop, University of Michigan Ann Arbor, October 26–27, 2018

Paper proposals and round-table participants are being sought for the Mediterranean Seminar’s two-day Fall 2018 Meeting, sponsored to be held at the University of Michigan Ann Arbor on 26 & 27 October 2018 on the subject “Margins of the Mediterranean.”

The Mediterranean is defined variably by its littoral: the edge that connects land and sea, or the cultural or geographic limits of its continental hinterlands. Our workshop will use the opposition between two elements as a point of departure to study the networks that connect the margins of the Mediterranean to larger networks within and beyond the Mediterranean–like the networks of trade, pilgrimage and diaspora traveled by Armenians, Berbers, Normans. What defines the margin (of a system or taxonomic unit)? What do edges do? How do the margins of discrete systems interact with each other? Margins may be construed literally (the margins of a manuscript page or the shores of a sea or a river, e.g.) or metaphorically.

For the workshop (to be held on Friday, 26 October), we invite abstracts of in-progress drafts of articles or book/dissertation chapters on any aspect of edges and marginality in the pre-Modern or Modern Mediterranean, broadly construed. Particularly welcome are papers (a) relating to the multi-religious/ethnic environment of the region, including cross-confessional influence, relations, syncretism, and literary and/or artistic representations; or (b) papers that address the longue durée, methodology, or that are comparative in approach. Papers from history, art history, literary and cultural studies, or any relevant Humanities or Social Sciences discipline are welcome. Our Mediterranean is construed geographically as including southern Europe, the Near East and North Africa; however scholars who work on analogous themes in other periods and regions are encouraged to apply.

All North American-based scholars (or foreign scholars who will be in the US at this time) working on relevant material are encouraged to apply. Scholars from further abroad may apply but we cannot pay full travel costs. ABD PhD students, junior and non-tenure track faculty are particularly welcome to apply.

The workshop will also feature a keynote presentation to be confirmed.

The second day, Saturday, 27 October, will feature two round-table conversations, focusing on questions such as:

• Borders, boundaries, or limits in the Mediterranean: How do the boundary lines between two elements – liquid vs solid, contingency b/w causality – demarcate and characterize the margin? How is the edge mobilized by the networks that stretch between and connect the margins of discrete systems? Can there be edges without a center?
• The margins of Mediterranean Studies as a field: How might sources that are marginalized in the study of the Mediterranean – in Armenian, Persian, Ethiopic, Occitan, Berber, Syriac,  Georgian, and others – invite us to rethink where the Mediterranean begins and ends? How might reading along margins suggest other ways of doing Mediterranean Studies today?  

Participants will be expected to attend the entire two-day symposium.