Early Modern Levant

Panel(s) for the Sixteenth Century Society Conference (Cincinnati, Ohio, October 25-28,
2012)

*British Experiences and Constructions of Ethnic and Religious
Difference in the Early Modern Levant, 1500-1800*

The early modern period saw the intensification of contacts with the
Islamic world as people from the West ventured to the East in search
of trade, diplomatic relations, educational travel and biblical
scholarship. This panel will look at British constructions and
experiences of ethnic and religious groups encountered in the Levant
and the traditions they built upon by exploring how this difference
was studied and made visible in travel accounts, scholarly texts, and
mercantile and diplomatic correspondence. In the Levant, Britons came
in contact with a great variety of communities of eastern Christians,
Jews, and Muslims. This encounter invited comparisons between Western
Christians, peoples and lands in classical and biblical texts, and
cultures encountered in Africa, Asia, and the Americas. Papers are
invited especially on depictions of Armenians, Greeks, Copts, Jews, Shi'tes, Maronites, among others, and/or comparisons made between them.
*Please send abstracts (250 words for individual papers and a brief biographical statement to Eva Johanna Holmberg
(e.j.holmberg@qmul.ac.uk) by 30 March 2012.*

About the SCSC ~
The Sixteenth Century Society and Conference (SCSC) promotes
scholarship on the early modern era, broadly defined (ca. 1450 - ca.
1660). Providing opportunities for intellectual exchange among
scholars of the period, the Society also actively encourages the
integration of younger colleagues into the academic community. The
geographical scope of the organization is as international as its
membership. The SCSC welcomes scholars from all disciplines in early
modern studies, including history, art history, religion, history of
science, musicology, and literary and cultural studies in English, French, German, Italian, and Spanish. The Society holds one annual meeting in a different city each year, usually during the month of October, with an average of more than 700 participants.

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Dr Eva Johanna Holmberg
Postdoctoral researcher of the Academy of Finland, 2010-2012 Department of World Cultures, University of Helsinki Visiting Fellow 2010-2011 Department of History, Queen Mary, University of London