Visible and Invisible Borders Between Christians and Muslims in the Early Modern World
Scientific Coordinators: Robyn Dora Radway, Gábor Kármán, and Ferenc Tóth
Venue and Date: Central European University, Budapest (Hungary) – January 10-11, 2020
Meeting call:
It has traditionally been argued that with the rise of the modern nation state, borders increasingly became lines demarcating the spatial limits of state power. Recent efforts have been made to re-examine this territorial argument and pay close attention to the social, cultural, political, economic, and religious networks that created, reinforced, and also traversed borderlands. Though war, conquest, and diplomacy repeatedly redrew the dividing lines between empires and kingdoms, extensive interactions and exchanges left the borderlands with deeply entangled roots and routes. These patterns, mechanisms, and forces had a deep impact on all aspects of life and are still felt today. Arguably, no single element has been more dominant in shaping this complex relationship than the regional historiographies and historical memories that tried to write the empires out of their pasts entirely.
This conference aims to bring together an international group of scholars studying visible and invisible borders between Christians and Muslims in the early modern world in order to put distinct historiographical traditions into conversation with each other. It seeks to probe the overlaps, opportunities, and limitations of a comparative approach to borders and use the juxtaposition of thematically and temporally overlapping but spatially divergent case studies to raise questions of methodology, definitions, and future directions for research.
The proposals are encouraged to approach the study of borders, frontiers, and boundaries from a multidisciplinary perspective and present original research on a case study or series of case studies that engage with any of the following questions:
– What makes a border unique? What makes it archetypical?
– How do different historiographical traditions define and engage with borders between Christians and Muslims?
-How were borders viewed in relation to the ‘other’ in different historical polities? How were borders invented, marked, reinvented, crossed, and eventually dismantled?
– What are the different epistemological moves historians need to consider when examining how people (or objects) cross borders versus how borders cross people (or objects)?
– How did Muslim and Christian perspectives on borderlands converge? How did they differ? Were there specific patterns and shared historical experiences for territories which both sides claimed for themselves? What was the interplay between the imperial centers and local stakeholders in borderlands territories when it came to dealing with powers on the other side of the border?
– What can we learn from different sources (including but not limited to legal, administrative, military, diplomatic, literary, artistic, musical and culinary sources) on this issue in different territories?
– Can we find common patterns, themes, or questions relating to borders between Christians and Muslims across the early modern world?