ISECS Early Career Scholars’ Seminar, Diasporas in the Long Eighteenth Century, Universitat de Barcelona, 8-12 July 2024
The International Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies invites early-career scholars active in eighteenth-century studies to apply to take part in the ISECS ECS seminar, to be held over one week in central Barcelona.
In its 2024 edition, the seminar will focus on Diasporic Networks in the Long Eighteenth Century. Our focus on exiles and diasporas is informed by the work of such scholars as Peter Burke, in Exiles and Expatriates in the History of Knowledge, 1500-2000 (2017)—the active, creative reception of knowledge brought by diasporic individuals—and Niall Fergusson, in The Tower and the Square (2018), on the factors contributing dynamism to networks. To work up a model of diasporic history is to study the circulation of ideas transnationally, to question the traditional consignment of diasporas to a periphery, to gauge the dynamism of particular networks, and to identify and assess the factors fostering or hindering the opportune reception modelled by Burke. Thus, the three suggested, but not exclusive, foci of the seminar will be the role of culture in the cohesion of diasporic communities; the uses to which diasporic communities were put by their host societies and their institutions; and the means by which diasporic culture was created, or by which diasporas circulated culture transnationally in patterns distinct from those of translation and review culture.
The deadline for applications is 31 January 2024. Applications should be sent in English or French to ISECSBarcelona2024@gmail.com, preferably as PDFs or Microsoft Word documents. The organising and scientific advisory board will contact applicants about the outcome of the selection process by 28 February 2024.
