Episteme in Motion

Today’s interconnected world is not a new phenomenon, but looks back to a long history of exchange and interaction. But how do we analyze this long history of entanglement? Were processes of border-crossing interaction in the past accompanied by a “global consciousness”? How did transfers and forms of mobility impact on the ways in which people viewed themselves and their communities within their worlds? And how did these self-images evolve over time?

In this conference, we will explore the ways in which current approaches to issues of trans-cultural entanglements – such as global history and globalization, cultural mobility, transfer and world literatures – can be fruitfully applied to the world before 1800.

Program

Fr, 12.7. from 10 h Conference

with: Michael Borgolte (Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin), Almut Höfert (Universität Zürich), Christoph K. Neumann (Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München), Beatrice Gründler (Yale University), Jerry Brotton (Queen Mary, University of London), Jerold Frakes (State University of New York, Buffalo)

18 h–19.30 h Keynote

Gayatri C. Spivak (Columbia University, New York): Afloat in the Global

Sa, 13.7. from 9.30 h Conference

with: Emily Apter (New York University), Aamir Mufti (University of California, Los Angeles), Andrew J. Johnston (Freie Universität Berlin), Angelika Neuwirth (Freie Universität Berlin), Richard R. K. Sorabji (Wolfson College, University of Oxford), Jürgen Renn (Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, Berlin)

18 h–19.30 h Keynote

Wang Hui (Tsinghua University, Beijing): Three Sets of “Antithetical” Concepts in Narratives of Chinese History: Empire and Nation-state, fengjian and junxian, Rites/Music and Institutions

In cooperation with Freie Universität, Berlin. First Annual Conference of the Collaborative Research Center 980 ‘Episteme in Motion. Transfer of Knowledge from the Ancient World to the Early Modern Period’.