Sponsored by Rutgers University's Center for Cultural Analysis
The core conceptual understanding of the archipelago, as Simone Pinet frames it, is “unity in diversity,” as the island, self-enclosed by its shoreline, neatly circumscribes a people within its limits, while the close collection of these insular worlds encourages fellow-feeling and a shared experience within a wider system. As such, the archipelago is an ideal structure within which to examine issues of cultural connection and isolation in any time period. For this reason, Rutgers University's Center for Cultural Analysis has selected the Archipelago as its AY 2015/2016 theme. By organizing this panel, we seek to extend our conversation beyond the confines of the center and to deepen the topic's engagement with medieval studies. The European continent and its surrounding seas include several archipelagoes that can serve as the field of such inquiry. This session seeks papers in any discipline that examine the dynamics of archipelagoes in the medieval era. How does the geographical reality of the archipelago distinguish the communities that populate them from the mainland? What are the interactions of those communities and their limits? How is life within an archipelago shaped by its geographical reality? How is that reality and its impact reflected in the region's literature and art? By examining questions such as these we will treat typically peripheral communities as central to the development of medieval Europe.
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