This seminar focuses on the role of books in processes of cultural transfer between medieval England and continental Europe from the early Middle Ages to the beginning of printing in the second half of the fifteenth century. The approach will be interdisciplinary, thus seeking to integrate book history, cultural history and literary studies, with the book as a material (and mobile) object as well as a medium for transmitting concepts, ideas, and beliefs in text and image at its centre. Against the background of theories of cultural exchange and transfer and discourses on the general value of books in the Middle Ages, we will in particular investigate the conditions and structures that facilitate or inhibit cultural transfer by books (e.g. education and literacy, literary censorship) with special regard to the various forms of contact between cultures in English history (e.g. conversion to Christianity, conquests and settlements, intellectual exchange, trade). In our study of cultural mobility of people and objects we will direct our attention to types of agents and mediators in various fields, religious as well as secular (e.g. pilgrims, students and scholars, authors, diplomats, merchants), as well as to developing or established networks of monasteries, courts, academic groups and merchants. Of special interest is the important role of translation and of translators as mediators in a bilingual (and from 1066 in England with respect to French also trilingual) medieval literary culture with Latin as lingua franca among the literate elite, institutionally based on church and university. Finally, the effects of processes of cultural transfer by means of books on the donor culture as well as on the receiving culture, ranging from acceptance to resistance and even conflict, have to be discussed and evaluated. All participants will be invited to work on selected case studies and are expected to present a paper in class.
Beginn 5.11.2020
- Lehrende/r: Gabriele Müller-Oberhäuser