Illuminating Perspectives
Asynchronous Session
Memory in Transition: The Recovery of Cultural Heritage in the Museums
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Tugba Sevin
1492 was the year that changed the fate of the Jews of the Iberian Peninsula. Following the Edict of Expulsion imposed by King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella of Spain, Sephardic Jews who refused to convert to Catholicism sought refuge in different countries of Europe and North Africa, leaving behind their homeland in order to preserve their Jewish faith and cultural heritage. One important group that left mainly from Toledo, known as the Jewish capital of Spain, settled in Jerusalem, Thessaloniki, and Istanbul. These travelers created communities, in which they shared the only relics that they brought with them, their memories, religion, and traditions. With their unique customs, beliefs, and talents, these diasporic populations enriched the native culture of their new lands. Centuries after the expulsion from the Iberian Peninsula, in the main cities along the route of the Diaspora, museums were created to commemorate the Sephardic Jewish past. This paper deals with the investigation of Sephardic museums as institutions of recovery of cultural memory, and at the same time, exploring the past of the Diaspora from the present, establishing relations between the objects displayed in museums along the route. This essay also analyzes some Medieval and Early Modern texts are related to each city along this Sephardic Route and shows how the literature and the memory are so united.
Horses, Heroes, and Prophecies: A Comparative Study of Volsung's Saga and Kyor-oglu Epic View Digital Media
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Rahilya Geybullayeva
This research examines conceptual frameworks of “national” and “global” literatures which is in reality beyond limited borders, through shared motifs in Volsung's Saga and Kyor-oglu epic. Discovering the intriguing parallels between two seemingly distant epics, the Northern "Volsung's Saga," and the Oguz epic "Kyor-oglu" from the 17th century, the study focuses on the context of the "Volsung's Saga," the encounter between Sigurd and a long-bearded old man Odin which corresponds to Ker-oğlu Ali kishi in the Kyor-oglu epic. Sigurd seeking his guidance in choosing a horse. İn the Kyor-oglu epic blinded Ali kishi shares similarities with Odin. He helps his son Kyer-oglu (Son of Blind Man) in choosing horses, originating from the water alike in Volsungs and initially winged, The motif of prophecy and farewell of heroic legacy unfolds in both epics, adding another layer of parallelisms, as the heroes Sigurd and Kyer-oglu navigate prophecies and bid farewell to their heroic legacies. In essence, this research sheds light on shared motifs such as the encounter with a wise old man, the selection of a special horse, and the unfolding of prophecies and farewells in the heroic legacy. These parallels, despite the geographical and cultural distance, contribute to a richer understanding of the universality of epic traditions.
Biblical Traces in a Muslim Chronicle from Makassar, Indonesia View Digital Media
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session William Cummings
This close reading of the royal chronicles of Gowa and Talloq (Makassar, Indonesia) brings to high unexpected traces of Biblical influence. A surprising find in a kingdom known for its devout Islamic faith, this paper explores the literary evidence for the influence of Portuguese Christian missionaries known to have been present in Makassar. Biblical narrative tropes were borrowed from Latin gospels and used to describe the arrival and agreement between Malay traders and the indigenous rulers of Gowa and Talloq. While we have long known that Portuguese missionaries were present in Makassar in the late 16th century, it has long been assumed that their influence came to nothing after the kingdom's formal conversion to Islam in 1605. This interpretation of narrative episodes from the royal chronicles sheds new light on the appeal and persistence of Biblical texts despite the ultimate failure of missionaries to win converts.
The Sense of Form: From Linguistic Idealism to Literary Stylistics
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Ekaitz Ruiz De Vergara Olmos
The concept of form has been the subject of innumerable reflections and interpretations by various authors at least since classical Aristotelian philosophy. However, form acquired a new aesthetic dimension when Humboldt gave it a privileged role in the context of his linguistic idealism. For the German scholar, languages were not reduced to a set of grammatically articulated sound or phonetic materials, but such materials were in turn to be put at the service of expressing various ideal or spiritual conceptions specific to the group of speakers. Humboldt called this concept the "inner form of language" ("innere Sprachform"). Humboldt's formulation was later taken up by literary critics and historians such as Francesco de Sanctis, who in his "Storia della letteratura italiana" explored the origins of the "sense of form" in 14th-century Florentine humanism. Benedetto Croce was interested in these ideas when he formulated his aesthetics of expression, which would later be used by German critics such as Vossler and Spitzer in order to lay the foundations of the so-called genetic or idealistic stylistics. In this way, literary form is identified with style, i.e. with the personal and individual stamp that the writer puts on the common language of his works. Finally, the idealist concept of literary form would culminate in the constitution of the Spanish School of Stylistics, which was led by Dámaso Alonso and Amado Alonso, among others.
