INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE :
Away from Home: Ideas, Emotions, Images and Writings on Homesickness in the Mediterranean World (1492-1923)
National Library of Portugal(BNP), Lisbon 20-21 June, 2022.
ORGANIZATION: COST Action PIMo (CA18140) - People in Motion: Entangled Histories of Displacement across the Mediterranean (1492-1923) - in collaboration with Cátedra Eduardo Lourenço, Aix-Marseille University; CEC, Center for Classic Studies*; CH, Center for History**, Faculty of Arts and Humanities, University of Lisbon; CHAM, Centre for Humanities, NOVA FCSH-UAc***; CIDEHUS-University of Évora.
ABSTRACT: Homesickness is a sentiment, and an idea shared by societies around the Mediterranean, and felt by individuals and communities alike, either temporarily or permanently; particularly in a geography marked by the voluntary and involuntary displacement of people across the political, cultural and religious divide since Antiquity. Being away from home triggers a vast array of situations and feelings, like nostalgia manifested by narratives, art, patterns of consumption, etc.; or the attempt to keep the identity in face of a different set of values in the place one is living as an exile or as an expatriate; namely through the endeavor to build Home away from Home; and to maintain contact with Home exchanging writings, presents, etc. It is our aim to see how and to understand why, despite Globalization, Cosmopolitanism, and the growing circulation of people (like travelers, traders, pilgrims, students, scientists, tourists), and the exchange of ideas across national, cultural and religious divides, individual and communities still maintained their entangled relationship with Home, either in a real or constructed image and discourse, through time. For that we invite scholars to explore all available media that reveals Homesickness to participate in this congress. OBJECTIVES: 1 - Consider Homesickness in a long-term and comparative perspective; 2 - Investigate the expressions of Homesickness in its material, literary and immaterial dimensions, in order to understand the density of its diversity.