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Capturing the Present in Northwestern Europe (1348-1648). A Cultural History of Present Before the Age of Presentism

Titre du projet
Capturing the Present in Northwestern Europe (1348-1648). A Cultural History of Present Before the Age of Presentism
Description
This research examines how the concept of the present was perceived and experienced in Northwestern Europe during the period from the Middle Ages to the early modern era. This area, including the Netherlands, West Germany, Northern France, and Southern England, experienced significant shifts in politics, economy, religion, and art. With its diverse political systems, multiple languages, urban development, and evolving lifestyles, this region provides a unique historical backdrop, differing from the conventional Renaissance narrative.
Our study is comprehensive and multidisciplinary, encompassing history, art, literature, linguistics, media studies, anthropology, and political science. We focus on three principal themes: tracing the evolution of the concept of the 'present' from 1348 to 1648; uncovering the unique cultural characteristics of Northwestern Europe; and exploring how individuals and their communities perceived and adapted to the notion of the present. Our analysis will investigate how discourses and visual media give shape to individual and collective perceptions of one's own time, how events are represented and interpreted, and how people responded to novel ideas and political and societal changes.
The objective is to redirect historical focus towards Northwestern Europe, highlighting its complex diversity and critical role in influencing our comprehension of the present in a broader European context.
Chercheur principal
Blanc, Jan (Université de Genève)
Doudet, Estelle (Université de Lausanne)
Lecuppre-Desjardin, Elodie (Université de Lille)
Date de début
01 Septembre 2024
Organisations
identifiant
https://libra.unine.ch/handle/123456789/32385
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  • Publication
    Accès libre
    Revisiting Presentism: The Experience of the Present in Late Medieval and Early Modern North-Western Europe
    (2023-12-21)
    Brero, Thalia 
    ;
    Blanc, Jan
    ;
    Lecuppre-Desjardin, Elodie
    ;
    Osnabrugge, Marije
    This essay explores the pertinence of the present as a temporal category in the late medieval and early modern period. After a historiographical overview of scholarship on presentism and reflections on the complex notion of ‘present’, we present three case studies to explore how the experience of the present could be discerned and studied in literature, visual arts, and news media. The first case study focuses on the increasing emphasis on the present in the Gruuthuse manuscript and rederijker plays. Secondly, an examination of depictions of the breach of the Sint Anthonisdijk in 1651 shows different ways in which Dutch landscape painters engaged with the present. The final case study discusses how the spread of the northern invention of printed newsletters stimulated a wider interest in the present ‘elsewhere’ in apparent peripheric locations like Geneva. Drawing on these cases, we reflect on the relation between crises and presentism and suggest that the manner in which time, and the present in particular, was experienced in north-western Europe seems to be distinctly different from the relation to time of people in Renaissance Italy.