Tales of the City: Outsiders' Descriptions of Cities in the Early Modern Period
Session at the Renaissance Society of America, San Francisco, 23-5 March 2006
Specialist Session for the Eighth International Conference on Urban
History, Stockholm, 30 August - 2 September 2006
Conveners: Flaminia Bardati and Fabrizio Nevola
Ambassadors, merchants, bankers, scholars, artists, architects, to name but
a few, were all groups that travelled extensively during the Early Modern
period. The outsiders' gaze on the cities they came into contact with-
perceived both in terms of architectural space and social practices- were
frequently communicated formally or informally by means of letters,
dispatches and other literary means. Within an international perspective,
the recipients of such information- whether friends, family or princely
employers- were hungry for details of daily life and new fashions, as well
as for reports of construction projects or urban developments. Such
descriptive texts offer a complimentary point of view to that of sources
such as chronicles and diaries, tax accounts and legislation, that were
produced by insider-residents, and that are widely used by scholars of
urban history.
This session seeks to bring together papers that consider such outsiders'
descriptions of the cities they came into contact with. Contributors are
invited to present specific case studies around single observers or
subjects, or to present more broadly-based or method-driven studies. We
would particularly welcome papers that cross national or linguistic
boundaries, with the observer immersed in environments quite alien to their
own. What did outsiders particularly notice? To what degree was their point
of view conditioned by such factors as their own urban experience, or that
of their guide or guide-book? How far is the content of descriptions shaped
by their audience?
Contact:
Villa I Tatti, Harvard University Center for Renaissance Studies, via di
Vincigliata 26, Firenze 50135, ITALY
fax: +39 055 605058
e-mail: [log in to unmask] or [log in to unmask]
Proposals by 15 May, please.
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Rupert Shepherd
69 Middleton Road, Banbury, Oxon. OX16 3QR, UK
Tel./Fax: +44-(0)1295 270344. Mobile: +44-(0)7941 187904.
Email: [log in to unmask]
http://www.ferrara.u-net.com/
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