Global Early Modern


Embedded in the discipline of Islamic art history is the study of imperial histories and thus of global contact. This graduate seminar will focus on the circulation of Islamicate objects across trade and maritime networks in the early modern world from 1300-1850. Turquoise, indigo, arts of the book, maps, and textiles are some examples of the material culture studied in this course. The movement of these objects will be traced in order to emphasize the global connectedness of histories from Yemen port cities to Ottoman, Safavid, Mughal, and European territories. Each week we will interrogate a major theme that has defined the early modern period alongside a transcultural material object that is part of Islamic visual studies. By revisiting the periodization of the early modern through the prism of Islamic art history, we will ask how these two capacious concepts of the “early modern” and “Islamic art” inform and speak to one another. 3 credits. Satisfies the non-Western or Pre-1800 requirement.