Community and community spirit
To understand pre-modern societies as a whole, it is important to consider how local communities were formed. Using a wide range of theoretical models, we try to identify how the interaction between different groups led to new identities and ideologies, and how this influenced the form and content of material culture. Whether entire empires, regional trade networks, or local monasteries: at all levels of society, people tried to shape their place in the bigger picture. This could happen in a very direct way, in small face-to-face communities, families and households - but the way people felt connected to a nation or religious movement could also be an expression of the imagination of the people affected.
Cultural memory and national identity
Medieval ethnic or political communities - peoples, kingdoms - are often seen, especially within Europe, as the 'origins' of the modern nation-state. Thus, 'France' is said to have been founded by the Franks under Clovis, Germany is often seen as a direct successor of the Holy Roman Empire, and it is tempting to draw a direct line from the formation of modern Holland to the Burgundian court, or, in extreme cases, even the 'pagan' past of the Low Countries. However, the origins of such ideas often stem from the political ideologies developed in the context of the emerging nationalism of the 19th century (but, in the case of the Netherlands, also as an outgrowth of the Eighty Years' War). Our research into these aspects of the 'formation of peoples' focuses not only on the historical realities of the Middle Ages, but also on the historiographical traditions that helped shape a country's cultural memory in the centuries that followed. It is important to recognise that the continuity between past and present often is a construct that we need to examine on its own terms.
Researchers in this theme
dr. Kay Boers
Email: k.boers@uu.nl- Late Antiquity, Roman history, Citizenship, Violence, Victim Rights, Religious Tolerance, Literature and Space, Censorship, Rhetoric, Narrative and Discourse, Latin Language and Literature, Early Middle Ages
- Social History, Urban History, Health, Medieval History
- Early Middle Ages, Corruption, Social Justice, Food History, Justice, Medieval Manuscripts, Medieval Culture
- Medieval Culture, Power, Religion, Public Religion and Politics
- Urban History, History of political participation, Medieval Culture, Medieval Manuscripts, Democracy and Citizenship