Synopses & Reviews
Synopsis
Studies of the pivotal historic place of the Mediterranean have long been dominated by specialists of its northern shores, that is by European historians. The seven leading authors in this groundbreaking volume challenge views of Mediterranean space as shaped by European trajectories and so problematize our comfortable notions. Drawing perspective from its eastern and southern shores, the book asks anew: what is the Mediterranean? What are its borders, its defining characteristics? What forces of nature, politics, culture, or economics have made the Mediterranean, and how long have they or will they endure? By covering the 16th centuries to the 20th century, the timely volume brings the early modern world into conversation with the modern world in new ways, and makes it clear that it is only recently that we can differentiate the north and south into separate cultural and political zones. The Making of the Modern Mediterranean: Views from the South thus offers a blueprint for a new generation of readers to rethink the world we thought we knew.