Date de l’évènement : 4 February 2022 – University of Oxford
Dr Lauren Working (Oxford and York, ERC-TIDE), Dr Emily Stevenson (Oxford, ERCTIDE),
Louise McCarthy (LARCA, Université de Paris)
Richard Hakluyt and the French Connection: Transfers of Global Geographical Knowledge from Paris to Oxford (late 16th – early 17th c) Richard Hakluyt is one of the most emblematic figures associated with England’s commercial and colonial expansion at the end of the 16th and beginning of the 17th century. A prolific translator, compiler and purveyor of geographical material and travel accounts, he was a significant contributor to the articulation and early promotion of the idea of an English — and later British — empire. These efforts took the form of his monumental printed collections Diverse Voyages Touching the Discovery of America (1582) and The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques and Discoveries of the English Nation (1589; 1598-1600), as well as his assiduous lobbying in diplomatic, scholarly, and company circles. Among the many networks of power and knowledge with which Hakluyt interacted, the connections he made during his five-year residence in Paris as chaplain to the English ambassador between 1583 and 1588 were particularly fruitful in terms of collecting and translating travel and geographical information. The gathering, translation, and transmission of that Parisian material, and its effect on the development of imperial thought in England and France, will be the focus of this one-day event.
Graduate students and early career researchers are invited to present a short paper (5 minutes) at the event as part of a lightening talk panel. Papers may be presented in person or over Zoom.
Contributions may address, but are not limited to, the following topics:
– Oxford and/or Paris-based travel, trade and colonialism
– Early modern travel writing in France and/or Britain
– Forms of geographical knowledge and their circulation
– Promotional literature
– Early conceptions of the British/French empire and colonial rivalry
– Early modern British-French diplomacy and connections
– Early modern British-French colonial rivalry
– Translation of geographical and travel knowledge
Abstracts (150 words) in English should be sent along with a short biographical note (100 words) to hakluyt.paris.oxford.2022[at]gmail.com by 5 December 2021. Please email if you have any further queries. Notifications will be sent by 20 December 2021.
