ABSTRACT

The Routledge Companion to Cultural History in the Western World is a comprehensive examination of recent discussions and findings in the exciting field of cultural history.

A synthesis of how the new cultural history has transformed the study of history, the volume is divided into three parts – medieval, early modern and modern – that emphasize the way people made sense of the world around them. Contributions cover such themes as material cultures of living, mobility and transport, cultural exchange and transfer, power and conflict, emotion and communication, and the history of the senses. The focus is on the Western world, but the notion of the West is a flexible one. In bringing together 36 authors from 15 countries, the book takes a wide geographical coverage, devoting continuous attention to global connections and the emerging trend of globalization. It builds a panorama of the transformation of Western identities, and the critical ramifications of that evolution from the Middle Ages to the twenty-first century, that offers the reader a wide-ranging illustration of the potentials of cultural history as a way of studying the past in a variety of times, spaces and aspects of human experience.

Engaging with historiographical debate and covering a vast range of themes, periods and places, The Routledge Companion to Cultural History in the Western World is the ideal resource for cultural history students and scholars to understand and advance this dynamic field.

part 1|186 pages

Shaping Western identities, 1250–1500

chapter |24 pages

Introduction

chapter 1|21 pages

Culture Of Politics In The Middle Ages

Rituals to create and confirm political order

chapter 2|16 pages

Cultures Of Conflict

chapter 3|18 pages

Material Cultures Of Living

Spatiality and everyday life i

chapter 5|13 pages

Cultural Encounters And Transfer

The case of pious foundations in the Islamicate world

chapter 6|15 pages

Practices Of Communication

Literacy, gestures and words: research on late medieval communication

chapter 9|21 pages

Body, Sexuality, and Health

part 2|174 pages

Europe meets the globe

chapter |23 pages

Introduction

chapter 11|18 pages

God’s Green Garden

Interactions between humans and the environment

chapter 12|22 pages

Material Cultures of Living

European attitudes to novelties

chapter 14|14 pages

Making Sense of the World

The creation and transfer of knowledge

chapter 15|22 pages

The Self

Representations and practices

chapter 16|18 pages

The Experience of Time

chapter 17|21 pages

* Written Communication in Urban Spaces

Publication, textual materiality and appropriations*

chapter 19|19 pages

Faces of Power and Conflict

part 3|206 pages

The Western world and the global challenge, from 1750 to the present

chapter |4 pages

Introduction

chapter 24|17 pages

Natural Disasters and Modernity

chapter 25|16 pages

Cultures of Mobility

chapter 27|19 pages

Media and Mediatization

chapter 29|15 pages

Violence and Trauma

Experiencing the two World Wars

chapter 30|15 pages

The Cold War Cultures and Beyond

chapter 32|5 pages

Epilogue

Cultural history in retrospect