Conference reserved for members of the GlobalMed network

Organised by the "GlobalMed - The Mediterranean and the World from Prehistory to the Present. Interdisciplinary and International Approaches network", this conference aims to examine the Mediterranean as an object of global and interdisciplinary research through concrete case studies. The conference seeks to develop two main lines of reflection based on the polysemy of the term “issue/problem”.

 On the one hand, the aim is to identify problems in the Mediterranean that are not necessarily crisis situations specific to this region, although this may sometimes be the case. Instead, the focus is on phenomena connected to macro-regional or global scales, with the Mediterranean viewed from a global perspective. From that point, the question of the Mediterranean as an observatory of global issues can be raised, even if the exceptional or central nature of the phenomena observed may – and must – be called into question. The range of observable situations is varied, including heritage and cultural questions, as well as demographic, political and geopolitical, and environmental concerns. This approach makes it possible to interrogate both the global dimensions and/or the exceptional nature of these phenomena.

On the other hand, the conference offers an opportunity to connect reflections on Mediterranean issues with questions about the analytical framework of the Mediterranean itself from a critical and epistemological perspective. Over the past five years, the GlobalMed network has brought together scholars with different national, disciplinary, and cultural backgrounds to develop a global approach to the Mediterranean. In the process, the concept of the Mediterranean and the field of Mediterranean studies have been examined from various angles. These interdisciplinary exchanges have helped to relativise the appropriateness of certain concepts which, when considered in isolation within their disciplinary fields, had the status of paradigms. The conference therefore aims to take stock and to open new perspectives on the Mediterranean question. Examining the Mediterranean is stimulating but complex; considering it within a global approach is no less so.

Participants may submit a paper for one of the three sessions below or participate in the closing roundtable discussion.

“Mediterranean paradigm” Session

The concept of the Mediterranean as a coherent region dates back to the turn of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Produced by travellers, archaeologists, historians, geographers and writers from Western Europe, it was shaped by their fascination with the ancient civilisations, landscapes and heritage they encountered there. The Mediterranean paradigm, developed by Fernand Braudel in the mid-twentieth century, was based on in this legacy and established a dominant analytical framework: the unity of the Mediterranean, anchored in the “longue durée” of commercial structures and network mobility.

From the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries onwards, this paradigm was gradually deconstructed. The unity of the Mediterranean was called into question by examining fractures and fragmentations within the Mediterranean region as well as the globalised dynamics of which it was a part.

This first session will draw on this epistemological evolution, not to challenge the Mediterranean paradigm per se – a task that has largely been accomplished over the past twenty years – but rather to use it as means of interrogating the Mediterranean region as a laboratory for considering scales of analysis and how they are articulated. The aim will be to identify these scales, ranging from the local to the global, and to examine the relationships between them. Individual papers may focus on the nature of these connections – paying attention to the multifaceted phenomena of domination but also of hybridisation. The absence of connections, situations of isolation, and lines of fracture, as well as their causes, will provide a counterpoint. This session may also consider whether comparable paradigms exist in other regions of the world.

“Decentering the Mediterranean” Session

Over the past twenty years, the global approach that has characterised the humanities and social sciences has sought to challenge Eurocentric viewpoints and decentre perspectives. Postcolonial studies have played a foundational role in this respect, demonstrating that world history has most often been written and disseminated from a Western standpoint – that is, from the perspective of those in power in colonial and imperial enterprises. However, an alternative approach is possible, as evidenced by the work of non-Western scholars who adopt a de-centered perspective, and aim to “provincialise” the West, particularly Europe and the Mediterranean.

 This second session does not seek to reopen the debate on this rebalancing of perspectives, which is now widely acknowledged. Instead, it aims to consider the Mediterranean space in light of this critical shift in perspective. We invite reflections on the results produced by studies that treat the Mediterranean as peripheral, provincial or marginal. How do these studies interact with the Mediterranean paradigm? To what extent do they contribute to challenging it?

The session also aims to challenge the concept of provincialization itself. Does moving beyond the Mediterranean mean moving beyond the Mediterranean paradigm? Is a periphery necessarily external? In other words, must the Mediterranean be placed on the edge of a map to escape a dominant or centralising perspective? Are the margins, neglected areas, and blind spots of the Mediterranean not also part of its peripheries? 

 “(Re)integrating the World” Session

 This third session shifts the focus by considering the Mediterranean not as a “world” or a periphery, but as a part of the world, embedded within a network of global circulations. The intention is to move away from a fragmented view of the world and to approach the Mediterranean as a space that connects seas, continents and distant horizons. As such, the inland sea thus becomes a privileged observatory for contemplating the unity of the world, while acknowledging its discontinuities, its zones of contact, and its lines of fracture.

We welcome studies that position the Mediterranean within multi-scalar circulatory systems, connecting the Atlantic, the Black Sea, the Indian Ocean and the Pacific through commercial trajectories, maritime routes, artistic and digital flows, and migratory mobilities. We encourage attention to be paid to “connected and mobile societies” – cosmopolitan milieus and spaces, diasporas and transnational collectives – whose current demands for the right to mobility and recognition, for environmental and social justice, and for the restitution of cultural property compel us to reconsider the role of the Mediterranean in the world.

This session will also invite reflection on the effects of this recent planetary shift on our analytical tools. How can Mediterranean approaches be combined with connected histories or entangled histories, oceanic studies or global studies without perpetuating a hegemonic perspective? Which methods, such as multi-sited fieldwork, South–North collaborations, participatory devices and digital tools, enable us to grasp circulations that transcend classical national and regional frameworks? Finally, contributors may address the forms of engagement that underpin such research. How do militant, artistic, or heritage practices in the Mediterranean contribute to formulating alternative ways of “inhabiting the world”, based on the recognition of interdependencies and the pursuit of fairer and more sustainable forms of circulation?

 “Post-global Mediterranean” Panel

The final roundtable discussion of the conference will focus on the concept of a post-global Mediterranean, which is defined as a critical analysis of the global approach. While the Mediterranean can serve as an observatory of the geopolitical, social, environmental and cultural issues currently facing the world, it can also be used to think about the limits and impasses of the global approach, which is largely based on paradigms of mobility, exchange, fluidity, and connectivity. Although this critical stance is not new, it nevertheless takes on urgency given the intensity of the phenomena observable in the Mediterranean.

The roundtable will highlight areas where the global approach is more of an incantation than an accurate description of reality, thereby enabling a more precise description of its nuances, degrees of intensity, and blockages.

At the same time, the discussion will consider the limitations of the global approach not as a simple opposition, but as a means of imagining alternative models. The crises that unfold in the  Mediterranean are also met with utopian visions and projects and shared causes. New social projects are emerging in the Mediterranean that challenge the model of productivism and economic growth, seeking instead to promote sustainable forms of development based on social justice and ecological preservation. The sea may still, and forever, be a space for these utopian visions, even if they are not global.