 | An Orthodox Commonwealth: Symbolic Legacies and Cultural Encounters in Southeastern Europe Subjects: Humanities; History; European History; World/ International History; Early Modern History 1500-1750; Modern History 1750-1945; Religious History; This collection brings together fifteen studies on the survival and adaptation of the Orthodox religious and cultural tradition in the societies of Southeastern Europe after the fall of Constantinople, a world so often misunderstood and misinterpreted. This problem of cultural history is examined in a diversity of contexts and on multiple levels of analysis in order to elucidate issues of broader concern to social theory such as the fluidity and dynamic character of identity, the intricate encounter of religion and politics and the challenge of secular world views such as the Enlightenment and nationalism to traditional religious outlooks. The author argues consistently against all forms of reductionism, converses at length with the sources in order to pose questions to conventional views and invites the historical imagination to recover and understand a world submerged by the nationalist interpretation of the past. This task involves the recovery of the geographical pluralism that made Orthodox culture a truly transnational phenomenon. The collection accordingly brings into focus both the epicentres of Orthodox culture and symbolism such as Mt Athos and Constantinople, but also its hinterlands in Asia Minor and the Balkans. Paschalis M. Kitromilides, PhD Harvard University, is Professor Emeritus of Political Science at the University of Athens and Director of the Centre for Asia Minor Studies. From 2000 to 2011 he was Director of the Institute of Neohellenic Research at the National Hellenic Research Foundation. His books in English include: The Enlightenment as Social Criticism. Iosipos Moisiodax and Greek Culture in the Eighteenth Century (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1992); Enlightenment Nationalism Orthodoxy (Variorum, 1994); An Orthodox Commonwealth. Symbolic Legacies and Cultural Encounters in Southeastern Europe (Variorum Collected Studies Series, Ashgate, 2007); Adamantios Korais and the European Enlightenment (Voltaire Foundation, 2010); Enlightenment and Revolution. The Making of Modern Greece (Harvard University Press, 2013); Enlightenment and religion in the Orthodox world (Voltaire Foundation, 2016). |
