Six professors from the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences have been named Conrad Humanities Scholars, and three of them come from the School of Literatures, Cultures and Linguistics, including Eric Calderwood, Associate Professor of Comparative and World Literature.
Calderwood defines his field as the study of people, and how people study cultural difference over time. Now, with the help of the Conrad Humanities Scholarship, he will be able to travel to help finish his current book project that examines the cultural memory of al-Andalus (medieval Muslim Iberia).
Specifically, Calderwood is examining Al-Andalus, the Arabic name for the parts of the Iberian Peninsula that were under Muslim rule from 711 to 1492.
“The book will be about how that past has been used to talk about politics in the present. Many political and cultural projects have appropriated that moment in history and used it to very different ends,” Calderwood said. “This period of history has become a symbol of Palestine, Muslim and Arab feminism, and Christian and Muslim tolerance— projects and traditions that we don’t usually associate with each other.”
Each chapter of the book will present a theme, including chapters on al-Andalus and feminism, al-Andalus and Palestine, al-Andalus and music, and many other topics. While the book will be written for a scholarly audience, Calderwood said there are other important implications for his research.
“The relationship between past and present has relevance and transferability to people in a lot of places,” Calderwood said. “There’s also an ethical urgency to teach—in a sensitive, curious and open way—the long historical relationship between Europe and the Muslim world given our current political realities.”
The Conrad Humanities Scholar awards are funded by a gift from the late Arlys Conrad, whose estate gift shared by the College of LAS and the College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences is intended to assist and retain promising mid-career faculty.