Maps and Mobility in Islamic World History

Catalog description

Islam arose out of established patterns of commercial mobility and cultural exchange, but it also produced new local and global movements and circulations that are a primary concern of this course. The annual hajj pilgrimage to Mecca, pastoral and nomadic seasonal migrations, inland and port city market relations, imperial capital supply systems, and Islamic travel literature anchor the mobility pillars of the course. While Islam generated new kinds of migrations and interactions, it also produced new cartographic structures and sensibilities built around new geographies, sciences and world views. European colonialism and nationalist movements in the Islamic world generated additional historical layers of mapping pressures, possibilities and realities. Islamic, European and national maps in the Muslim world form the cartographic pillars of the course.