Mission Statement
This year’s Classical, Medieval and Early Modern Studies conference ‘Voices of Authority in Premodern Times’ is aimed at exploring figures or modes of authority, ways to express authority, and the voices behind authority in classical, medieval, or early modern history.
The Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines authority as the power to influence or command thought, opinion, or behaviour. As such, figures of authority could be rulers or governmental bodies in command, influential or preeminent figures, or exemplary figures from the cultural tradition. Many ideas about authority and leadership were adopted and transmitted from earlier periods into later times, where they were confirmed, challenged, and defied. These ideas about authority, and its history as a concept that can be defined in numerous ways, have already been the subject of many scholars throughout the centuries, including Cicero, Niccolò Machiavelli, Max Weber, and Hannah Arendt. Sociologist Frank Furedi has recently approached the topic from a historical angle in his book Authority: A Sociological History (2013). According to Furedi, Western culture has a difficult relationship with authority, which is as old as human history itself. Although problems and challenges to authority are frequently studied through modern ideas, especially those of Weber and Arendt, they are often a far cry from the thousands of years of history that lie beyond these modern interpretations and challenges to authority. One of the basic questions with regard to authority is therefore: “what makes people perceive commands and institutions as authoritative?” What is considered authoritative has changed throughout history, yet Furedi states that in “an embryonic form”, authority “is both a social and cultural accomplishment that presupposes a consensus on the norms through which it gains both meaning and force.” Authority is something that rests on a foundation that warrants its exercise, and “throughout history, such foundational norms – divine authority, tradition and customs, reason and science, popular consent – provide the resources for narratives of validation.” While Furedi’s book takes the path of conceptual history by tracing the development of authority as a concept, how it was shaped and received its meaning from the pre-modern into the modern age, our conference will be less focused on the exact concept of authority, but more on the “narratives of validation,” or in our terms: “the voices of authority”.
Ideas about authority and figures of leadership can be found in texts of varying genres, as well as in art and materials (e.g. paintings, sculptures, and coins). During this CMEMS conference, students from varying disciplines within the Faculty of Arts will discuss questions such as: how could one achieve authority? Which instruments could one employ to express authority? How were ideas concerning authority transmitted and by whom? How (or by what means) are figures of authority themselves influenced, controlled, shaped, or challenged? Such are the questions we will address, in hopes of shedding light on the ‘voices of authority’ in premodern history.
The Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines authority as the power to influence or command thought, opinion, or behaviour. As such, figures of authority could be rulers or governmental bodies in command, influential or preeminent figures, or exemplary figures from the cultural tradition. Many ideas about authority and leadership were adopted and transmitted from earlier periods into later times, where they were confirmed, challenged, and defied. These ideas about authority, and its history as a concept that can be defined in numerous ways, have already been the subject of many scholars throughout the centuries, including Cicero, Niccolò Machiavelli, Max Weber, and Hannah Arendt. Sociologist Frank Furedi has recently approached the topic from a historical angle in his book Authority: A Sociological History (2013). According to Furedi, Western culture has a difficult relationship with authority, which is as old as human history itself. Although problems and challenges to authority are frequently studied through modern ideas, especially those of Weber and Arendt, they are often a far cry from the thousands of years of history that lie beyond these modern interpretations and challenges to authority. One of the basic questions with regard to authority is therefore: “what makes people perceive commands and institutions as authoritative?” What is considered authoritative has changed throughout history, yet Furedi states that in “an embryonic form”, authority “is both a social and cultural accomplishment that presupposes a consensus on the norms through which it gains both meaning and force.” Authority is something that rests on a foundation that warrants its exercise, and “throughout history, such foundational norms – divine authority, tradition and customs, reason and science, popular consent – provide the resources for narratives of validation.” While Furedi’s book takes the path of conceptual history by tracing the development of authority as a concept, how it was shaped and received its meaning from the pre-modern into the modern age, our conference will be less focused on the exact concept of authority, but more on the “narratives of validation,” or in our terms: “the voices of authority”.
Ideas about authority and figures of leadership can be found in texts of varying genres, as well as in art and materials (e.g. paintings, sculptures, and coins). During this CMEMS conference, students from varying disciplines within the Faculty of Arts will discuss questions such as: how could one achieve authority? Which instruments could one employ to express authority? How were ideas concerning authority transmitted and by whom? How (or by what means) are figures of authority themselves influenced, controlled, shaped, or challenged? Such are the questions we will address, in hopes of shedding light on the ‘voices of authority’ in premodern history.