Apply before November 2 to attend this May 2027 weekend seminar designed for advanced graduate students and early career faculty working on Netherlandish topics:
Netherlandish Political Thought and Culture in the Early Modern World (weekend seminar)
Sponsored by the Center for Early Modern Political Thought
Co-directed by Nigel Smith (Princeton University) and Claudia Swan (Washington University in St. Louis)
The global presence of the Dutch Republic and the trading prowess of the early modern southern Netherlands animate distinct histories and historiographies. Yet, with the exception of the histories of law and philosophy exemplified by Grotius and Spinoza, the political thought and culture in the Dutch Republic and the Spanish Netherlands tend to be studied in isolation. However, recent approaches have seen a new comparative emphasis that is invigorated by interdisciplinary inquiry, placing Netherlandish political life and culture in dynamic interaction with the cultures of other places across the globe. Applications are welcomed from advanced graduate students and early career faculty in all humanities disciplines working on Netherlandish topics, especially those with comparative and global dimensions. Each participant will circulate and discuss their project’s abstract and may present portions of a work-in-progress or lead discussions on an object of analysis (including any form of cultural production, whether text, visual art, and/or performance). They will receive feedback from both workshop leaders and fellow participants.
Director: Nigel Smith is William and Annie S. Paton Foundation Professor of Ancient and Modern Literature at Princeton University. He has published widely on seventeenth-century English literature, especially Marvell, Milton, and radicalism. More recently he has focused on early modern Dutch literature in comparative context, including Bredero, Vondel, Tesselschade, Vos, and Oudaan. Polyglot Poetics: Transnational Early Modern Literature is shortly forthcoming. Claudia Swan, Mark Steinberg Weil Professor of Art History & Archaeology at Washington University in St. Louis, is a scholar of early modern art history, history of science, material culture studies, and global trade and politics. Recent publications include Rarities of These Lands: Art, Trade, and Diplomacy in the Dutch Republic and the co-authored volume Conchophilia: Shells, Art, and Curiosity in Early Modern Europe.
Anticipated Schedule: Friday and Saturday, May 7-8, 2027.
Apply by November 2, 2026, for admission and grants-in-aid for Folger Institute Consortium affiliates.
Questions? Please email owilliams@folger.edu