• Digital Humanities and Cultural Heritage
• Publications close
• The Historical Journal close
• Edinburgh Research Explorer close
• figshare close

ABSTRACT The Idylls of Theocritus stand between imitation and imagination, between the real world and story. Theocritus’s presentation of both urban and rural environments trains our readings on people, landscape, and materiality—and the porosity between them. This article offers a reading of Theocritus’s Idyll 21 and the strong connection it presents between fishermen and their environs, through the lens of material ecocriticism. It shows that the world of the Theocritean corpus is complicated and enriched by material agency and the agentic landscape. This article engages with approaches to imagination, especially new-materialist entangled perspectives that resonate with Theocritus’s cast of characters, which include nature and the nonhuman.

This paper explores the placement and function of the discipline of geography in the expansion of the Japanese empire, doing so through the prism of the work and field research of Tada Fumio, a leading geographer in Japan both before and after 1945. This examination of this aspect of Tada Fumio's career and its interweaving with the construction and consolidation of Japan's empire will broaden recent studies of imperial Japan's simultaneous encounter with geopolitics and fascism while engaging with Japan's developing ideas about geography as a political and cultural discipline. This paper demonstrates the importance of the entwined histories of Japanese and German geographers in the Japanese empire, as well as documenting Tada Fumio's activities in Manchuria (northeast China) and on the Korean peninsula. Finally, the paper reveals fissures in the historical record of Japanese geographers in continentalAsia and, until such time as more subaltern voices can be found, seeks to lay down the foundation for further research on the study of geography in the Japanese empire.

Abstract According to some of the past half-century’s most influential critics of liberalism, John Locke is the pivotal subverter of the pre-modern ethical tradition. Locke’s view of nature and of human nature, the story goes, divorced ethics from natural teleology and so set off an inevitable spiral downward into moral dissolution. This story about Locke remains influential even though the last fifty years of Locke scholarship have brought a cascade of studies treating Locke as operating within the tradition of Reformed natural law. These studies, in part because they embrace a distorted view of Locke’s conception of the person, have failed to address satisfactorily the crux of the story told by the critics of liberalism. This article corrects that distortion and demonstrates how natural teleology operates within Locke’s ethics. I show how Locke sought to identify the teleological ordering of human beings to the supreme good by developing a relational conception of the person, analysing the human being as embedded in and defined by a web of relationships including neighbour and God. The result is a Locke far more in continuity with pre-modern ethical approaches than has hitherto been realized, one who sought to preserve natural teleology for the modern world.

Abstract Fifty years ago, the infamous bank robbery and ensuing hostage crisis that took place in a Stockholm bank gave rise to the so-called ‘Stockholm syndrome’. Though never recognized as a valid medical diagnosis, the (allegedly) pathological relationship between kidnapper and hostage has become an omnipresent media phenomenon that inspires movies and television series to this day. However, this forced bond was not always seen as problematic. The years between 1860 and 1910 witnessed the rise of kidnappings in the Mediterranean world (Southern Italy, Greece, the Ottoman Balkan region, and Morocco) involving English, American, and European hostages. Today, we know about these incidents from autobiographical narratives by the former captives. They painted a surprisingly favourable picture of their captors – and found enthusiastic audiences for their stories. Looking at the interplay of feelings, coercion, and empowerment, the article opens up a new perspective on the history of emotions that brings both victims and perpetrators into the picture.

Abstract This article aims to decipher distinctive conceptual characteristics attributed to the legendary founder of Ḥasidism, Israel Baʿal Shem Ṭov, as documented by his faithful disciple, Jacob Joseph of Polonnoye (1710–1784). I endeavor to demonstrate how a quantitative analysis of the earliest testimonies of Beshtian teachings can improve our understanding of the interplay between major concepts within these teachings. To achieve this objective, I apply a combination of statistical tools of distant reading with textual analysis of close reading. It will reveal singular characteristics of the reported teachings of the Beshṭ, while distinguishing them from the textual corpus into which they were integrated, Jacob Joseph’s writings: Sefer Toldot Yaʿaqov Yosef (1780), Ben Porat Yosef (1781), and Ṣafnat Paʿneaḥ (1782). The results indicate a significant focus on negativity—moral, emotional, and conditional—as well as verbs that offer followers guidance regarding how to overcome these negative aspects of the human experience.

While Holocaust museums have embraced social media to connect with online audiences and provide educational materials, the specifics of their use are not well understood. A Delphi study involving 22 experts developed a framework for examining Holocaust-related social media content. This framework, the result of a three-round iterative process, includes three main areas: Historical content of the Holocaust, Contemporary issues related to the Holocaust, and Museum activities and communication. The hierarchical system of categories can help users explore the vast range of online materials and help educators identify effective strategies for using social media content in Holocaust education.

Abstract Between 1958 and 1973, hijackings between Cuba and the US surged, prompting Cuban officials in the early 1960s to propose an extradition agreement for hijackers. However, the US, leveraging its superpower status, dismissed these initiatives, viewing hijackers as political asylum seekers rather than criminals. By the late 1960s, as hijackings escalated from the US to Cuba, the American approach shifted, seeking a bilateral agreement to address air piracy, only to be rebuffed by Cuba, which refused to accept the US’s categorization of specific hijackers as political asylum seekers while classifying others as criminals. Meanwhile, the US pressed its extradition stance through international bodies like the International Civil Aviation Organization. These diplomatic efforts underscored broader challenges in US–Cuban relations, with negotiations repeatedly missing opportunities for enhanced co-operation. A pivotal shift occurred after a significant incident threatened both nations, leading to a more balanced perspective between the US and Cuba. This change culminated in the 1973 signing of a ‘Memorandum of understanding’, marking a turning point that significantly curbed hijacking incidents and hinted at potential future improvements in bilateral relations.

AbstractIn this article, I will argue that various scholars of kalām unanimously agree that sense-perception is something beyond the physical processes in the sense organs. There may be something happening in our eyes when we see a red apple, but seeing a red apple is not tantamount to it. We will see that some scholars of kalām argue that sense-perception is akin to being aware or conscious of the object of perception, and, hence, distinct from the physical process in the sense organs. One group will go so far as to accept that sense-perception is not even dependent on any physical processes in the body. Another group will accept that sense-perception presupposes that various physical conditions obtain, yet still regard sense-perception as something distinct from the occurrence of those conditions. I am suggesting that these nonreductive theories of sense-perception are the reason why Arabic-Islamic philosophers, starting from the eleventh century CE, consistently reject the Aristotelian-Avicennian theory of sense-perception.