Lecture by Dr. Christine Stephan-Kaissis

Ruprecht-Karls-University Heidelberg

The lecture given by Christine Stephan-Kaissis at the UNESCO Chair in Intercultural Policy at the University of Macedonia, Thessaloniki/Greece, highlights the role of Greece in transcultural encounters across the then known world, called “Oikumene”. Covering the three continents of Europe, Africa and Asia her discussion centers on specific world pictures that the Greeks developed over time. Starting with Alexander the Great and the subsequent encounter of Greeks and people across the Asian continent, her analysis proceeds to the time of the medieval Empire of Byzantium by addressing the following questions: Were ancient Greeks and Byzantines aware of distant cultures across other continents? And if yes, how did they interact with these other cultures? Are there any reflections of cultural interaction in historical material objects? What do these objects tell us about the quality of past intercultural relations across geographical, linguistic, ethnic and religious borders? In order to understand mutual artistic exchange as well as frictions involved in visual practices, past and present processes of learning and reorientation are discussed. In her talk, Christine Stephan-Kaissis focuses on a set of specific case studies in a transcultural context and presents the methodological tools currently developed in a range of newly established academic disciplines.