Our network will build on previous approaches and seek to answer two main questions: How were medieval and early modern spaces adapted and transformed through the movement of material and immaterial things? To what extent did an individual’s sense of place depend upon the activities taking place there and how in turn did these create new social groups and identities?  

This annual conference is fundamentally interdisciplinary: literary, musical, architectural, artistic, and religious spaces, will be the subjects of enquiry not as discrete or separate entities, but ones which overlapped, came into contact with one another, and at times were in conflict. The creation of boundaries and demarcations in subsequent centuries was often a result of these early approaches to spaces.

Our first event took place on 24 February 2017 in London, and subsequent research days will be held at the Open University in Milton Keynes. If you’d like to be put on our mailing list, please email Helen Coffey (Helen.coffey@open.a.cuk) or Leah Clark (leah.clark@open.ac.uk)

*CFP Medieval and Early Modern Spaces and Places, The Open University, Milton Keynes, 23 February 2018*

Following a successful first workshop in February 2017, The Open University will be hosting a one-day conference on spaces and places on 23 February 2018

The conference will examine life in buildings, institutions and broader geographical areas from a variety of perspectives and will consider the following questions:

• How were medieval and early modern spaces adapted and transformed through the movement of material and immaterial things?
• Which particular aspects of political, social and economic infrastructures enabled the exchange of objects and ideas?
• To what extent did a sense of place depend upon the activities taking place there?