Abstract
This paper explores the role of artistic and literary expression in shaping diasporic identity and modeling systems of cultural survival in the early modern Mediterranean. Focusing on the Sephardic diasporic communities that flourished in the Ottoman Empire after the 1492 expulsion from Spain, I examine how visual, literary, and intellectual practices became mechanisms of continuity, resilience, and intercultural exchange. Particular attention is paid to the cities of Thessaloniki and Constantinople, where exiled Sephardic artists and scholars—such as Moses Almosnino—engaged deeply with both Jewish tradition and Italian humanist aesthetics. I argue that these communities developed a diasporic aesthetic system that functioned like a living ecology: self-sustaining, adaptive, and responsive to surrounding political and cultural conditions. Through close readings of literary texts, communal artworks, and patterns of artistic inheritance, this paper highlights how creative forms carried memory across generations and geographies, resisting cultural erasure while fostering transnational identity. It seeks to contribute to conversations about how marginalized communities use art to reimagine belonging and negotiate visibility, offering a model for understanding how aesthetics operate as both cultural archive and political expression.
Presenters
Tugba SevinProfessor and World Languages Coordinator, Department of Language and Literature, Southwestern Oklahoma State University, United States
Details
Presentation Type
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session
Theme
The Arts in Social, Political, and Community Life
KEYWORDS
CULTURAL MEMORY, TRANSNATIONAL IDENTITIES, EARLY MODERN HUMANITIES, RELIANCE THROUGH ART
