Philology and Modern Science: Frames, Functions, Fantasies
Organisers: Paul Michael Kurtz (Ghent) and Kristine Palmieri (Halle)
This workshop sets at its core the scientific, the philological, and the modern: in their contours, connections, and contingencies. Posed as a question, it asks what, exactly, was so ‘modern’ or ‘scientific’ about philology after 1800. Critically, it does so on two levels: as conceived by those moderns themselves and as viewed by contemporary historians. To examine the construction of philology as a modern science, this collaborative undertaking focuses not only on its making or unmaking but also on its reverberations elsewhere. The contributions thus investigate (a) how philology became, was, or ceased to be conceptualized as scientific or even as a science all its own, (b) how its epistemic status rose and fell in relation to other fields, and (c) how that standing impacted not only its own development but also that of other sciences, whether physical or life, social or human.