Emeritus history professor Edmund “Terry” Burke III, director of the UCSC Center for World History, will deliver the 2014 Spring Emeriti Faculty Lecture on Thursday, April 17, at the UCSC Music Center Recital Hall.
Burke will speak on the topic “Models of Mediterranean Modernity: The Perspective from the Longue Durée,” beginning at 7 p.m.
Admission is free and open to the public.
“Today, the Mediterranean appears as a land of contradictions—not only the abode of vibrant cultures and histories, but also an economic and political basket case,” notes Burke. “Only a world historical perspective can help us to transcend such culturally-based views.”
Burke said that his lecture will weave together the story of how he became a world historian, and how his thinking about the Mediterranean region has evolved over his career.
“The modern Mediterranean,” he suggests, “emerged in the context of deep eco-historical transformations. These gave rise to common strategies of development as well as divergent outcomes.”
A UC Presidential Chair in World History from 2003 to 2007, Burke is the author of numerous books, including Environmental Imaginaries of the Middle East: History, Policy, Power and Practice (Ohio University Press, 2011); and The Environment and World History, 1500-2000 (UC Press, 2009).
His most recent book, The Ethnographic State: France and Moroccan Islam will be published later this year.
Although he is currently retired, Burke still occasionally teaches upper division survey courses in the history of the modern world from 1450-1950. Over the past decade, these classes have utilized histories of production and consumption as lenses to comprehend the unfolding of the modern era.
He additionally developed and taught an upper division survey course, "The Mediterranean in the Modern Age, 1492-1942," as well as a senior seminar, "The Mediterranean in the Cold War, 1942-1992."
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The UC Santa Cruz Emeriti Group presents the 2014 Emeriti Faculty Lecture with Edmund “Terry” “Burke III on Thursday, April 17, at the Music Center Recital Hall on the UCSC campus. Admission is free and open to the public. Free parking is available in the Performing Arts parking lot. For more information, contact the UCSC Special Events Office at (831) 459-5003 or specialevents@ucsc.edu.
