Blackness and Islam among enslaved North Africans in 18th-century Mediterranean Europe
FBK Aula Piccola
Fondazione Bruno Kessler - Polo delle Scienze Umane e sociali
Slavery in the Mediterranean, from ancient times through the abolition era, is often thought to have been mostly unaffected by racial issues. It is usually considered to have been, above all, shaped by religious divides: men and women were enslaved according to their religious affiliation. But at the same time, in this type of slavery, dark-skinned enslaved men and women were often in the most subordinate positions compared to other dominated groups. Can historical studies on race help to shed light on this Mediterranean slavery, or conversely, can the Mediterranean case provide a different understanding of racialization processes during the early modern period?
M’hamed OUALDI | European University Institute
Coordinamento scientifico:
Anna Clara Basilicò (FBK-ISIG)
Irene Fattacciu (FBK-ISIG)
Alessandra Quaranta (FBK-ISIG)
Massimo Rospocher (FBK-ISIG)
Sandra Toffolo (FBK-ISIG)
Ciclo di seminari: “Tavola ovale di storia moderna“
ISIG è soggetto accreditato o qualificato a realizzare attività formativa a favore del personale della scuola trentina.
Evento in lingua inglese.
La presentazione avverrà in presenza in Aula Piccola – FBK fino ad esaurimento posti e in modalità online.
E’ obbligatoria la registrazione entro il giorno 16 aprile 2026 alle ore 12.00.
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Immagine: Biblioteca FBK. Credits: Andrea Franceschini
Speakers
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M’hamed Oualdi - SpeakerEuropean University InstituteM’hamed Oualdi is a historian of Europe and North Africa in the world in the long 19th century at the European University Institute, Florence. Before joining the EUI, he was a full professor at Sciences Po-Paris (2019-2023), assistant, and then associate professor at Princeton University (2013-2019). From 2020 to 2026, he has been supervising a European Research Council-funded project (“Slavevoices”) about the demise of slavery in the Mediterranean from the mid-18th century to the 1930s. He is the author of A Slave Between Empires. A Transimperial History, Columbia University Press, 2020 and Esclavages dans les mondes musulmans, Amsterdam editions. He is the co-curator of the exhbition “Esclaves en Méditerranée” at the “Institut du monde arabe” Paris.
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The initiative was also realized thanks to the contribution of "Direzione generale Educazione, ricerca e istituti culturali" of the Ministry of Culture.