Studies in Eighteenth-Century Culture

Addressing the diverse ways in which eighteenth-century contemporaries of different nations and cultures created visual, verbal, and material representations in various media.

Focused on conventions of technology, labor, and tolerance on the one hand, and on artistic intentionality on the other hand, these essays also address the implications of this past in our own research today. The first section, “Representing Humans and Technology,” opens with the late Srinivas Aravamudan’s presidential address, “From Enlightenment to Anthropocene.” This is followed by a panel of essays on labor and industry, which includes Valentina Tikoff on the overlap between welfare and the technical training of Spanish orphans for warfare; Susan Egenolf on mythological representations of industry; Susan Libby on the Encyclopédie’s mechanical representations of sugar production on the plantations; and Jon Klancher on technological manuals.

The second section, “Inside the Artist’s Studio,” opens with Shearer West’s ASECS/BSECS lecture on “selfiehood” and eighteenth-century celebrity. This is followed by papers on self-promoting self-representations—by painters in Wendy Wassyng Roworth’s essay on Angelica Kauffman’s studio in Rome and Francesca Bove’s essay on George Morland’s studio; and by a self-promoting French society lady in Heather McPherson’s essay on Madame Récamier’s portraits. This section concludes with Leith Davis’s essay on representations in the contemporary press of Ireland and the Glorious Revolution.

The final section addresses emerging issues in two forums. The first reconsiders issues of intentionality: participants include Stephanie Insley Hershinow, Sarah Ellenzweig, Edmund J. Goehring, Thomas Salem Manganaro, and Kathleen Lubey. The second section reconsiders issues of tolerance—and the association of Enlightenment tolerance with Voltaire during the recent Charlie Hebdo rallies in Paris. Participants include Jeffrey M. Leichman, Reginald McGinnis, Jack Iverson, Fayçal Falaky, Ourida Mostefai, and Elena Russo.