Language–Philology–Culture: Arab cultural semantics in transition

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Project web site

The research project “Language-Philology-Culture. Arab Cultural Semantics in Transition” explored the pivotal role of language consciousness in the history of Arab culture. This project was conducted from 2013 to 2019.

The project was funded by the European Research Council (ERC Starting Grant 312458 AR-SEM).

The objectives of the project were threefold: 

  1. it examined the vocabulary of the Arabic language and its semantic history
  2. it studied philological discourses on the semantic changes in the language in the classical Arabic philological tradition
  3. it explored the impact of Arabic philology in the wider historical and cultural context of the Judaeo-Arab neo-classical heritage (12th to 13th centuries) and Christian-Arab intellectual history on the eve of modernity (19th century).

The work on the Analytical Database of Arabic Poetry (ADAP) is ongoing. Scholars interested in contributing to it are encouraged to contact Dr Kirill Dmitriev, kd25@st-andrews.ac.uk.