The longue durée of the Islam Narrative in European History Textbooks

Description

This project compares narratives on Muslims and Islam in historical textbooks with self-portrayals and reconstructs the processes via which Christian/European self-images come into being. Although during the period between 1555 and 1648 Catholics had been divided from Protestants, Lutherans from Reformists and the latter two in turn from the Baptists and other radical congregations, the narrative of the threatening otherness of Muslims constituted the ultimate boundary that united all Western Europeans. This narrative thus contributed to the narrative shaping of a Christian continent, all the way across (Western) Europe. When in the course of the 18^th century the boundaries between the Christian denominations gradually became more fluid on a domestic level, the common boundary defining relations to Muslims was upheld. 

The longue durée investigates how Muslims are rendered ‘others’ and which boundaries are drawn in the process; to what extent the Islam narrative has contributed to stabilising concepts of the self and which changes they have experienced over the course of time. Based on the examples of textbooks from Germany, Austria and the Netherlands, these questions are addressed with respect to a timeframe of around 300 years. The selection of countries allows for a focus on the narrative production of the three most significant Christian denominations of the early modern period: Lutheranism, Catholicism and Reformism.