Introductory lecture outlining the main approaches to the study of migration and diaspora, followed by a closer discussion of two groups of shaped many of the early connections in global history: the Jewish diaspora and the Armeian diaspora.

• What does the term ‘diaspora’ mean, and how significant are the origins of the word for the study of diasporas?
• How different are the Jewish and Armenian diasporas and what characteristics do they share?
• How central is trade to the Jewish and Armeinian diaspora communities?

• Philip Curtin, 'Trade Diasporas and Cross-Cultural Trade' in Curtin, Cross-cultural trade in world history (1984)
• Robin Cohen, Global Diasporas: An Introduction (1997)

• To what extent did diaspora communities contribute to urban life? Concentrate on one diaspora.
• To what extent were diasporas global phenomena?

• Nicholas Canny, Europeans on the Move: Studies on European Migration, 1500-1800 (1994)
• Robin Cohen, The Cambridge Survey of World Migration
• Patrick Manning, Migration in World History (2004)
• David B Ruderman, Early Modern Jewry: A New Cultural History (2010)

TBC

• Jewish People Around the World
• A history of the Armenian diaspora

 

Galata Tower in the Jewish quarter in Istanbul

 

Depiction of an Armenian merchant (1652-1718); British Museum collection