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FELLOWSHIP FINAL REPORT The search for the Adamic language and the emergence of transcultural aspiration in the aftermath of the European maritime discoveries Ewa Lukaszyk1,2, Marie-Luce Demonet3

1 LE STUDIUM Institute for Advanced Studies, 45000 Orléans, France 2 University of Warsaw, Poland 3 CESR, University of Tours, France

REPORT INFO ABSTRACT Fellow: Ewa Lukaszyk The main hypothesis of this project is connected to the notion of pre- From University of Warsaw cultural origins of the humanity, situated in the paradisaical reality, not Host laboratory in region Centre-Val only before the fall, but also before the invention of the human language de Loire: CESR, University of Tours (Adam naming the animals created by God). The myth of the pre-lapsarian Host scientist: Marie-Luce Demonet unity of the human kind became crucial to the development of the Period of residence in region Centre- Val de Loire: 1 Sept. 2017 – 31 Aug. European relationship with other peoples in the aftermath of the maritime th 2018 discoveries in the 16 c. The examination of this topic is an important element of the projected transcultural humanities, searching to establish a Keywords : comprehensive outlook of the cultural inscription and limitations of the Adamic language, pre-lapsarian, human thought. transcultural, universalism, maritime discoveries

1- Introduction the Indian Ocean, brought a new hope of reconstructing the common language of the The medieval and early-modern speculations on humanity against the « confusion » of Babel, Adamic language (lingua adamica, the tongue leading to the recuperation of the unspoiled spoken in the Garden of Eden) are related both condition of man and of the world (restitutio to the question of paradisical origins of man and omnium in the thought of Guillaume Postel). the essential unity of the human kind. During Nowadays, the search for Adamic language the Middle Ages, the belief in the existence of a stands for the interrogation concerning not just primordial tongue spoken in Paradise spread the hypothetical pre-cultural origins, but even across cultural and religious denominations more importantly, the post-cultural becoming of around the Mediterranean (among Jews, man, exploring the perspectives of non- Muslims and Christians). This perfect language hegemonic universalism and opening a new was supposed to be lost in the biblical episode chapter of transcultural humanities. of the Tower of Babel. Nonetheless, in all those contexts and across the divisions, heterodox 2- Experimental details individuals dreamt of going beyond their The aim of the project consisted in introducing « cultured » condition to explore their common a historical perspective into the state-of-the art participation in the universal intellect and even reflection on transcultural perspectives in the speak the language of angels (locutio angelica). present-day humanities. This aim has been What is more, increased mobility and new achieved, in the first place, through the textual contacts established in the early-modern period, analysis of the works of the French heterodox both across the Mediterranean, the Atlantic and thinker Guillaume Postel, as well as the Lukaszyk, E.; Demonnet, M-L. The search for the Adamic language and the emergence of transcultural aspiration in the aftermath of the European maritime discoveries, LE STUDIUM Interdisciplinary Journal, 2018, 2, 21-24 https://doi.org/10.34846/Le-Studium.161.05.FR.08-2018 21 historical context of his activities, that permitted more, this Mediterranean and Iberian to evaluate the weight of transcultural phenomenon finds its global projection in the transgression and the inscription into the aftermath of the European maritime political projects of his time. A special attention discoveries. has been paid to the stakes and implications of Apparently marginal topic, such as the search his Oriental project, implying both philological for the Adamic language and the idea of work of Postel, such as his grammar of Arabic, generalized restitution (restitutio omnium) and his activity related with his participation in through language, defended by Guillaume the French embassy to Turkey. Postel, served as a way of retelling Euro- The stake of the project was to put in the Mediterranean and global transcultural past. limelight the early-modern origins of the universalist ideas, concentrating on the 3- Results and discussion unfalsified aspect of translocal / Two conference papers concerning the work of transconfessional / transcultural collaboration Guillaume Postel has been presented at the in pursuit of a crucial, common intellectual international conferences in Kiev (Ukraine) and cause that in the early-modern epoch was Ljubliana (Slovenia). Even more importantly, epitomized by the recuperation of the an international conference organized in the primordial language of the humanity. The framework of the project, “Transcultural aspect focused has been the relationship Mediterranean: in search of non-orthodox and between the problem of the lost primordial non-hegemonic universalism(s)” (Tours, Centre tongue and the valorization of intellectual d'Études Supérieures de la Renaissance, 30- activity beyond the cultural frontiers as well as 31.05.2018) permitted to foster the discussion the idea that the lost path of truth (via veritatis of transcultural transgression among the perdita) can only be found through the colleagues specialized not only in European confrontation with otherness. The charismatic Renaissance, but also in the Oriental studies, figure and the writings of Guillaume Postel focusing on the Mediterranean understood as a exemplify a coherent line of thinkers that are to region defined, in the first place, by the be found not only in France, but even more phenomena of exchange and circulation of importantly in the Iberian Peninsula (Llull, ideas. The proposed approach permitted to Barros, Vieira) that saw the necessity of identify the spheres of interference between the transcultural and transreligious dimension in Islamic and Christian worlds (contemplated in their intellectual activity. their plurality and mutual inter-penetrability). Tracing a relation between culturally locatable The central hypothesis of the project concerned origins and the hypothetical transcultural the early-modern emergence of the transcultural consequences of such processes of interference, aspiration, i.e. the desire of crossing the cultural the participants aimed at conclusions valid not frontier in search of intellectual or spiritual only for the history of ideas as an academic accomplishment. Such terms as “transculture”, discipline, but also for the contemporary “transculturation”, “transculturality”, perception of the shared Mediterranean “transcultural” (writing, comparativism, etc.) heritage. have already entered the current language of humanities; nonetheless, the predominant optics On the other hand, the definition of transcultural associate the transculturality with the present- condition implied in the project has been time conditions of global mobility. This is why presented during one of LE STUDIUM it has been crucial for this project to treat Thursdays (“Defining the symbolic space. From transculture as a phenomenon of the past and a cluster of transcultural case studies to a study it in a diachronic perspective: as a topological conceptualisation”, Tours, CESR, tradition forming a consistent stream of ideas 2.11.2017). binding together not only the European, but also the Mediterranean history of ideas. What is Lukaszyk, E.; Demonnet, M-L. The search for the Adamic language and the emergence of transcultural aspiration in the aftermath of the European maritime discoveries, LE STUDIUM Interdisciplinary Journal, 2018, 2, 21-24 https://doi.org/10.34846/Le-Studium.161.05.FR.08-2018 22 sources which are in the focus of the host institution (CESR), the continuation of this 4- Conclusion research will accentuate the Islamic and Hebraic The aim of my project was to introduce the aspects of the studied problems and hopefully historical perspective into the emergent field of will be realised at the LUCIS Centre for the transcultural humanities. The projected impact Study of Islam and Society, Leiden University of this research is thus to cross the boundaries in the Netherlands. The perspectives of the of the discipline in the narrow sense, such as the future collaboration with the host laboratory Renaissance studies, in order to open new (CESR) consist in fostering a cross-cultural interrogations in the reflection on the approach to the cultural past that till now was a perspectives of the global (trans)culture. marginal aspect in this institution. This aim may be achieved through further exchange of 5- Perspectives of future experiences and ideas based on the contacts and collaborations with the host discussions held in the framework of this laboratory project. Based on the research and reflection in the 6- Articles published in the framework of the project, I planned a future framework of the fellowship research proposal under the title “Poetics of the Void. Mystical insight and transcultural E. Lukaszyk, “Congregatio mundi today. New transgression in the Mediterranean”. This perspectives on Guillaume Postel (1510- forthcoming project is inscribed in the same 1581)”, Primerjalna Kniževnost, no 41, 1/2018, field of reflection; at the same time, it aims at p. 191-199. ISSN 2591-1805. enlarging the scope of the existing research, The lecture given during the “Le Studium proposing to treat Epsteinian “transculture” as a Thursday” (“Defining the symbolic space: phenomenon that may be traced back to remote From a cluster of transcultural case studies to a periods of history and associated, in the first topological conceptualization”), presenting the place, to individualistic, primarily non- general lines and targets of my theoretical communitarian phenomena (even if some form innovation and situated my research on Adamic of “community of individuals” is utterly derived language in relation to this larger project, has from it). Individual transcultural aspirations, as been published in Polish as the first chapter I claim, are not born either with modernity nor (“Emergencje”) in E. Lukaszyk, Humanistyka, post-modernity; on the contrary, they may be która nadchodzi. W poszukiwaniu kondycji found in medieval and early-modern past of the transkulturowej [The coming humanities. In Mediterranean world understood as a crossroad search of the transcultural condition], of traditions connected to major monotheistic Warszawa, DiG, 2018, p. 11-29. ISBN 978-83- religions. I claim that as early as the beginning 286-0031-7 of the second millennium CE transcultural aspirations had been present in specific parts of 7- Acknowledgements the Mediterranean world, namely al-Andalus, This work was supported by the Le Studium, and that they formed a distinct line of “counter- Loire Valley Institute for Advanced Studies, tradition” that cannot be entirely inscribed in Orleans & Tours, France under Marie any cultural context in particular and is based on Sklodowska-Curie grand agreement no. the will of disruption of the existing cultural 665790, European Commission. patterns and boundaries. What is more, this line appears as alive and productive today, shaping, I would like to thank prof. György Endre Szönyi in a significant way, the contemporary Euro- (Central European University, Budapest) for the Mediterranean world. suggestions concerning the interpretation of the writings of Guillaume Postel. While in the current project I worked predominantly with French and Romance Lukaszyk, E.; Demonnet, M-L. The search for the Adamic language and the emergence of transcultural aspiration in the aftermath of the European maritime discoveries, LE STUDIUM Interdisciplinary Journal, 2018, 2, 21-24 https://doi.org/10.34846/Le-Studium.161.05.FR.08-2018 23 Adams, Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag, 1999, pp. 57-80. 8- References Knowlson, J., Universal Language Schemes in Aarsleff, H., From Locke to Saussure, England and France, 1600-1800, Toronto and Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, Buffalo: University of Toronto Press, 1975. 1982. Kuntz, M. Leathers, “Hebrew and the “other Bouwsma, W. J., Concordia Mundi. The Career sister” Arabic: The language of Adam as a and Thought of Guillaume Postel (1510-1581), paradigm for the Restitutio Omnium in the Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, thought of Guillaume Postel”, Quaderni di 1957. Studi Arabi, vol. 15, 1997, pp. 21-44. Buescu, M. 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Lukaszyk, E.; Demonnet, M-L. The search for the Adamic language and the emergence of transcultural aspiration in the aftermath of the European maritime discoveries, LE STUDIUM Interdisciplinary Journal, 2018, 2, 21-24 https://doi.org/10.34846/Le-Studium.161.05.FR.08-2018 24