This lecture explores the notion of European culture and ‘civilization’. Around the time of the Renaissance, some Europeans began to think about Europe in terms of its civilization; before that period only Christianity had given Europe any semblance of unity, let alone any sense of superiority. But since then, and even more so since the eighteenth century, Europe came to think of its civilization as being different from that in other parts of the world, and indeed better. This idea was based on assumptions of so-called European virtues, and European values. Especially since the age of the European overseas empires, Europeans have championed those virtues and indeed tried to export them to the rest of the world, convinced of their superiority. It is an essential part of historical Eurocentrism.
What exactly were those ways of thinking? When and how did those ‘European virtues and values’ arise, and how have they changed over time? How were they translated into myths and narratives and norms, and how were they proselytized around the world? What is the origin of the much-vaunted European values of the European Union? Just how important really was the Enlightenment, for example?
What precisely has been the European narrative, and is there a myth which holds all these things together about the superior European civilization?”
Michael Wintle (Amsterdam), M.J.Wintle(at)uva.nl