The effects of modernity : historiographical experiments

What is the "modern state", the "modern age" - and what is modern about what we call, for want of a better term, "early modernity"? Conceived as a collective workshop, the seminar will attempt to turn an interrogation of historical periodization into the beginning of a more ambitious reflection. By postponing the "end" of the Middle Ages, we hope to shift the terms of modernity, in other words, to challenge the words of an overly conventional discourse on the glorious advent of modern times. Reassessing ancient rationalities, comparing them with those that seem radically different only because they are so far away: these are the tasks facing historians today. The ends of the Middle Ages also designate the ends of its study: it's not just a question of undertaking the genealogy of powers, but of identifying, in this period of the past thus defined, the hotbeds of political inventiveness and creativity that are still active for the understanding of contemporary societies.