Making Sense as a Cultural Practice: Historical Perspectives

In the cultural and social formations of the past, practices exist for the generation and integration of moments having and giving sense with the objective of strengthening the cultural and social cohesion. Such practices and processes have a constructive character, even if this is not always the intention of the actors themselves. As the production of sense is one of the central fields of action of cultural and political practice, the articles examine with an interdisciplinary perspective how, in different contexts, the construction of sense was organized and implemented as a cultural practice.

1 Editorial 2 Content 5 Preface 9 Welcome Address 11 Introduction 13 The Parables of Jesus as Media of Collective Memory 23 Social Groups, Personal Relations, and the Making of Communities in Medieval vita monastica 45 Writing a Life 65 Knowledge Making and Authorization Strategies 75 Making Sense of Europe 93 How to Create Political Meaning in Public Spaces? 109 Making Sense of Autocracy 121 The Dissemination of News in Early Modern Venice 135 Political Information and Religious Skepticism in Early Modern Italy 147 How to Read a Renaissance Fool 163 Sixteenth-Century Classifications of Passions and their Historical Contexts 181 Making Sense of Illness 193 Making Sense of the Confinement of the Poor 211 Making Sense of Diabetes 225 List of Contributors 241