Objective
The ways in which languages interact, live and die, in political contexts that impose one or two dominant languages are today a central question for Europe. This project aims to address it through the study of a medieval Middle Eastern society with similar characteristics (multicultural, multilingual, religiously diverse, loosely unified politically, with strong local historical traditions), but remote enough as to enable a dispassionate analysis.
The project will focus on the social history of the Coptic language from its birth in the third century to its death around the eleventh century. Linguistically, Coptic is the continuation of ancient Egyptian. It acquired its own identity through attribution of a new social value, association with Christianity, notation in the Greek script, and massive use of Greek vocabulary. For almost a millennium, its interaction with two successive language French (Greek, Arabic) within an evolving historical context yielded varying results, from boosting its status as communal identity marker in times of tension to making it totally obsolete in social terms and leading to its death.
I shall study why Coptic evolved in the way it did, how it was used by centres of power, the role it played as a vector of Egyptian identity, and ultimately the reasons for its demise. I shall compare Coptic with the parallel but very different case of Syriac, which arose in similar conditions in the Roman East. The realisation of this interdisciplinary project requires mastery of a number of disciplines and their methods, in the Humanities and the Social Sciences, and competence in numerous ancient and modern languages.
It also requires the collaboration of specialists and exceptional documentary resources; such as the University of Oxford is one of the rare establishments worldwide to offer. It is hoped that this joint undertaking will foster much-needed collaboration between France and the United Kingdom, both leaders in many of the fields involved.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
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Keywords
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Programme(s)
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Topic(s)
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Call for proposal
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
FP6-2005-MOBILITY-5
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Funding Scheme
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
Coordinator
OXFORD
United Kingdom
The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.