LUMINAR - INTERNET AND HUMANISM

In this monographic edition, Engramma presents a survey of the study days Luminar. Internet and Humanism held in Venice since 2002, and particularly the materials gathered on 4 and 5 february 2005 in occasion of Luminar 4. On-line sources and resources. The method of humanistic studies.

Engramma, in collaboration with the Querini Stampalia Foundation and the History of Architecture Department of IUAV University in Venice, promotes on 2 and 3 February 2006 the fifth annual meeting Luminar 5. On-line journals: experiences and prospects. The conference will be held in Venice at the Querini Stampalia Foundation.

2005 - Luminar 4. On-line sources and resources. Method in historical and humanistic science. Last year the conference was devoted to investigate value and reliability of systematic archiving of documentary sources and resources in the web, and to analyze various kinds of on-line resources for humanistic studies.

2004 - Luminar 3. Web museums The third annual Luminar conference opened up new avenues of reflection specifically related to possible models for web museums. The aim is to maintain an intimate link between theoretical analysis and the practical aspects of carrying out research and comunication on the web.

2003 - Luminar 2. Web Auctoritas and Memory The second Luminar conference scrutinised various technical and legal aspects of on-line humanist learning such as the authority of publications, matters regarding authors' rights (copyright and 'copyleft'), the value of the web's archive system, and the temporary on-line registration of its contents.

2002 - Luminar. Internet and Humanism: an introduction to the theme The first Luminar conference gave scholars of different disciplines the opportunity to discuss the potential of the web in terms of humanistic research. A comparison between various experiences highlighted several core issues: the revolutionary role of the Internet in humanistic studies; the changes which the Internet has brought in gnosiological terms; the difficulties that these changes have inevitably brought to theory and practice.

The word "Luminar" appears in Eumeswil, the great visionary novel by Ernst Jünger published in 1977. Located at the western boundaries of the Mediterranean, between the desert and the ocean, in a future Middle Ages, Eumeswil, is a city in which nothing is real and everything is possible. In the rarefied setting of the novel, Luminar is the main research tool used by the protagonist, the historian Martin Venator - an interactive screen that records and coordinates data from the past, and then, on request, reproduces them, and restores the recollection of them.

Luminar prefigures the virtual space now provided by the Internet. By opening up unexpected perspectives in the field of humanistic studies, the Internet not only makes it possible to explore the boundaries between areas of knowledge and the way they interact, but it also gives rise to experimentation in expressive forms and methods of research. The Internet, the 'world wide web', is a new dimension which enhances the methods and themes of research available to scholars.
In the history of the West, technological innovations - writing, bound books, the press, photography, cinema - have led to moments of beneficent crisis and revolutionary changes in the elaboration of knowledge and its transmission.
The transformation brought about by the Internet - the opening up of new links between different forms of knowledge - now, at last, leads 'scholars', technicians' 'humanists' and 'scientists' to compare their different practices and theories.

"Whoever I may be, please don't try to discover my name…" Exhibition Secret rites. Mysteries in Greece and Rome (Il rito segreto. Misteri in Grecia e a Roma), Coliseum, 22 july 2005 - 3 january 2006 (Maria Bergamo, Monica Centanni) Exhibitions and museums in Italy (and not only… ) a new site-observatory from the Scuola Normale in Pisa Exhibitions and Museums Observatory http://mostreemusei.sns.it (Monica Centanni) Tireless scholar, explorer and vagabond "born with the instinct of a wayfarer" Giuseppe Tucci, The country of women with many husbands (Il paese delle donne dai molti mariti), published by Neri Pozza, Vicenza 2005 (Claudia Daniotti) The polytheistic phenomenology of war James Hillman, A terrible Love of War (Un terribile amore per la guerra), Adelphi, Milano, 2005 (Monica Centanni, Daniela Sacco) The new Cambellotti Museum at Latina Duilio Cambellotti Museum, Latina, Piazza San Marco, Palazzo della Cultura (Simona Dolari)