Aris Lecture: Sarah E. Bond

About the event

The Aris Lecture occurs annually in the spring as part of our Endowed Lecture Series and is supported by the Rutherford Aris Memorial Fund. This year's speaker is Sarah E. Bond (History, University of Iowa). The title of her talk is "Diagrams of Difference: Representing Information in the Late Roman and Medieval Mediterranean." 

Paper abstract

This talk looks at the use of information visualizations in the late antique and early medieval Mediterranean, specifically the paschal calendar and the T-O map, as tools for representing Christian cosmologies. From Dionysius Exiguus to Isidore of Seville, diagrams that represented information such as the date of Easter or the dispersal of Noah’s sons were not only teaching devices, they reiterated perceived differences between faiths, places, and ethnicities. This talk looks at the development of information devices and assesses their impact of anti-Jewish sentiment, attitudes towards slavery, and their place in the history of information science.

About the speaker

Sarah E. Bond is Associate Professor of History at the University of Iowa. She is a historian of the late Roman world with a focus on Roman law, marginalized persons, and digital humanities. She published her book, Trade and Taboo: Disreputable Professions in the Roman Mediterranean with the University of Michigan Press in 2016. She is a contributor to the arts journal Hyperallergic and a column editor for the Los Angeles Review of Books and Public Books.

How to support

To contribute to the Rutherford Aris Memorial Fund at the Center for Premodern Studies in the College of Liberal Arts at the University of Minnesota, visit give.umn.edu/giveto/aris