Global Americana: The Wider Worlds of a Singular Collection (JCB Digital Exhibition)
From its foundational core of Americana purchased in 1846, the John Carter Brown Library has always been a global collection. The connections between America and other regions around the world have consistently been a central theme in the Library’s acquisition policies. Even more so today: as we continue to acquire new books, maps, and prints, we are paying close attention to broader connections, largely in response to the Library’s researchers who incessantly push the conventional geographical boundaries in their own historical scholarship. In conjunction with the LAGLOBAL research network at the University of London (of which the JCB is one of several institutional partners) and researchers at the Library, Global Americana has been conceived as a collectively curated exhibition that highlights not only the JCB’s globe-spanning collection, but also the ingenuity of scholars from around the world who are taking advantage of its materials to advance research in a global frame.
The exhibition takes its viewers on a journey through different geographies, genres, and languages. Cohering around the American continent, the texts chosen nevertheless speak to connections that move beyond continental and disciplinary borders. From China to the Nile, from natural history to the philosophical treatise, from indigenous Andeans to European creoles and American whalers, these selections also have a deeply personal angle, since many of them were chosen by scholars who have either been in residence at the JCB or who are part of a global network that seeks to emphasize Latin America’s place at the center of global historical developments. What they demonstrate most forcefully is that there are many worlds – and not just American ones – beneath the surface of our extraordinary collection. And with any hope at all, cosmopolitans and our local community members alike will come to see the Library as a refuge for global thinking at a moment where too many barriers unfortunately still abound.
Empirical Cosmographies and Imaginary Journeys
Theodor de Bry (Firm), and others
Americae pars VIII. : Continens primo, Descriptionem trium itinerum nobi...
1625
Daniel Jost de Villeneuve, and others
Le voyageur philosophe dans un pais inconnu aux habitans de la terre.
1761, v.1
Pedro Gobeo de Victoria, and others
Joannis Bisselii, è Societate Jesu, Argonauticon Americanorum, sive, hi...
1647
Corporal Geographies
Bernardino Antonio Gomes
Ensaio dermosographico ou Succinta e systematica descripção das doenças cutaneas
1820
Alonso López de Hinojosos e.a.
Summa y recopilacion de cirugia, con un arte para sangrar, y examen de barberos
1595
Beyond Nature and Culture
Francisco Hernández e.a.
Quatro libros. De la naturaleza, y virtudes de las plantas, y animales q...
1615
Francisco Xavier Ribeiro de Sampaio
Diario da viagem que em visita, e correição das povoações da Capitania d...
1825
Contributors: José Antonio de Alzate y Ramírez, and others
Gazeta de literatura de Mexico
1788-1795, v.1
Commerce without Borders
Jean Baptiste Debret e.a.
[top] Les Premières Occupations du Matin. [bottom left] Quèteurs. [botto...
1801-1850
Thomas Jefferson
Report of the secretary of state, on the subject of the cod and whale fisheries
1791
Candidus, and others
A letter to Philo Africanus, upon slavery : in answer to his of the 22d ...
1788
Philippe Sylvestre Dufour, and others
Traitez nouveaux & curieux du café, du thé et du chocolate. : Ouvrage ...
1685
Technologies of the Word and the Body
Willem Piso, and others
Historia naturalis Brasiliae : auspicio et beneficio illustriss. I. Maur...
1648
António de Sousa e.a.
Relacion de la real tragiocomedia con que los padres de la Compaǹia de ...
1620
Juan González de Mendoza e.a.
Historia de las cosas mas notables, ritos y costumbres, del gran reyno d...
1585
Raymond Breton, and others
Dictionaire caraibe-françois : meslé de quantité de remarques historique...
1665, cop.1
Gonzalo Fernández de Oviedo y Valdés
Coronica delas Indias. La hystoria general de las Indias agora nueuament...
1547
Credits
The John Carter Brown Library would like to acknowledge the following individuals for their contributions to this exhibition: Miruna Achim, Candida Barros, Daniela Bleichmar, Ben Breen, Jorge Canizares-Esguerra, Sarah Crabtree, Helen Cowie, Sherri Cummings, Diogo Ramada Curto, Rafael Dias Campos, Rebecca Earle, Mariana Françozo, Pablo F. Gómez, Mark Harris, Christopher Heaney, Sabine Hyland, Lorelai Kury, Diego Javier Luis, José Ramón Marcaida, Iris Montero Sobrevilla, Linda Newson, Marcy Norton, José Pardo-Tomás, Juan Pimentel, Irina Podgorny, Jennifer Reed, Magali Romero Sá, Neil Safier, Elisa Sevilla, Mark Thurner.
Project Creator(s)
- The John Carter Brown Library