Iberian Moorings

Ross Brann is Milton R. Konvitz Professor of Judeo-Islamic Studies, Cornell University. He is author of The Compunctious Poet: Cultural Ambiguity and Hebrew Poetry in Muslim Spain and Power in the Portrayal: Representations of Muslims and Jews in Islamic Spain.

"Iberian Moorings is a truly illuminating journey through the history of a cultural construct whose ramifications reach well beyond the scope of either Medieval, or Near Eastern Studies. Through his erudite and highly readable text, Professor Ross Brann portrays the medieval Islamic world of the Mediterranean basin as a fascinating landscape of cultural intersections, economic cooperation and competing ideological and political discourses, which reverberate in diverse identity-building narratives to this day." (Bulletin of Spanish Studies) "The conclusion, a masterful converging of two centuries of scrutinizing al-Andalus and Sepharad, is a compendium that shows the breadth (and potential pitfalls) of ideological possibility in these terms alongside their capacity to embrace evolving methodological approaches amid shifting disciplinary boundaries...Iberian Moorings is much broader than the sum of its interwoven studies, and by innovating even while acknowledging the dangerous allure contained within the ideas of al-Andalus and Sepharad, Brann honors the rigorous and thoughtful approach to the study of these ideas." (AJS Reviews) "[A]n enticing contribution to the understanding of why the Iberian Peninsula during the period of Islamic rule has become a special, even exceptional, place for different groups of people who have looked at it from different perspectives...[T]his is a book that deserves to be read by those who work on Andalusi matters, as it offers a balanced, thought-provoking, and firmly grounded approach to the roots of the enduring appeal of al-Andalus and Sefarad." (Revista Hispánica Moderna) "This is an important and thought-provoking book, spanning literary and social history to address a subject that is of significance to scholars who work on any aspect of medieval Iberian culture. It rewards attentive reading, both of the very rich and wide-ranging text and of the highly informative notes. Brann wears his expertise lightly, drawing on an impressively wide array of sources, including secular and liturgical poetry, philosophical tracts, exegetical commentaries, rhetorical and grammatical guides, polemics, letters, biographical dictionaries, and chronicles in Hebrew and Arabic, to provide nuanced and detailed comparisons of these communities and the ways in which they crafted their own literary self-image...[T]his book will surely invigorate further debate pertaining to medieval identity and belonging in the Iberian Peninsula and beyond." (English Historical Review) "[Brann's] original narrative offers an inspiring model for how to write a history that brings together two religious minorities not just side by side, but by powerfully portraying their connected history through an exploration of shared tropes, literary genres and political strategies. Methodologically, his study of 'cultural politics' will surely inspire more nuanced readings in the canonical literary texts produced by Andalusī writers, to help us understand how vivid images were performed in practice in well-defined moments of change and conflict." (Al-Masāq) "[A] richly researched and elegantly written work. It stands out for its interdisciplinary and comparative scope....[and] explores the 'conceptual, discursive, and performative' construction, articulation, and perpetuation of the tropes of Andalusi and Sefardi exceptionalism which refer to the idealization of al-Andalus and Sefarad by Andalusi and Sefardi scholars (mainly) from the tenth to the thirteenth centuries...Iberian Moorings is a much welcomed contribution to numerous fields, including Iberian studies, Mediterranean studies, Islamic studies, Jewish studies, medieval Hebrew and Arabic literary and cultural studies, and comparative literature." (Speculum) "Iberian Moorings constitutes an original and compelling contribution to several disciplines that have woefully divided scholarship on Islamic al-Andalus from that of Hebrew Sefarad, and both from the bulk of scholarship on Christian Spain and western Europe. The study is the first of which I am aware to offer a full, diachronic and multivalenced investigation of the long-nurtured belief of Andalusi Muslim and Jewish elites in their cultural superiority and uniqueness, and the afterlife of that belief into our own times." (Susan Einbinder, University of Connecticut)