Paper Title and Abstract:
THE OTTOMAN QUAGMIRE: MALARIA, SWAMPS, AND SETTLEMENT IN THE LATE OTTOMAN MEDITERRANEAN
During the late Ottoman period, a large influx of migrants and the expansion of cultivation created opportunities and demand for new settlements. However, settlement often brought misery to newcomers in the form of malaria, especially when it occurred in the swampy and uncultivated lowlands of the Mediterranean. This paper traces the contours of the encounter with malaria that arose out of settlement, offering an overview of how Ottoman state and society confronted the conundrum of the swamp and examining the impact of this confrontation on local political economies.
Participant Bio:
Chris Gratien holds a Ph.D. in History from Georgetown University and is currently a postdoctoral associate at Yale University’s MacMillan Center Program in Agrarian Studies. His research examines the social and environmental history of the Ottoman Empire and the modern Middle East. He is also producer of Ottoman History Podcast, a weekly internet radio program featuring interviews with scholars and researchers in English and Turkish.