About us

The Digital Encyclopaedia of Insular Studies, a project developed in the context of the research group LOCUS (Spaces, Places, Landscapes) of the University of Lisbon Centre for Comparative Studies (CEComp), seeks to bring together a plurality of contemporary voices on Islands and Insularity, coming from the most diverse scientific areas, both national and international, putting them in dialogue on a common platform.

With the aim of developing scientific thought around places, concepts and practices of insularity, the Digital Encyclopaedia of Insular Studies seeks to establish itself as a meeting point for all researchers engaged in the study of these phenomena. In this sense, the Encyclopaedia counts on the collaboration of researchers, students, academics and specialists who share a common interest in realities related to insularity, working on them from different points of view.

The aim of this Encyclopaedia is to promote access to scientific knowledge, making it available to the whole community. For this reason, it seeks to bring together, in an open network, the most varied contributions from different areas, from engineering, literature, music or ecology, among others, bringing them together, with a comparative spirit, in the same dialogic space and under a common archetype.

Structurally, the Encyclopaedia is divided into three main categories, “Epistemologies”, “Practices” and “Representations”, a shared sub-category, Personalia, dedicated to containing biographical entries relevant to each of the thematic categories, and an essay category, “Islands in the Anthropocene”, where it is proposed to reflect, from the contemporaneity of this encyclopaedic exercise, the present and future places of islands and insularities.

It contains contributions of dozens of researchers, with the support of the host institution, the Centre of Comparative Studies of the University of Lisbon, as well as with that of our institutional partners, with particular emphasis on the University of Madeira, the University of Malta, the UNESCO Island Studies Chair of the University of Prince Edward Island and the International Small Islands Studies Association (ISISA). The Encyclopaedia also bears witness to what, when possible, is the driving force of scientific experimentation as a public service, cooperation among peers in a collaborative movement for the benefit of the community.

Coordination

Ana Isabel Moniz – Universidade da Madeira e Centro de Estudos Comparatistas da Universidade de Lisboa

Francisco C. Marques – CEComp Universidade de Lisboa

Godfrey Baldacchino – Universidade de Malta/ISISA

Scientific Advisory Board

Bertrand Westphal – Université de Limoges

César Domínguez – Universidade de Santiago de Compostela (USC)

Helena Buescu – Universidade de Lisboa e Centro de Estudos Comparatistas da Universidade de Lisboa

Maria de Lourdes Câncio Martins – Universidade de Lisboa e Centro de Estudos Comparatistas da Universidade de Lisboa

Onésimo Teotónio de Almeida – Brown University