1st International Egodocumental Network Conference
Vilnius University, Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń, the University of Lodz, and the Egodocumental Research Group (https://egodocuments.umk.pl) organise an international conference focusing on research, development, and changing perceptions of egodocuments in the twenty-first century. The conference aims to bring together scholars from different disciplines to share their insights and to encourage interdisciplinary studies of egodocuments.
The conference will also be the first meeting of the International Egodocumental Network established in December 2023 by the Egodocumental Research Group (Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń and the University of Lodz) to unite scholars from different disciplines working on egodocuments. It provides a platform for discussion, collaboration, and exchange of information between the participants, as well as online research seminars organized twice a year. In this dimension, our conference continues two editions of the Scientific Symposium "Egodocuments, Life-Writing and Autobiographical Texts..." organized at NCU in Toruń in 2022 and 2024.
Keynote speakers
Dr. Nataliia Voloshkova
Kazimierz Wielki University and Oxford Brookes University
Prof. Leona Toker
Hebrew University and Shalem Academic College
Prof. François-Joseph Ruggiu
Sorbonne Université, CNRS and Oxford University
Jarosław Dumanowski
Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń
Culinary Memories: New Type of Ego-Documents? Writings of Paschalis Radoliński from ca. 1823
Researchers of ancient texts categorize more and more forms of expression and types of content as ego documents. As a food historian, I would like to draw attention to such elements in culinary writings. They contain various observations and comments of an individual, personal nature.
Menus are the effect of a dialogue between representatives of the gourmet elite and cooks and servants. The staff of a court or a palace first had to understand, then execute, and finally describe the orders of their landlords. The form of the accounting record often became a testimony to personal discoveries, reflections and problems with understanding the aspirations and wishes of their superiors.
In this context, I would like to present the manuscript records of the nobleman Paschalis Radoliński (1753–1828), which, in addition to culinary recipes and a collection of prayers, included a kind of diary, or, instead, notes devoted to issues of court supplies, cooking and problems with servants. We are dealing with a record of the troubles of everyday life, loneliness and social alienation. The writings of Paschalis Radoliński are a remarkable testimony to the sensitivity and knowledge of a middle-class nobleman, in which the texts of the recipes and diary serve as documentation of the circulation of information, social networking, and the adaptation of innovations.
