The volume attempts to triangulate three vibrant discourses of our times: It combines postcolonial and decolonial readings of cultural conflicts with assessments of ecological dimensions of those conflicts, as well as their significance within discourses on natural and cultural world heritage. The examples from four continents range from the medieval Middle East – already shaken by a convergence of ecological and social disaster – to modern imaginary constructions of medieval Vikings, the persistence of Indigenous knowledge in the Arctic, literary poetics of patrimony, and the heritage politics of Mediterranean urban architecture.

This volume brings together experts from diverse disciplines and places around the globe whose work is concerned with the phenomenon and discourse of travel, transculturation, and the cross-cultural Production of knowledge. The contributions reflect the recent shift in travel scholarship toward including the study of ideological conflicts within Europe’s ‘imperial gaze’, as well as attempts at tracing the perspective of Europe’s ‘others’, which frequently challenged colonial certainties and claims to intellectual supremacy.

With examples covering from various historical periods between the early modern period and the present, as well as geographical areas such as the Mediterranean, Africa, the Americas, Hawaii, New Zealand and northern Europe, scholars from various disciplines and methodological backgrounds – reaching from history to religious studies and from literary studies to ethnology – fathom the intricacies of in-betweenness and reflect on the impact which "agents of transculturation" have in situations of cultural, social and political encounters.

The contributions in this volume approach the entanglement of science and cultural encounters – many of them in colonial Settings – from a variety of perspectives. Historical and historiographical survey essays sketch a transcultural history of knowledge and conduct a critical dialogue between the recent academic fields of Postcolonial Studies and Science & Empire Studies; a Series of case studies explores the topos of Europe’s ‘great inventions’. ‘Entangled Knowledges’ also refers to the critical practices of scholarship: various essays investigate scholarship’s own failures in self-reflexivity, arising from an uncritical appropriation of cultural stereotypes and colonial myths. The volume thus contributes to the study of cultural and colonial relations as well as to the history of science and scholarship.

This volume brings together a number of case studies that demonstrate how knowledge becomes transient, evanescent, and ephemeral in cultural contact zones. The papers take a closer look at the mechanisms of preservation and loss of knowledge during cultural encounters. The examples establish that the materiality of knowledge cannot be separated from its intellectual and ideological aspects.

Kaum ein Ereignis der mittelalterlichen Geschichte hat so widersprüchliche Beurteilungen erfahren wie die Kreuzzüge. Für manche symbolisieren sie den „Kampf der Kulturen“ zwischen Islam und Abendland. Andere finden in ihnen Beispiele für friedliche Kulturkontakte zwischen Christen und Muslimen. Kristin Skottki rekonstruiert die Entstehungszusammenhänge dieser unterschiedlichen Interpretationen und reflektiert dabei die Bedingungen historischer Forschung im Spannungsfeld von Orientalismus, Okzidentalismus und Mediävalismus. Zugleich bietet sie eine narratologische Analyse der Darstellungen von Begegnungen zwischen Kreuzfahrern und Muslimen in mittelalterlichen Chroniken des Ersten Kreuzzugs. Auf diese Weise wird nicht nur der Frage nach Konstruktionsprozessen von Identitäten und Alteritäten nachgegangen, sondern auch der nach einem ethisch verantworteten Umgang mit schwierigen Texten der mittelalterlichen Vergangenheit.