An interdisciplinary conference exploring the place of the Netherlands and its culture in the later 16th and 17th centuries as it began to exert influence across the globe and as it acted as a distinctive conduit for the transmission of American, African and Asian elements back into Europe.  Papers will discuss political, social, colonial, religious and intellectual history, press history and censorship, poetry, drama, visual art, international law, travel, philosophy, and diplomacy.

The conference will feature mostly experts from the Netherlands and elsewhere in Europe, an unusual event in the US outside of a major international convention; we hope that it will be an attractive gathering for those interested living and working in the New York and mid-Atlantic region.