A Comparative History of Literatures in the Iberian Peninsula is the second comparative history of a new subseries with a regional focus, published by the Coordinating Committee of the International Comparative Literature Association. As its predecessor for East-Central Europe, this two-volume history distances itself from traditional histories built around periods and movements, and explores, from a comparative viewpoint, a space considered to be a powerful symbol of inter-literary relations. Both the geographical pertinence and its symbolic condition are obviously discussed, when not even contested. Written by an international team of researchers who are specialists in the field, this history is the first attempt at applying a comparative approach to the plurilingual and multicultural literatures in the Iberian Peninsula. The aim of comprehensiveness is abandoned in favor of a diverse and extensive array of key issues for a comparative agenda. A Comparative History of Literatures in the Iberian Peninsula undermines the primacy claimed for national and linguistic boundaries, and provides a geo-cultural account of literary inter-systems which cannot otherwise be explained.

The series Manuals of Romance Linguistics (MRL) aims to present a comprehensive, state-of-the-art overview of Romance linguistics. It will comprise approximately 60 volumes that can either be consulted individually or used as a series of books providing a detailed overall picture of the current state of research in Romance linguistics. A special focus will be placed on the presentation and analysis of the smaller languages, the linguae minores.

Access to new plants and consumer goods such as sugar, tobacco, and chocolate from the beginning of the sixteenth century onwards would massively change the way people lived, especially in how and what they consumed. While global markets were consequently formed and provided access to these new commodities that increasingly became important in the ‘Old World’, especially with regard to the establishment early modern consumer societies. This book brings together specialists from a range of historical fields to analyse the establishment of these commodity chains from the Americas to Europe as well as their cultural implications.