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Anchoring Urban Lived Experience in Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages – a “digital showcase”

Anchoring Innovation is a heuristic model for understanding how innovations, be they technological, political, or cultural, achieve acceptance by building upon recognizable, “anchored” elements of the past.


On June 16, 2026, the workshop Anchoring Urban Lived Experience in Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages was held at the University of Groningen, organized by Dr. Marlena Whiting (University of Groningen). The workshop examined the relation of “innovation” to the late antique and medieval city as a lived space. We asked, How do city dwellers adjust to new circumstances, incorporate disruptions into their routines, or reinterpret familiar spaces in the face of crisis? The goal of the workshop was to bring together scholars from the Netherlands and abroad to explore methodologies recovering the lived experience of everyday urban life from archaeological and literary evidence. Scholars specializing in Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages in Europe and the Islamic world were invited to share their insights. 


The aim was to encourage scholars not specifically engaged with the fields of Classics and the history of the Greco-Roman world to think about whether Anchoring Innovation might be fruitfully applied to their own field of study. A pre-circulated document provided a summary of the basic principles of Anchoring Innovation, focussing on four key points:

  1. Anchoring is a cognitive process whereby forms of continuity are either perceived or constructed within change.
  2. Anchoring is an individual cognitive process and a collective, socially embedded practice.
  3. Innovation does not equate exclusively to progress.
  4. Anchoring is situationally dependent: the ability of the audience to accept and interpret the anchor in relation to the innovation.

In this “digital showcase” you can read reflection pieces by each of the participants on their takeaways on Anchoring Innovation as a tool for thinking through their specific subject and period. You can also hear podcast interviews with two of the participants.


Reflection Pieces:


Louise Blanke on how Anchoring Innovation and Resilience Theory can help us understand the persistence of urban life following devastation: Anchoring and resilience in Jerash after the earthquake of 749 CE


Sofie Remijsen on Anchoring Innovation as a bridging technique with novel names for novel mealtimes in Late Antiquity: How to package novel mealtimes?


Javier Martínez Jiménez on physically anchored water infrastructure and how it invites innovation in cultural meaning: A space, because it is a place, can be an anchoring point


Willem Flinterman on religious identity as a social anchor: Waste, work and religion in medieval Cairo: How Cairo's dirtiest professions were (and still are) anchored in religious inequality


Mariëtte Verhoeven on how digital initiatives on the ancient water supply of Istanbul can help anchor heritage in modern discussions on water management: Anchoring Istanbul’s Water Heritage


Podcasts:

Javier Martínez Jiménez and Louise Blanke paid a visit to the podcast studio - you can hear their thoughts on Anchoring Innovation, Place Theory and Resilience Theory, and urban life in Late Antiquity here, and here.



This workshop was financially supported by Anchoring Innovation, The Netherlands Institute for the Near East (NINO), The University of Groningen Institute for Cultural Studies (ICOG), The Research Group in Classics, Religion, Archaeology and Ancient History (CRASIS), and the OIKOS Research Group Cities and Settlements.


Sheep grazing amid the ruins of Roman and Late Antique Gerasa (Jerash) with the modern city in the background
© Marlena Whiting



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