Editors’ Foreword
abstract
The Department of Asian and North African Studies (DSAAM) at Ca’ Foscari University of Venice is one of the “Departments of Excellence”, a financial plan launched by the Ministry of Education to fund the top State University departments that stand out for the quality of their research, didactics and development project. As a “Department of Excellence”, DSAAM aims to intensify its research interests on the transcultural dimension of historical, religious, philosophical, literary and artistic processes between Asia, the Arab world and Europe. To this end, the DSAAM has established the Marco Polo International Research Centre (MaP) for Global Europe-Asia Connections, whose primary mission is the understanding of the dynamics underlying the cultural, political and economic interactions and connections between and within Asia, Europe and the Arab-Islamic world. To foster international scientific cooperation and the dissemination of up-to-date research results on topics that are supported by the Centre, the latter has conceived a new publication called Marco Polo. Studies in Global Europe-Asia Connections.