De-centering the Global Middle Ages, a symposium to be held at the University of Michigan February 8-9, 2019, invites researchers to consider scholarly perspectives of the “global turn” of the premodern world, addressing connectivity and mobility of the globe c. 500-1600 CE. What work does the idea of “the medieval” do, and for whom? What do we gain and what do we lose by insisting on a shared notion of the medieval? By conceiving of a more diverse Middle Ages characterized by mobility and connectedness rather than isolation and limited travel?  This symposium will explore what the “medieval” means for scholars of various geographic regions, including Africa, Asia, the Americas, and Europe in hopes of facilitating a dramatic shift in our visions of what it means to do medieval history, and the meaning of global history more broadly.