*Empowerment and the Sacred*
*An Interdisciplinary Conference*
Institute for Colonial and Postcolonial Studies, University of Leeds
24th-26th June 2011
http://www.empowermentandthesacred.com
<http://www.empowermentandthesacred.com/>
*/At a moment when the 'resurgence of religion' is calling into question
the secular orientation of global futures, we ask: isn't it time for
cross-cultural, cross-disciplinary debate about the role that the sacred
plays in our ideas and our histories of personal and collective agency,
power and change? /*
This conference will bring together scholars, professionals and
arts-practitioners to investigate the ways in which sacred traditions -
in diverse historical and cultural contexts - have shaped discourses and
practices of empowerment, emancipation, change, resistance and survival.
We invite proposals for 20-minute presentations, which address the
relationship between empowerment and the sacred to be given at the
conference. For more information on conference themes and submitting a
proposal please see our Call for Papers (attached and below) or visit
our website at: http://www.empowermentandthesacred.com
<http://www.empowermentandthesacred.com/>.
*Call for Papers*
*Keynote Speakers: *Professors Kim Knott (University of Leeds); Bart
Moore-Gilbert (Goldsmith's University); Neil L. Whitehead (University of
Wisconsin).
Discussing international responses to the 'resurgence of religion' in
our time, Talal Asad has argued: 'If anything is agreed upon, it is that
a straightforward narrative of progress from the religious to the
secular is no longer acceptable' (Asad, 2006). In the 'straightforward
narratives' of which Asad talks - and in Enlightenment discourses of
'reason', 'progress' and 'modernity' more generally - religion,
spirituality and the sacred have customarily been pitted against
empowerment and emancipation in political, cultural and intellectual
terms. At this present historical juncture, then - when the secularist
orientation of global futures is increasingly being called into question
- a vital need presents itself for cross-cultural, cross-disciplinary
debate about the role thatt the sacred has, does and can play in our
understanding of the possibilities of personal and collective agency,
power and change.
This conference will bring together scholars, professionals and
arts-practitioners to investigate the ways in which sacred traditions -
in diverse cultural and historical contexts - have shaped discourses,
practices and narratives of empowerment, emancipation, social change,
resistance and survival. We ask: How do different sacred discourses and
practices frame and/or extend the possibilities of agency - socially,
spiritually, imaginatively and corporeally? What variant concepts of the
spheres of activity have they produced - whether temporal, spatial,
cultural, cosmic, public and/or private? And what role have religious
and spiritual traditions played in political discourses and
counter-discourses of class, gender, race, sexuality, cultural identity,
humanism and human rights? Where sacred traditions have challenged the
limits of secular reason, what alternatives have they suggested for
cognition, representation, and even rationality? And how have they
'empowered' difference artistic practices? Does the 'commitment to
social justice' necessitate the 'translation' of sacred realities into
'disenchanted histories', in order to maintain dialogue with modern
institutions (Dipesh Chakrabarty)? Or does a 'conception of creativity
in dialogue with the sacred' enable an interrogation of 'forbidden
territories within ourselves' as well as 'the sacrosanct territories of
our institutions (Wilson Harris)? Do sacred traditions themselves
provide the premises for imaginations of cross-cultural and inter-faith
community that differ from secular multiculturalism?
We welcome papers, especially from postgraduates and early career
researchers, that address issues of the sacred and empowerment in
relation to topics that may include, but are by no means limited to:
*Concepts of agency*: God, gods, spirits and the divine; the
human/extra-human; identity and 'imagined communities'; actors,
heroes/anti-heroes, role-models and leaders; somatic/spiritual
powers.
*
*Performances of power*: artistic, cultural, political, ritual;
protest and activism; violence/non-violence.
*
*Histories and historiography*: colonialism and the postcolonial;
globalization; materials; memory.
*
*Sacred texts and authority*: interpretation, translation,
intertextuality; secular/religious criticism; freedom of speech,
blasphemy and taboo.
*
*Place, space and environment*: sacred sites and land rights;
nature, geography, topography, archaeology.
*
*Difference and dialogue*: orthodoxy/the unorthodox; syncretism;
inter-faith and cross-culturalism.
*
*Justice and judgment*: ethics, morality, legality;
sacred-secular/inter-faith arbitration.
*
*Secular/sacred powers and the state*: private/public spheres;
policy-making and pedagogy.
*
*Re-conceptualizations*: 'sacred', 'secular', 'post-secular',
'religion', 'magic', 'spirituality', 'myth' etc.
*
*Action, motivation and practice*: choice, desire, sacrifice and
faith; freedom/constraint.
*
*Epistemologies and aesthetics*: faith, rationalism and science;
representation and the unrepresentable.
Please submit 300 word abstracts, accompanied by a 100 word biography,
for 20 minute papers to the conference organisers, Shivani Rajkomar and
Lori Shelbourn, at [log in to unmask]
<mailto:[log in to unmask]>. The deadline for
submissions is February 20th 2011. Further details can be found on our
website: http://www.empowermentandthesacred.com
<http://www.empowermentandthesacred.com/>.
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