ISRLC Conference 2022
Transmutations & Transgressions
15-18 September 2022
University of Chester
Abstracts of no more than 300 words each should be sent directly to the convenors of the relevant panel no later than 1 December 2021. Notice of acceptance will be given by 31 January 2022. Speakers at the conference are limited to a single presentation. Submission to multiple panels is permitted, but we ask that you be clear about this so that convenors may work together to place your paper in the appropriate panel.
Asian Religions in Global Popular Culture: Speculative Fiction
Convenors: Zhange Ni and James Thrall
This panel invites proposals that explore the conference theme by studying entanglements of Asian religions and speculative fiction on a global scale. Representations of transmutation and transgression permeate speculative fiction, whether the conversions being explored are
physical or theoretical, and whether the transgressions are of time, space, substance, or custom. A central question of “What if?” invites consideration of transmutation/transgression of the past/current/familiar to the possible/potential/unfamiliar.
Asian religions play an increasingly prominent role in providing a reservoir of resources for speculative fiction, that is, science fiction and fantasy, most broadly construed. What we mean by speculative fiction is not limited to print literature but covers works in multiple media formats such as print and digital literature, films, TV dramas, and video games. These works are produced/consumed in Asia, the Euro-American West, and/or other parts of the world. In these works, Asian religions may serve as systems of transmutation or as systems to be transgressed, or both. Asian religions may also provide interpretive frameworks for assessing works of speculative fiction.
Suggested specific topics include the influences/representations/perspectives of Asian religions on transmutations/transgressions of:
- Time—What disruptive or corrective possibilities are opened up by shifts in the temporal plane, whether through time-travel or speculative imaginings of alternative futures or pasts?
- Space—How might the material world be reconstituted/reimagined/reconfigured? With what effects?
- Identity—How might adaptations of human and other species’ forms and capabilities produce wider changes to cultural and social systems?
- Power—How might speculation about alternative social systems of governance and custom critique existing assumptions of how life should be lived?
Please send abstracts (300 words maximum) and a short biography (75 words maximum) to both strand co-chairs, Zhange Ni and James Thrall, no later than 1 December 2021. Speakers will only be allowed to give one presentation at the conference. If you are submitting to another panel as well, please give a hint about that.
Biblical Studies
Convenor: Mette Bundvad
Transmutation is at the heart of biblical text.
The needs of the communities that produce and use the biblical texts constantly shift and develop—and when writers and readers change, so do their texts. Literary transformations take place as traditions collide. Old certainties are questioned, sometimes violently, novel frameworks of interpretation taking their place.
This panel welcomes 20-minute papers that explore any aspect of transmutation in and of the biblical texts. Papers that reflect on the transgressive aspects of biblical transmutations are particularly welcome. What is at stake when text-producing communities challenge,
Continental Philosophy and Religion
Panel Convenor: Andrew Hass
Call for Papers:
The Continental Philosophy and Religion Panel invites abstracts for 20-minute papers that consider notions of transmutation and transgression across philosophy, religion/theology and creative endeavour. Ever since Heraclitus announced the impossibility of stepping into the same river twice, questions of change and changeability have accompanied philosophical and theological thought. But as we battle and endure an extended global pandemic, the question of change, and indeed of mutation, has hit us with new force. Have our own transgressions brought this upheaval upon us, and changed us intrinsically and irremediably? Or have natural forces brought us a day of reckoning, and forced change upon us extrinsically and irrevocably? What are the philosophical and theological implications of such changes, and what transmutations might they induce, even inspire? The Panel especially invites papers that explore:
- the transgressive nature of infection, disease, pathogenicity, or virulence as philosophical/theological concerns
- metamorphosis, transfiguration, transformation, or alchemy as religio-philosophical tropes, especially in relation to a pandemic
- transmutation as re-creation, especially out of suffering
- philosophical/theological reflections upon global responses to forced change (by nature and/or governing authorities)
More broadly, the Panel also encourages papers that address:
- the transgressive implications of change between poles of experience (e.g. sickness and health, passive and active, created and creating), or between conceptual categories (e.g. real and ideal, being and nothing, self and other, knowledge and faith, necessity and freedom), or between modes (e.g. mythos and logos, praxis and theory, science and imaginary) or, indeed, between binary and unity or multiplicity
- Continental philosophy itself as undergoing a transmutation, either in respect to analytic philosophy, to other non-Western philosophy, or to other disciplines, with attention to the role religion, theology, and the arts might be playing in any such transformation
All proposals should have Continental philosophy clearly in view. Abstracts that seek interdisciplinary engagement between philosophy, religion/theology and the arts will receive special consideration, as will those that try to go beyond merely historical analysis.
Queries and proposals of no more than 300 words, accompanied by a short biographical statement, should be sent to Andrew Hass (University of Stirling) at andrew.hass@stir.ac.uk no later than 1 December 2021. Speakers will only be allowed to give one presentation at the conference. If you are submitting to another panel as well, please give a hint about that.
Ecotheologies: Culture, Nature and Religion
Convenor: Anna Fisk
This panel seeks contributions which explore the relationship between spiritual and ecological imaginaries in literature and culture. In the face of ecological and climate crisis, we ask how theology may be part of a re-imagining of the human relationship with the natural world, and how is contemporary religion creatively responding to an age of ‘climate emergency’.
The publication of the IPCC report in autumn 2018, which states that ‘limiting global warming to 1.5°C would require rapid, far-reaching and unprecedented changes in all aspects of society’, saw a wave of climate crisis activism across the globe. There has also been a shift in the environmental rhetoric used by politicians and the mainstream media—including religious language such as ‘apocalypse’ and ‘sacrifice’.
This panel asks if this has been a transmutation of the ecological imaginary, and whether this is a genuine change or a continuation, or perhaps a reworking, of what has gone before. Papers may also consider how ecological and climate discourse has shifted yet again during the COVID-19 pandemic and the prominence of the Black Lives Matter movement, with renewed focus on ‘justice’ and of interconnecting struggles.We welcome proposals for 20-minute presentations, whether formal papers or creative performances. We are also open to proposals for 90-minute panels which use an alternative format, provided there are multiple contributors.
All proposals should be emailed, along with a brief author bio, to anna.fisk@glasgow.ac.uk no later than 1 December 2021. Speakers will only be allowed to give one presentation at the conference. If you are submitting to another panel as well, please give a hint about that.
Gender
Convenors: Alison Jasper and Dawn Llewellyn
This panel will run sessions previously arranged for 2020.
Islam
Convenor: Amanullah de Sondy
This panel seeks contributions which explore transnational Muslim identity. In particular, we are interested in papers which explore the relationship that second and subsequent generation Muslim immigrants have to poetry and music from their parents’ homeland. The familial and emotional ties these new generations of Muslims have to their parents’ homelands cannot be underestimated. These ties are infused through language, literature, and the arts (music, poetry, visual art, film, television) and the cultural consumption—and production—of these subsequent generations troubles the popular assumption of a cultural dichotomy between Islam and the West.
Abstracts of no more than 300 words for papers addressing this topic, along with a brief author biography, should be sent to amanullah.desondy@ucc.ie no later than 1 December 2021. Speakers will only be allowed to give one presentation at the conference. If you are submitting to another panel as well, please give a hint about that.
Judaism
Convenor: Marianne Schleicher
This panel will run sessions previously arranged for 2020.
Literature
Convenors: Jeff Keuss and Mark Knight
We welcome proposals for 20-minute papers on literature and the conference theme of transgressions and transformations. Papers should address literature written in or translated into English, from any period, and may think about texts formally, theoretically, historically, and/or thematically. Possible topics include:
- Early Modern Transformations
- Reading Death and the Eschatological
- Gothic Literature
- Race and Literature
- Religious and Secular Entanglement in Literature
Please send abstracts (300 words maximum) and a short biography (75 words maximum) to both strand co-chairs: Jeff Keuss (keussj@spu.edu) and Mark Knight (m.knight@lancaster.ac.uk). The deadline for submissions is 1 December 2021. Speakers at the conference will only be allowed to give one presentation so if you are submitting to another panel as well as literature please us know (so that we can liaise with the chairs of the other strands).
Material Religion
Convenor: Petra Carlsson
Everyday objects, happy objects, white bodies, brown bodies, thingies, holy things, gods, sex toys, random things, words, visual art objects, nonhuman objects, architecture, city planning, critters, trees, viruses, face masks, melting ice, migrating bodies. The Material Religion Panel is interested in material aspects of reality in relation to culture, philosophy, theology and politics. Presentations may enter the materiality of religion through literature and art and/or through theoretical perspectives such as affect theory, ecology, critical theory, political theology, radical theology or process theology.
In keeping with the conference theme, we especially welcome papers dealing with the materiality of borders and transgressions, and of material transmutations as political and cultural as well as philosophical and theological expressions.
Proposals of no more than 300 words, accompanied by a short biographical statement, should be mailed to petra.carlsson@ehs.se no later than 1 December 2021. Speakers will only be allowed to give one presentation at the conference. If you are submitting to another panel as well, please give a hint about that.
Music
Convenor: Nils Holger Petersen
This panel will run sessions previously arranged for 2020.
Postcolonialism
Convenor: Fiona Darroch
This panel will run sessions previously arranged for 2020.
Religious & Inter-Religious Studies
Convenor: Alana M. Vincent
“Religion” is an inherently unstable concept; both actual religions and the very notion of what religion is undergo countless transmutations in response to changes in the social conditions in which they exist. This has been especially true over the course of the pandemic, as communities have had to reshape themselves in response to restrictions on in-person gathering, but has also been the case throughout history–particularly when religions have evolved in close proximity to one another.
This panel invites papers that consider portrayals of religious change, mutation, and transgression in literature, film, theatre, and visual art. We are particularly interested in papers which explore these tensions in regard to religious pluralism, syncretism, and multiple religious belonging.
Please send abstracts of no more than 300 words, together with a short biographical statement, to alana.vincent@gmail.com no later than 1 December 2021. We also welcome alternative formats and suggestions for panels. Please let us know If you are submitting an abstract to more than one panel.
Theological Humanism
Convenor: Dan Boscaljon
In 2020, the world transformed in ways we would once have thought impossible. An invisible virus revealed old forms of power and allowed new modes of resistance. These repeat a familiar pattern of the struggle between idolatry and the sacred. Our awareness of the integrity of life was brought to the foreground—as well as the kinds of power that continual to challenge this value.
Theological humanism explores the result of limiting theological potentialities within the boundaries of the human, exploring the infinite depths of finitude as rendering unnecessary the demand for divine designations that once held sway: omniscience, omnipotence, omnipresence. As a form of radical thinking, theological humanism develops resources for combating the twin perils of hypertheism and overhumanization, each of which attempt to subvert human potential into false forms of the infinite. As a form of engaged, embodied scholarship and pedagogy, theological humanism is a practice of offering transformation through explorations of non-binary forms of thought.
- How does older scholarship (for example: Hillman’s archetypal psychology; Huston’s human potential movement; or 20th century mystical approaches grounded on Aurobindo, de Chardin, Steiner, or Gurdjieff) provide a different ground for theological humanism to explore?
- How does contemporary scholarship (for example: Mbembe’s Critique of Black Reason, Ko’s Racism as Zoological Witchcraft, Bourgeault’s Eye of the Heart, Brown’s Black Utopias, Bennett’s Vibrant Matter) provide new resources for thinking about theological humanism?
- How might the process of experiencing beauty or wonder provide an aesthetic portal into contemplations of theological humanism (for example: Scarry’s On Beauty and Being Just, Miller’s In the Throe of Wonder) and a non-idolatrous path toward the sacred?
Abstracts of no more than 300 words, accompanied by a short biographical statement, can be sent to daniel.boscaljon@gmail.com no later than 1 December 2021. Speakers will only be allowed to give one presentation at the conference. If you are submitting to another panel as well, please give a hint about that.
Visual Art
Convenor: Lieke Wijnia
This year’s ISRLC theme Transmutation and Transgression provides an exciting and relevant road of enquiry into the study of the transformational potential of visual art in contemporary postsecular societies. Among others, the postsecular is characterized by a dynamic of translation and intertwinement between religion and the secular. While translation presupposes the necessity of an intermediary, transmutation and transgression reinforce a transformation into novelty. Artistic visions have the potential of contributing to reconsiderations of existing values, worldviews, and power structures. Artists render the invisible visible through images, materials, bodies. By becoming part of institutional frameworks – galleries, museums, media – art has the potential to become a societal voice, ánd force. At the same time, art is generally seen to embody an open and free discursive space, where transgression (or, at least, the potential for transgression) is inherently present. Especially during the Covid19-pandemic, like other societal spheres, the artworld had to respond and adapt. How did such forcibly changed circumstances impact perceptions of religion, the secular, and their reciprocal dynamic in artistic practices?
Overall topics for consideration in this ISRLC panel are: how art transgresses invisible boundaries with visible means; the public reception of artistic transgressive perceptions of the sacred; the impact of transformed professional roles (e.g. when artistic voices are curatorial instruments, when curators are activists, when artists conduct research; when spectators become participants); and what it is that follows the transgressive act once art gains a place in the public sphere. Papers on transformative negotiations between artists, their work, their audiences, and institutional contexts are particularly welcomed – also in the light of the Covid19-pandemic. Although this CFP focuses on contemporary artistic practices, if you would abstracts on historical case-studies are equally welcome.
Abstracts of no more than 300 words, together with a short biographical statement, can be sent to l.wijnia@catharijneconvent.nl no later than 1 December 2021. Speakers will only be allowed to give one presentation at the conference. If you are submitting to another panel as well, please give a hint about that.