Law, Religion, and Culture Unit
As always, the Law, Religion, and Culture Unit welcomes proposals for individual papers, papers sessions, and roundtable panel proposals, including author-meets-critics sessions, on any aspect of the cultural, historical, critical, and comparative study of the intersections of law and religion globally. This year we are particularly interested in work that pursues:
1) The presidential theme of “Freedom.” We’re interested in limits on freedom of speech and assembly on college campuses. In collaboration with the Feminist Theory and the Study of Religion group we’re open to panel and paper proposals addressing police actions and surveillance on campus; legislative intervention in curricula and legislative oversight of syllabi and course design, as well as responses to such restrictions by students and professors; and the future of DEI, its current role in the political imaginary, and corporate and campus reimaginings of DEI in our immediate political moment.
2) Child abuse: As we will be meeting in Boston, we’re interested in paper and/or panel proposals addressing the child sex abuse crisis, papers and panels thinking comparatively about issues of religiously-facilitated patterns of abuse and/or broader issues of law, religion, and children.
3) Bureaucracy: We’re interested in papers and/or panels on how the law stalls, on the ways legal activism loses momentum and public attention/support, the rituals of bureaucracy and proceduralism.
4) Hinduism: We’re interested in papers and/or panels on Hindus and Hindu practices as subjects and focus of law in the Western hemisphere.
Statement of Purpose:
This Unit is interested in the cross-cultural, interdisciplinary, and comparative studies of the interrelationships of law and religion. The terms “law” and “religion” are broadly conceptualized and our interests have extended to include ancient and contemporary contexts and a wide variety of critical approaches. We hope to instigate consideration of religion and law issues at the AAR beyond issues concerning religious freedom and the United States Constitution.