Liberation Theologies Unit

Liberating Freedoms 

The Liberation Theologies Unit invites proposals that engage critically with this year’s presidential theme, “Freedom,” from the perspective of liberation theologies. As a tradition of critical theological reflection, liberation theology correlates freedom with justice, often challenging liberal conceptions of liberty by stressing the material conditions that render freedom possible. Liberationists have stressed that hegemonic understandings of freedom are constructed on the oppression of marginalized communities and populations, through land appropriation, labor exploitation, ecological devastation, and genocide. Moreover, in the current “culture wars” raging in academic and political discourse, there is a weaponization of the language of freedom under the pretense of the preservation of an intellectual and political “freedom” that often ends up stifling struggles for liberation, enforcing consent, and policing radical political and theological positions. What might freedom look like when considered entangled with the struggle for justice? How have liberation theologians construed freedom? What does freedom look like in sites of rampant political repression? How does freedom-talk function in theological and religious discourse? 

As a unit, we envision the following themes as examples of possible engagements with our call for papers:

• Freedom and the boundaries of the nation-state: how do notions of freedom relate to the established and assumed boundaries of nation-states? 
• Liberation theology, freedom, and justice after Gaza
• How might different languages, epistemologies, and worldviews construe “freedom”?
• Liberation theologies and the decolonization of freedom 
• Freedom, civil war, and state-sponsored violence 
• Freedom as ‘freeing’: imagining futures free from borders, oppressions, hierarchies
• Freedom not as a right but as a responsibility
• Freedom in the margins and the margins of freedom
• Co-optation of the language and structure of freedom

Pre-arranged Panel: Liberation Theologies after Gaza

The ongoing humanitarian crisis caused by the Israeli war on Gaza challenges liberation theologians to reimagine and rewrite the fundamental meanings of freedom and liberation. Is it even possible to imagine a theology of liberation “after” the war and the existential threat it poses to Palestinians? If so, how will this theology dismantle globalized Christian Zionism and racialized military violence against Palestinians, while revitalizing prophetic traditions found in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam? What about the hermeneutical competency necessary to produce liberation theology after Gaza? This pre-arranged panel brings liberation theologians from Middle East, North America, Latin America, and Asia who contributed to Theology after Gaza (2025). If you have any questions about this panel, please contact K. Christine Pae (paec@denison.edu). 

Decolonizing “Internationalism:” Impoverishing the Nations (Possibly June Session)
2025 marks the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II, the formation of the United Nations, and the beginning of global conflicts often framed as the “Cold War.” The Liberation Theologies Unit and the Religion and Peace Unit of the American Academy of Religion (AAR) invite proposals for a special panel that examines the complex relationships between international organizations, Western conceptions of global peace, and the rising intra- and extra-state conflicts over the past eight decades. We particularly welcome proposals that explore the role of religion in both fueling these conflicts and offering alternatives to violence and oppression.

We invite submissions for both the June online meeting and the November in-person meeting in Boston. To foster inclusivity, we may prioritize international scholars who are typically unable to attend the in-person meeting for the June session, while reserving space in November for our usual constituencies.

Proposals may address, but are not limited to, the following topics:

• Unjust peace and the role of international organizations.
• Pacification plans from above that failed.
• "The North is Cold because the South is Hot": Cold War lessons from Global South/East perspectives.
• International networks of repression in the Global South.
• Why do Western democracies support non-Western autocracies?
• Are we living through a new red scare?
• The Spirit of Bandung as an international network today.