Online Program Book

This is the preliminary program for the 2024 in-person Annual Meeting, hosted with the Society for Biblical Literature in San Diego, CA - November 23-26. Pre-conference workshops and many committee meetings will be held November 22. If you have questions about the program, contact annualmeeting@aarweb.org. All times are listed in local/Pacific Time.


	A24-428 Religion and Science Fiction Unit Theme: Inventing Persons in Invented Worlds Sunday, 5:00 PM - 6:30 PM Convention Center-24A (Upper Level East) James Thrall, Knox College, Presiding The worlds that form the backdrop of speculative fiction -- whether radically different from our own or different only in small particulars -- compel reconceptualizing human experience and human being itself. This session considers the possibilities, limits, and the constructions of human being through provocative examples of invented spaces. Presenters examine transfiguration, monstrosity and cannibalism in _Lovecraft Country_ from a Womanist/Afrofuturist reading; the ritualized body conceived in _Herland_, and _News from Nowhere_ through Fredric Jameson's views of utopia; issues of transcendence, artificiality, control and prophetic control in human histories and futures as pedagogical goals in _Arrival_, _Blade Runner_, and _Dune_. Jazzy Johnson, Emory University Cannabalism and Womanist Transubstantiating Magic: Materializing Colonialcraft in Lovecraft Country HBO Abstract Lovecraft Country is a genre-bending television series created by screenwriter and director, Misha Green, which spans the categories of speculative fiction, horror, historical fiction, fantasy, and drama. I will interrogate Lovecraft as an instrument of metaphysics that exposes the way power, violence, coloniality, anti-Blackness, and kinship function in religious and cultural imaginations. In the face of unyielding gratuitous violence—physical and psychic—against Black people, I contend that “making a way out of no way,” a core assumption in womanist methodologies, is a practice of transubstantiating reversal magic against intractable colonial sorcery/colonialcraft, which is illustrated throughout the limited HBO series. This portal of speculative fiction offers an exploration of magic that seeks to seed possibilities for releasing the discursive grip on the humanist axiological framework, as we remember and recollect sources of imaginational, lingual/linguistic, sensorial, material, affective, and divine power which are not dependent upon legibility as “human.” Harrison Hall, Harvard University Ritual Embodiment as Aesthetic Politics Through the Lens of Jameson’s Utopian Criticism Abstract The question that Jameson poses to utopian literature, “Can culture be political?” incites an understanding of cultural embodiment informing the consideration of ritual. While many utopian novels in the period of their late 19th century popularity seem essentially anti-artistic and anti-religious, Jameson’s criticism prompts us to examine the formations and transformations of the body that utopian fiction also explored. In this paper, I argue that Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s Herland and William Morris’s News From Nowhere imagine aesthetics as a ritualized embodiment of the societal ideal, by which a sacramental power is afforded to everyday utopian life. I aim to elucidate a broader fin-de-siècle paradigm in which utopia’s internal and productive challenges were mobilized toward the progressive, political reinvention of the human, by way of the reinvention of religion and art. Jean-Pierre Fortin, University of St. Michael's College In Search of the Human: Exploring Philosophical/Theological Anthropology with the help of Arrival, Blade Runner and Dune Abstract The proposed presentation uses three works of science fiction to explore significant characteristics and demands of being human today: self-transcendence is analyzed with the help of Arrival, the importance of simulation and artificiality through Blade Runner, and the temptation to exercise prophetic authority at the expense of others with Dune. These works compel readers/viewers to nurture understandings of religion and the supernatural transcending superstition, notions of the human and education overcoming unilateral rational control of the body, in favor of embracing the inherent indeterminacy of natural and human evolution and history. Human finitude can indeed be conceived and embraced as responsible openness to the transcendent welcoming the other/Other in its/her difference, enabling the formation of authentic community and communion.
	A24-429 Religion and the Social Sciences Unit Theme: New Books in the Social Science of Religion: Race, Gender, and American Christianities Sunday, 5:00 PM - 6:30 PM Convention Center-5B (Upper Level West) Jason Jeffries, University of Denver, Presiding This roundtable session features authors of recent social science books that critically illuminate the role of race and gender in American religion. Through lively discussion, the authors will offer insight into how American Christianity is unfolding in multiple directions through research on how pastors of color navigate racially diverse religious organizations, how hypermasculinity is constructed in conservative white Christianity, and how African American Christian engage with Israel-Palestine. Featuring: Korie Little Edwards, author of Estranged Pioneers: Race, Faith and Leadership in a Diverse World (with Rebecca Y. Kim). Jennifer McKinney, author of Making Christianity Manly Again: Mark Driscoll, Mars Hill Church, and American Evangelicalism Roger Baumann, author of Black Visions of the Holy Land: African American Christian Engagement with Israel and Palestine Michael Emerson, author of The The Religion of Whiteness: How Racism Distorts Christian Faith will be serving as a respondent/moderator. Panelists Roger Baumann, Hope College Jennifer McKinney, Seattle Pacific University Korie Little Edwards, Ohio State University Responding Michael Emerson, Rice University
	A24-430 Religion in Premodern Europe and the Mediterranean Unit Theme: Human Bodies, Heavenly Bodies, Sacred power Sunday, 5:00 PM - 6:30 PM Convention Center-32A (Upper Level East) Lora Walsh, University of Arkansas, Presiding This session is intended to focus on embodied knowledge and the multiple ways that knowledge is transmitted and received across time, space and cultures. Each paper explores a case study of a premodern artistic, ritual or textual knowledge transmission, showing how divine bodies materialized through human bodies, or human actions and representations, may act to influence the human world or deliver prognostic messages. Mai Lootah, Rice University 1666: AN ENCOUNTER WITH THE BEAST OF THE TAILED STAR Abstract In November 1666, an illustrated book arrived in Edirne, Turkey, captivating its Ottoman spectators with peculiar images, including an image of a hybrid monster that theologian Muḥammad bin ‘Abd al-Rasūl al-Barzanjī (1630-1691) documented in one of his works. A close examination of al-Barzanjī's description led to an intriguing discovery: the images were Western astronomical maps that illustrated the trajectory of two comets that appeared in the years 1664-65, printed in Polish astronomer Stanislaw Lubieniecki's (1623-1675) Theatrum Cometicum. The appearance of these comets sparked scientific enthusiasm and apocalyptic fears in European and Ottoman lands, as reactions spread through the communication paths of the “Republic of Letters,” a community of intellectuals who exchanged ideas via correspondence. By delving into the intersections of science, religion, culture, and imagination, this paper explores this cross-cultural “encounter” and seeks to unravel the adaptability of celestial narratives and their impact on diverse audiences. Judith Bishop, Cosmic bodies and sensorial meaning-making: Paolo Uccello’s The Miracle of the Desecrated Host as ‘sensory surround’ antisemitism in Renaissance Italy Abstract The tempura-on-panel predella was painted between 1467 and 1469 for the Confraternity of the Corpus Domini and their oratory in the Corpus Domini church in Urbino. It consists of six panels detailing an account of a popular antisemitic legend focused on the desecration of the host. While the work represents a set of intimate interiors, the scale of the action is cosmic, involving humans, angels, and demons interacting over the injury to God's body -- a suite of moments that simultaneously reflect ordinary urban interactions and a cosmic struggle. The cultural centrality of the Eucharist during this period, the somatic nature of Communion, and the positioning of the artwork within the church all contribute to the emotional impact of the depicted events -- an impact that derives from complex entanglements of culture, the senses, and sensemaking. Marla Segol, State University of New York, Buffalo Pregnant Ritual: SYnthesis and Genesis in Kabbalistic Ibbur Abstract This paper theorizes ibbur (mystical pregnancy) as a model for ritual, cultural, and cosmic synthesis in Jewish kabbalistic works from the 16th-20th centuries. Over time, we see that while the porous, open models of body and cosmos are relatively consistent, both the body and the rituals to impregnate it absorb more and more so that it literally becomes pregnant with the entire cosmos, with different religious practies, and with new cultural and scientific discourse. This state of absorption is understood as a constant and idealized as spiritual, religious and psychological health. Business Meeting Lora Walsh, University of Arkansas, Presiding Claire Fanger, Rice University, Presiding
	A24-431 Religion, Affect, and Emotion Unit Theme: Theorizing Thinking, Feeling, Belief Sunday, 5:00 PM - 6:30 PM Hilton Bayfront-Indigo D (Second Level) Marvin Wickware, Lutheran School of Theology, Chicago, Presiding This session will offer perspectives, case studies, and object lessons on the relationships between cognition, emotion/sensation/feeling, and what we call "belief." It will do so at the intersection of theories of affect that have thickened and re-examined the relationship between thinking and feeling (starting particularly with Massumi's Parables for the Virtual and Sedgwick's Touching Feeling), and religious studies, with special focus on Donovan Schaefer's 2022 book Wild Experiment: Feeling Science and Secularism after Darwin. Panelists Ellen T. Armour, Vanderbilt University Joseph Winters, Duke University Maia Kotrosits, Center for the Study of World Religions, Harvard Divinity School Responding Donovan Schaefer, University of Pennsylvania
	A24-432 Religion, Holocaust, and Genocide Unit Theme: The German Catechism and the Politics of German Memory Culture Sunday, 5:00 PM - 6:30 PM Convention Center-33A (Upper Level East) Benjamin Sax, Institute for Islamic, Christian, and Jewish Studies, Presiding For the first few decades following the reunification of Germany, the ritualized remembrance of the Holocaust—Erinneringskultur—emerged as a widely celebrated approach to engage the nation’s fraught genocidal past. Genocide studies scholar A. Dirk Moses called this culture “The German Catechism,” which was understood though five features: (1) that the Holocaust is unique because it was the exterminating Jews for the sake of extermination itself, which is different from the limited and pragmatic aims of other genocides; (2) it was a civilizational rupture; (3) Germany has a special responsibility to Jews in Germany and a special loyalty to Israel; (4) antisemitism is a distinct prejudice and it should not be confused with racism; and (5) antizionism is antisemitism. While the catechism served an important function in denazifying the country, the culture has now changed. The papers in this session will explore the politics of this catechism in contemporary German society. A. Dirk Moses, The City College of New York (CUNY) The German Catechism Applied Abstract For the German political class, the memory of the Holocaust as a break with civilization and loyalty to the State of Israel constitutes the moral refoundation of the country, indeed its “reason of state.” To question this commitment is tantamount to a heresy that leads to ex communication rituals. Palestinians and progressive Jews have been its principle target. This enforcement of the “catechism,” as I call it, intensified since 10.7. This paper will account for the hold and function of the catechism on German memory culture and politics by tracing its evolution over the part 20 years. Yaniv Feller, University of Florida The Good German from Hannah Arendt to Clint Smith Abstract In a brief but pivotal moment during her reporting from the Eichmann trial in Jerusalem, Hannah Arendt suggested that the fact that there were Germans who resisted provides a condition for the possibility of morals after the Holocaust. Drawing on this idea of the Good German, this paper examines how this idea was transformed in recent years to reflect positive assessments of German memory culture by figures such as Clint Smith and Susan Neiman, who use the image of a Good Germany to criticize the memory of slavery in the United States. Their enterprise is contrasted in the final section of the paper with the vitriolic debate around Dirk Moses’ German Catechism, showing the great discrepancy between the discourse in Germany and outside it. Emily Pothast, Graduate Theological Union Substitution and Sacrifice in the Ritual Logic of German Memory Culture Abstract This paper engages the work of Esra Özyürek, A. Dirk Moses, and others in order to delineate a logic of substitution and sacrifice within German Holocaust remembrance. Rather than seeking to compare genocides, this paper argues that the understanding of mass violence must be mediated by robust frameworks with the capacity to hold multiple instances in view at once in order to help reveal, not obscure, both their interdependence and their distinctiveness. It makes a case for enlarging the depth of field, so that not only colonialism, but also medieval and early modern blood libels, witch hunts, and other pretenses for divinely sanctioned violence may be similarly understood in terms of their sacrificial and substitutional logics. Responding Frank Biess, University of California San Diego Business Meeting Benjamin Sax, Institute for Islamic, Christian, and Jewish Studies, Presiding David Tollerton, University of Exeter, Presiding
	A24-433 Religions in the Latina/o Americas Unit and Secularism and Secularity Unit Theme: The Public Aesthetics of Religion in Contemporary Brazilian Secularism Sunday, 5:00 PM - 6:30 PM Convention Center-28B (Upper Level East) Lucia Hulsether, Skidmore College, Presiding With the political upheavals of Jair Bolsonaro as stark evidence, the traditional boundaries of public and private as well as religious and secular are rapidly transforming in Brazil. To that end, the papers in this session will examine the ways public expressions of "religion" are aesthetically constructed, experienced, and politicized within the context of modern Brazilian secularism. Presentations will explore how Brazilian secularist logics operate aesthetically in a range of contemporary settings, from museum curation to urban design and Christian nationalist movements. Drake Konow, University of Texas, Austin Art Museums and the Aesthetics of Secularism in Brazil Abstract This paper takes two case studies from a contemporary art museum in São Paulo, Brazil, as a critical point of departure for the study of secularism in Brazil. It examines how two shows, by Adriana Varejão and Ayrson Heráclito, both at the Pinacoteca de São Paulo, offered different formulations of the relationship between religion and art. This paper takes these two case studies as a key point of departure for studying the secular in Brazil. Building on earlier secularism works, this paper analyzes museums as a secularizing force, analyzing how they direct, discipline, and frame forms of religion for the public. How do practices of creating discourse (e.g. exhibitions, work descriptions, wall texts, catalogs), placing material into space (i.e. expography), and staging encounters between art, artists, and viewers constitute and perform a secular aesthetic? How does this help us understand the aesthetics of the secular in Brazil and more broadly? Justin Doran, Middlebury College Brazilian Modernities and Secular Repair Abstract In the center of São Paulo stands two megastructures, the Edifício Copan and the Templo de Salomão. The Copan—an Oscar Niemeyer apartment building with more than 5,000 residents that opened in 1966—has been a monument to the urban life imagined by midcentury modernity. The Templo is a replica of Solomon's temple magnified to occupy an entire city block, constructed by an evangelical church for 300 million US dollars in 2014. While the Templo has become a mecca for conservative Christians throughout South America, the Copan decays; its intricate tilework falling into the street below. This paper compares what James Holston calls the “alternative modernities” represented by these edifices to diagnose the slippery hold of secularism in contemporary Brazil. It argues that instead of viewing the post-secular as an inevitable condition of post-modern societies, we should view secularism as a political project in need of intellectual repair. Timothy Byram, Harvard University Christian Nationalism and the Rise of Charismatic Publics in Brazil Abstract This presentation argues that what was earlier held as an open “marketplace” of religion in Brazil has broken out of the private sphere to hold sway as a political force in the form of an emergent Christian nationalism. Taking Michelle Bolsonaro’s speech to a crowd on February 25th as its point of departure, I track the transit of three phenomena between religious sites and the public sphere: spiritual deliverance, Biblical Hebrew imagery, and Protestant-Catholic ecumenism. This presentation uses the theoretical concepts of discursive chains of equivalence and charisma to analyze the motifs listed above as tools political actors are using to blur the boundaries between religious authority and secular space. It ends with a reflection on the ways such blurring affects national conversations surrounding secularism, race, and freedom of speech. Responding Kelly E. Hayes, Indiana University Indianapolis
	A24-434 Schleiermacher Unit Theme: Schleiermacher's Speeches and the Modern Study of Religion Sunday, 5:00 PM - 6:30 PM Hilton Bayfront-Aqua 314 (Third Level) Matthew Robinson, University of Bonn, Presiding Friedrich Schleiermacher’s Speeches on religion is a classic text within the academic study of religion and theology. It also stands as one of the most debated texts in the field, generating contested understandings of religious feeling and intuition, the character of religious experience, the modern concept of religion, and the relation of religious piety to critical reflection and the public sphere. This session explores two fresh interpretations of Schleiermacher's Speeches that each draw upon significant original research. The first considers the important revisions to the second edition of Schleiermacher's Speeches in light of his ongoing work in translating and interpreting the writings of Plato. The second explores Schleiermacher's account of religious affections as illuminating the relationship and tension between ethics and religion. Julia A. Lamm, Georgetown University Schleiermacher's Revisions to the Second Speech Abstract This paper examines the revisions Schleiermacher made to the Second Speech (“On the Nature of Religion”) in the second edition of the Speeches (1806). I shall focus on his two most important revisions—changes that arguably reshaped his argument. First, Schleiermacher’s use of the terms feeling (Gefühl) and intuition (Anschauung). Historically, it is this issue that has preoccupied scholars for the past two centuries. I shall revisit the issue from a new perspective. Second, Schleiermacher’s reformulation of what can be called The Three: from metaphysics, morality, and religion (1799) to knowing, acting, and feeling (1806). Where the original formulation was simplistically drawn, the new formulation includes a complex, multi-dimensional typology. Moreover, Schleiermacher takes care in his reformulation to explain the interrelations of The Three. These two revisions also lend more coherence to Schleiermacher’s attempt to explain religion as it relates to violence and non-violence. Andrew Packman, United Theological Seminary of the Twin Cities “We should do everything with religion, nothing because of religion”: Agency, Atmospheric Feelings, and the Religious Dimension of Ethics in Schleiermacher’s Speeches Abstract This paper interprets a cryptic passage in Schleiermacher’s Second Speech as a provocation for a contemporary rethinking of the relationship between ethics and religion. In it, Schleiermacher simultaneously asserts the autonomy of ethics vis-à-vis religion even as he affirms the ethically salutary - even necessary - relation between religious feelings and the central object of ethics, namely, human action. On this view, religious feelings are not to motivate or rationally justify moral conduct; their proper role consists rather in orienting and accompanying it. And while one’s conduct might be impeccably moral without religious accompaniment, he claims that it remains deficient as human action. Drawing on recent work in philosophy of emotion, I reconstruct Schleiermacher’s early account of religious affections as atmospheric feelings, highlighting their peculiar intentionality, phenomenality, and supra-personal character. I then consider the significance of this ostensibly general feature of human agency for contemporary moral philosophy and religious ethics. Business Meeting Kevin Vander Schel, Gonzaga University, Presiding Calli Micale, Palmer Theological Seminary, Presiding Taraneh Wilkinson, University of Cincinnati, Presiding
	A24-435 Sikh Studies Unit Theme: Embodying the Sensuous: Sikh Poetry, Aesthetics, Ecology, and Feminisms Sunday, 5:00 PM - 6:30 PM Convention Center-25A (Upper Level East) Nirinjan Khalsa, Loyola Marymount University, Presiding This roundtable discussion in conversation with the work of Dr. Nikky-Guninder Kaur Singh will explore Sikh feminist approaches to aesthetic and ethical dimensions of Sikh sacred art, poetry, philosophy, and practice. Dr. Singh has published extensively in the field of Sikh studies, including two new books of translation of Sikh hymns, as well as one on Early Sikh Art. Scholars who teach and engage her abundant offerings in the field of religious studies and beyond will explore the ways in which her work uplifts the sensuous, embodied, and pluriversal nature of Sikh teachings through keen analysis of artistic, musical, poetic, mystical, environmental, ethical, and revolutionary dimensions. Panelists Simran Jeet Singh, The Aspen Institute Robin Rinehart, Lafayette College Veena Howard, California State University, Fresno Jvala Singh, University of British Columbia Amy Allocco, Elon University Nikky Singh, Colby College Nicole Ranganath, University of California, Davis Business Meeting Nirinjan Khalsa, Loyola Marymount University, Presiding Jasjit Singh, University of Leeds, Presiding
	A24-436 Special Session Theme: Honoring Judith Plaskow’s induction into the Women’s Hall of Fame Sunday, 5:00 PM - 6:30 PM Hilton Bayfront-Sapphire AEI (Fourth Level) Jin Y Park, American University, Washington, D.C., Presiding This panel will reflect on Plaskow’s intellectual contributions to religious feminism in the academy and her commitment and service to the AAR. The focus will be on how her work has both influenced generations of religious feminist scholars and been critical to bridging differences of religion, race, sexuality, gender, ability, and gender identity in our field. Panelists Julia Watts Belser, Georgetown University Emilie M. Townes, Boston University Max Strassfeld, University of Southern California Natalia M. Imperatori-Lee, Manhattan College Michal Raucher, Rutgers University, New Brunswick Responding Judith Plaskow, Manhattan College
	A24-437 Teaching Religion Unit Theme: The (Super)Power of Comics, Zines, and More in the Religion Classroom Sunday, 5:00 PM - 6:30 PM Hilton Bayfront-Indigo H (Second Level) James McGrath, Butler University, Presiding In this non-traditional roundtable, panelists will share how they use graphic novels, zines, comics, and even Legos in their classrooms. Our presentations engage a variety of religious traditions, topics, and methodologies, including religion and incarceration, American Muslim experiences, trans religious lives, Black theology, and Hindu sacred texts. Throughout the session, attendees will rotate in small groups to discuss various materials and pedagogical approaches. Together, we will explore how using non-traditional material as “text” highlights diverse voices from populations often excluded from the religious studies classroom and facilitates engagement with the thematic, artistic, emotional, ethical, practical, and lived dimensions of each text or creation. By inviting students into this dynamic analysis, we also encourage them to participate reflectively in the process of meaning-making themselves. Our conversation-station format will lend itself to a deeper dialogue on how non-traditional materials might work in each attendee’s specific courses, fields, lived identities, and institutional contexts. Panelists Elizabeth Sartell, Lewis University Elyse Ambrose, University of California, Riverside Whitney Cox, Rowan University Nell Hawley, Vassar College Rebecca Makas, Villanova University Héctor Varela Rios, Villanova University
	A24-438 Theology and Continental Philosophy Unit Theme: A History of the Enemy in the Present: 25 years after Gil Anidjar’s The Jew, The Arab Sunday, 5:00 PM - 6:30 PM Convention Center-25B (Upper Level East) Amaryah Shaye Armstrong, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Presiding Just over twenty-years ago, Gil Anidjar published The Jew, The Arab: A History of the Enemy (Stanford UP, 2003), his groundbreaking examination of the (absent) concept of the enemy in the Western canon. Europe and so-called Western civilization, Anidjar argued, was structured by its relation to the figure of the enemy, divided in two: ”the Jew” as the theological adversary and ”the Arab” the political opponent. This separation is emblematic of how the Western canon sought to separate the theological and the political. As this book became foundational for many in understanding the nature of secularism, its limits, and the drive to distinguish nation from ethnicity from race. This panel brings together three scholars from different subfields, but with a shared disrespect for disciplinary boundaries, to reflect on the significance and questions raised by the book today, followed by a response from Gil Anidjar. Panelists Daniel Boyarin, University of California, Berkeley Anthony Paul Smith, La Salle University Zaynab Shahar, Metropolitan State University of Denver Responding Gil Anidjar, Columbia University
	A24-439 Yogācāra Studies Unit Theme: Abhidharma and Yogācāra Sunday, 5:00 PM - 6:30 PM Hilton Bayfront-Aqua Salon AB (Third Level) Laura Guerrero, The College of William & Mary, Presiding This panel will explore the relationships between Abhidharma and Yogācāra traditions of Buddhism. In particular, this panel aims to examine the continuities and discontinuities between the two traditions either historically, philosophically, or both. Ching Keng, National Taiwan University Are Cognitive objects Pure or Impure? A Dispute from the Saṃdhinirmocana-sūtra Abstract In the Buddhist path toward liberation, cognitive objects serve as a double-edged sword: on one hand, they prompt cognitive and emotional attachments that hinder sentient beings from attaining liberation; on the other hand, they are essential for guiding one toward the liberating knowledge that alone serves as the key to liberation. This paper draws from the Yogācāra theory of three natures (trisvabhāva-nirdeśa) outlined in the Saṃdhinirmocana-sūtra to suggest that the key to resolving the above tension is the idea of pure dependent nature. When the dependent nature (i.e., cognitive objects) is detached from the imagined nature (i.e., concepts superimposed on cognitive objects), cognitive objects are perceived through non-conceptual perception. Only through non-conceptual perception of objects can further seeds of names and concepts be avoided in the storehouse consciousness. In essence, a proper mode of perceiving cognitive objects paves the way for their elimination. Chihying Wu, University of California, Berkeley Subjectivity from Abhidharma to Yogācāra Abstract This paper analyzes theories on subjectivity and how they changed from Abhidharma scholasticism to Yogācāra philosophy of mind. One of the most common and fundamental themes in Buddhist intellectual discourses is the denial of self (anātman). Throughout history, Buddhist thinkers have attempted to account for subjectivity, while rejecting self as the basis for perhaps the most intrinsic and ineradicable feature of our existence. The Sarvāstivāda-Sautrāntikas maintain the reductionist approach to self and explain our sense of self through the function of the mental factor, the view of self (satkāyadṛṣṭi). However, under this Abhidharmic model subjectivity is at best episodic and sporadic. The Yogācāra thinkers then proposed the theory of the afflicted mentation (kliṣṭaṁ manas) which constantly ruminates and is responsible for the sense of self. This paper investigates the transition from the Abhidharma to the Yogācāra model and the intellectual context in which this transition emerged. Szilvia Szanyi, Oxford University Fundamental (dis)agreement: Sthiramati on the Abhidharmic view of the nature and objects of consciousness Abstract Sthiramati is a prominent commentator of the Yogācāra tradition, however his contributions to tackling key issues in Buddhist philosophy are often overlooked in scholarship. In his commentary on Vasubandhu’s Triṃśikā, the Triṃśikāvijñaptibhāṣya, Sthiramati claims that one of the purposes of Vasubandhu’s work is to reject the ‘extreme doctrine’ of the Ābhidharmikas that “just like consciousness, the object of consciousness also substantially (dravyatas) exists”. Although Sthiramati sides with the Ābhidharmikas (over the Mādhyamikas) in accepting that consciousness substantially exists, he denies the same status to the objects of consciousness. This talk investigates Sthiramati’s attempt to adhere to fundamental Abhidharmic presuppositions in philosophy of mind and perception while criticizing and reinterpreting the Ābhidharmikas’ view that the object-condition (ālambana-pratyaya) of consciousness is a mind-independent entity. With regard to his critique, I pay special attention to how Sthiramati combines various metaphysical and epistemological considerations used for a similar purpose in Vasubandhu’s and Dignāga’s works. Business Meeting Douglas S. Duckworth, Temple University, Presiding Jingjing Li, Leiden University, Presiding
	A24-441 Asian North American Religion, Culture, and Society Unit Theme: Roundtable on New Books: Transpacific Asian American Religions Sunday, 5:00 PM - 7:00 PM Convention Center-30C (Upper Level East) Grace Kao, Claremont School of Theology, Presiding What is a transpacific approach to Asian American religions in particular and American religions in general? How does it shape historical and social scientific approaches to studying religion? How does a transpacific turn help us rethink the religious and secular as well as categories such as race, empire and the state? This roundtable will engage such questions at the intersection of Melissa Borja’s Follow the New Way, Helen Jin Kim’s Race for Revival and Justin Tse’s The Secular in a Sheet of Scattered Sand. Panelists Melissa Borja, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor Helen Jin Kim, Emory University Justin Tse, Singapore Management University Responding Minjung Noh, Lehigh University
	M24-524 Union Presbyterian Seminary Theme: Reception for Friends of Union Presbyterian Seminary Sunday, 5:30 PM - 7:00 PM Offsite-Offsite Please join us for a Reception for Friends of Union Presbyterian Seminary on Sunday, November 24, from 5:30 pm - 7:00 pm at the Marriott San Diego Gaslamp Quarter. Please contact nsmith@upsem.edu for more information.
	M24-402 Urantia Book Academy Theme: The Urantia Book: A Scholars Introduction Sunday, 5:30 PM - 7:00 PM Grand Hyatt-Regatta A-B (Fourth Level) The Urantia Book (1955) is a lengthy text that comes across as a futuristic encyclopedia of theology, cosmology, religion, and more. A million+ copies are distributed, in all major languages. One portion provides an audacious retelling of the life and teachings of Jesus, but within a Chalcedonian framework. A rare chance to hear introductory talks by four veteran students of the text who are practicing scholars.
	M24-403 Oblate School of Theology/Institute for the Study of Contemporary Spirituality Theme: Oblate School of Theology/Institute for the Study of Contemporary Spirituality Reception Sunday, 6:00 PM - 7:30 PM Grand Hyatt-Promenade AB (Third Level - Harbor Tower) "The Institute for the Study of Contemporary Spirituality (ISCS) at Oblate School of Theology is the only concentrated, integrative program of its kind in the United States offering ATS accredited PhD, DMin, and MA degrees in Contemporary Spirituality. For scholars and people within academia, the ISCS offers three distinct degrees in the field of Contemporary Spirituality, all taught by an internationally renowned faculty. The goal of our degree programs is to convene the academic resources emerging within the growing field of Contemporary Spirituality and make them available to the community of scholars. The ISCS inspires an ongoing and renewed interest in the rigorous study of and publication on Spirituality to benefit the world’s understanding of how the deep wells of Christian mysticism can enrich broader global theological and religious scholarship."
	M24-401 Louisville Institute Theme: Louisville Institute Reception Sunday, 6:00 PM - 8:00 PM Marriott Marquis-Pacific Ballroom 18 (First Floor) Join Louisville Institute grantees, fellows, friends and staff for our annual reception! No formal program, just food, drinks and a time to gather with friends and colleagues. Plus, get up to date about the work of the Louisville Institute!
	M24-519 Northwestern University, Department of Religious Studies Theme: Northwestern University, Department of Religious Studies Reception Sunday, 6:00 PM - 8:00 PM Marriott Marquis-Marriott Grand 4 (Lobby Level) Northwestern University, Department of Religious Studies alumni, faculty, friends, and current and prospective graduate students are warmly invited to meet, mingle, and learn more about our latest programs and projects. We look forward to seeing you!
	M24-400 Institute for American Religious and Philosophical Thought Theme: American Journal of Theology and Philosophy Lecture Sunday, 6:00 PM - 8:30 PM Marriott Marquis-Torrey Pines 3 (North Tower - Lobby Level) From Willis Jenkins, this lecture, "Migrations of the Sacred: a multispecies account of value transformation," engages Hans Joas, climate dislocations, mass extinction, religion and cultural change via the relationship between avian and human migration. The lecture, which starts at 7pm, is preceded by the IARPT business meeting.
	A24-500 American Academy of Religion Theme: AAR Awards Ceremony and Member Reception Sunday, 6:30 PM - 7:30 PM Hilton Bayfront-Sapphire AEI (Fourth Level) Join the American Academy of Religion to celebrate the 2024 award winners, acknowledge the important contributions our members have made to the academic study and public understanding of religion, and celebrate volunteer leaders and everyone who has been supporting the work and enduring relevance of the AAR. Come see friends and colleagues, have a drink on us, and celebrate! All AAR members are welcome to attend!

« first
‹ previous
…
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
…
next ›
last »

You are here

Online Program Book