Saturday, 12:30 PM - 2:30 PM
Grand Hyatt-Crockett B (4th Floor)
This roundtable session features representatives from the Association of Professional Chaplains (APC) and the Chaplaincy Innovation Lab alongside chaplains in training and chaplains working in a variety of institutional settings (military, prisons, hospice, hospitals) in conversation about what chaplaincy is, what chaplains do, and how to become a chaplain. Graduates holding a MDiv or a MA in Religious Studies are eligible for board certification as chaplains through APC.
Saturday, 12:30 PM - 2:30 PM
San Antonio Convention Center-Room 303A (Ballroom Level)
These four papers consider various but related technologies in Islamic thought: lettrism, translation, sound, and astrology. Each paper explores the means by which Muslim thinkers sought to channel the power of interpretation, whether in the societies around them or in the cosmos. The first paper considers Ibn al-ʿArabī’s use of the science of letters, making comparisons to the Muslim philosopher Ibn Masarra and the Jewish exegete Saʿadia Gaon. The second paper studies translations of ʿUmar Khayyām’s Rubāʿiyāt into Telugu and the varying social and interpretive objectives of these translations. The third paper examines sound and silence in M.R. Bawa Muhaiyaddeen’s The Resonance of Allah . Finally, the fourth paper investigates the influx of the occult sciences into Ismaili theology, through a study of The Book of Interim Times and Planetary Conjunctions attributed to Ja‘far b. Manṣūr al-Yaman.
Saturday, 12:30 PM - 2:30 PM
Marriott Rivercenter-Conference Room 12
2023 marks the 200th anniversary of *Johnson v. M’Intosh*, the first case of the Marshall Trilogy, in which US Supreme Court Chief Justice John Marshall created what we now call “Federal Indian Law.” This is an occasion for us to bring together lawyers and scholars of Native American religious traditions to reflect on the roles that religion has played in the development of Federal Indian Law. Our roundtable discusses the argument that this story is not only about property, but also, importantly, about religion. Our discussion will not be limited to *Johnson v. M’Intosh*, but would also reflect on contemporary cases, such as *Haaland v. Brackeen*, as following the logic of discovery, even as they conceal the theological roots of federal Indian law.
Saturday, 12:30 PM - 2:30 PM
San Antonio Convention Center-Room 303C (Ballroom Level)
This session considers the provocation “Labor is Not Enough.” Whether we are talking about the violence of the ‘adjunctification’ of the academy ; “right to work” legislation and its affront to full time or unionized labor; the promotion of anti-work or ‘good living’ ideologies; or the varieties of unpaid labor in our institutions and society at large - we are confronted with the reality that labor is not enough. In what ways does our work reflect this reality? In what ways does the religious academy participate in the structures that disenfranchise labor? Where is liberation to be found when labor - as it is hegemonically or counter-hegemonically construed - is not enough to sustain communities and life with dignity? Might there be categories and things that fail to be acknowledged as labor?
Saturday, 12:30 PM - 2:30 PM
Grand Hyatt-Crockett C (4th Floor)
While the nineteenth century saw the emergence of self-consciously modern forms of theology, many of these theologies were also undergirded by sophisticated historical narratives reaching back to the Patristic age. Arguably, the broad outlines of doctrinal history that were constructed by major nineteenth-century theologians from Schleiermacher to Baur, Dorner, Ritschl, and Harnack have continued to inform historical theology even where their underlying dogmatic judgments were emphatically rejected. This session considers this fascinating and often overlooked aspect of nineteenth-century theological scholarship and suggests a fresh portrayal of nineteenth-century theology. It highlights how historical and systematic theology worked hand in hand throughout the century offering exemplary analyses of individual figures and broader, diachronic trends.
Saturday, 12:30 PM - 2:30 PM
San Antonio Convention Center-Room 304B (Ballroom Level)
The papers from this panel allow us the opportunity to take another look at the development of Pentecostalism in the United States. Pentecostalism has often been defined by the impoverished and by its white adherents. This panels ask us to take another look at who Pentecostals are and how they expressed themselves from the Great Depression to the present.
Saturday, 12:30 PM - 2:30 PM
San Antonio Convention Center-Room 212B (Meeting Room Level)
Phenomenology has long been seen as the source of uncritical approaches to the study of religion. This is because among those earlier practitioners of what became known as phenomenology of religion, empathy and description were prioritized over critical and theoretical examination. The advent of “critical phenomenology” within philosophy opens up an opportunity to return to phenomenology with fresh eyes. The panelists gathered here offer different approaches to engaging critical phenomenology and building on its insights within the field of religion.
Saturday, 12:30 PM - 2:30 PM
San Antonio Convention Center-Room 217B (Meeting Room Level)
After 9/11, Paul Kahn theorized the difference between the criminal and the enemy as involving law and sovereignty: the criminal opposes the law, the enemy opposes the sovereign. Now, Kahn turns to the case of civil war in conversation with Schmitt and Hobbes. Civil war signals a gap between law and popular sovereignty: citizens no longer perceive their collective authorship in the law. This gap is closed when a revolution succeeds in constituting a new state, a new legal order retaining a trace of sovereign presence. Such a movement traverses the categories of criminal and enemy. Rather than the state emerging from “nature,” one state replaces another. Friends become enemies in this process of revolutionary birth, or civil war, generating the force of sovereignty. This dynamic may haunt us as long as we invest our politics with an ultimate meaning.
Saturday, 12:30 PM - 2:30 PM
San Antonio Convention Center-Room 205 (Meeting Room Level)
The climate crisis is the greatest threat to creatures and creation. Some still deny it; others play it down. Moreover, the most significant problems caused by the world's wealthiest countries are occurring in the global South. Young people from all over the world keep gathering and protesting. And yet little is being done about the climate crisis in politics and society. But many people, including those in the church, also stay out of the discourse, as if the whole thing has nothing to do with their faith, nothing to do with their lives, nothing to do with their children and grandchildren. The climate crisis challenges habits such as nutrition, mobility, attitude towards the earth, etc., and challenges new ways of living. What does practical theology have to say about this? How is the climate crisis addressed in practical theological disciplines and religious practices? This interactive panel will provide impulses from a practical theological perspective, but at the same time, all session participants will be invited to join in the thinking and discussion.
Saturday, 12:30 PM - 2:30 PM
San Antonio Convention Center-Room 005 (River Level)
This panel will focus on the implications of the significant rise in suicides and suicidality in recent years, including differences among groups of identification and belonging (age, gender and sexuality, race, ethnicity, immigration status, etc.). These papers speak on topics including working clinically or pastorally with survivors of attempted suicide or survivors of those who have died by suicide, psychological and religious issues of stigmatization and shame, and the effects on family, friends, and communities.
Saturday, 12:30 PM - 2:30 PM
San Antonio Convention Center-Room 221D (Meeting Room Level)
The rising influence of white Christian nationalism in some circles of American politics is posing a major threat to the health of our democracy and our culture. This panel will discuss the results of a new PRRI/Brookings survey of more than 6,000 Americans, which establishes new measures to estimate the proportion of Americans who adhere to and reject Christian nationalist ideology. The survey also examines how Christian nationalist views intersect with white identity, anti-Black sentiment, patriarchy, antisemitism, anti-Muslim sentiments, anti-immigrant attitudes, and support for political violence. Additionally, the survey explores the influence Christian nationalism has among our two political parties and major religious subgroups today. PRRI president and founder Robert P. Jones will present the major findings of the study, and a distinguished panel will discuss what the survey results reveal about Christian nationalism, the state of American democracy, and the health of our society.
Saturday, 12:30 PM - 2:30 PM
Grand Hyatt-Bonham E (3rd Floor)
William Germano is Professor of English at The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art. Formerly vice-president and editorial director at Routledge and editor-in-chief at Columbia University Press, he is the author of On Revision: The Only Writing That Counts, From Dissertation to Book, and Getting It Published, all from the University of Chicago Press. Join Dr. Germano and Dr. Timothy Beal, chair of the AAR Publications Committee, to discuss best practices and resources. This session will include ample time to for Q&A and is open to all conference attendees.
Saturday, 12:30 PM - 2:30 PM
San Antonio Convention Center-Room 301C (Ballroom Level)
This panel explores the ways that humorists working in different media (comic books, single-panel comics, and stand-up comedians) navigate the politics of representing religion in the United States in different historical times. Whether it is the rise of clerical jokes in the 1950s; Muslima comedians fighting to represent Islam in the face of Islamophobia and racialized, misogynistic politics of representation; or satirical depictions of Jesus' return to Earth the presenters on this panel try to explain how and why humor is an important framing device for navigating religious change and controversy.
Saturday, 12:30 PM - 2:30 PM
San Antonio Convention Center-Room 008B (River Level)
This roundtable highlights themes from four recent books and their contributions to Digital Religion studies: Campbell & Bellar’s Digital Religion. The Basics, Dyer’s People of the Screen, Petersen’s Unrurly Souls and Echchaibi & Hoover’s Third Spaces of Digital Religion. Digital Religion studies take a particular approach to analyzing the intersections between religion, technology and digitally-mediated cultures, by recognizing the importance of considering online religious practice in tandem with offline religious traditions(Campbell& Bellar 2023). Each author use this approach in their work, to ask important questions about the impact these online-offline religious relationships, or what Luciano Floridi calls “on-life” (2015), are having on religious institutions and communities in the 21st Century. By closely considering current performances and perception of religion in emerging “third spaces” (Echchaibi & Hoover) roundtable members will draw attention to “hard questions” around topics of power, gender, nationalism coming to the fore in need of further critical reflection.
Saturday, 12:30 PM - 2:30 PM
Grand Hyatt-Crockett D (4th Floor)
Ritual is envisaged here not as a pacifying response to potentially problematic situations, but as a means whereby challenging circumstances – worshiping at interreligious sacred sites, disposing of sacred objets, bringing what has been erased to mind – are aknowledged and given hightened legitimacy.
Saturday, 12:30 PM - 2:30 PM
Grand Hyatt-Bowie C (2nd Floor)
The New Directions panel introduces new research in the study of language and religion in South Asia by recently-graduated Ph.D. students and doctoral candidates. This year's papers examine topics ranging from devotion and service to religious literature in Sanskrit and regional languages. In doing so, panelists also consider the intersections of religion with gender, caste, virtue, and politics.
Saturday, 12:30 PM - 2:30 PM
San Antonio Convention Center-Room 007B (River Level)
This session explores agency and sacred space in four different instantiations: land-owning deities, built religious space, liminal passages, and ontological others. In each of these papers, territories are created, borders established, and structures built. Movement is key in this generative process. Of course, territories, borders, and buildings can restrict movement, but as people and deities (are) move(d) through and within these spaces, they create, reinforce, and inscribe themselves and their actions on these spaces. These papers offer diverse perspectives on this process by showing how space is created by the migrant, the divine, the earth, and the initiate. Finally, these papers demonstrate the connections between humans and space. Divine spaces demand recognition from the state; they “observe, recollect, and feel;” they frame human identity; and they impose identities on “people crossing through [them who are deemed] as outside the human.”
Saturday, 12:30 PM - 2:30 PM
San Antonio Convention Center-Room 221C (Meeting Room Level)
Our co-sponsored special session, honors the scholarly legacy of the late Delores Williams, a trailblazing womanist theologian. We recognize the significance of Williams’ works and particularly highlight the 30th Anniversary of the publication of Sisters in the Wilderness: The Challenge of Womanist Godtalk (Orbis, 1993). This is an invited panel with closed submissions.
9 Sponsoring Units:
Black Theology Unit (Jawanza E. Clark and Eboni Marshall Turman, Co-Chairs)
Tillich: Issues in Theology, Religion, and Culture Unit (Michelle Watkins and Kirk MacGregor, Co-Chairs)
Womanist Approaches to Religion and Society Unit (Melanie Jones and Valerie Miles-Tribble, Co-Chairs)
Martin Luther and Global Lutheran Traditions Unit (Jacob Erickson and Marit Trelstad, Co-Chairs)
Liberation Theologies Unit (Iskander Abbasi, K. Christine Pae and M.T. Davila, Co-Chairs)
Theology of Martin Luther King, Jr. Unit (Montague Williams and Leonard McKinnis, Co-Chairs)
Sacred Texts, Theory, and Theological Construction Unit (Karen Bray and Robert Seesengood, Co-Chairs)
Class, Religion & Theology Unit (Jeremy Posadas and Rosetta E. Ross, Co-Chairs)
African Diaspora Religions Unit (Scott Barton and Carol Marie Webster, Co-Chairs)
Saturday, 12:30 PM - 2:30 PM
San Antonio Convention Center-Room 007D (River Level)
This panel will host graduate students in Islamic studies at various stages in their dissertation processes and will encoruage interactivity among panelists, as well as constructive feedback from a respondent.
Saturday, 12:30 PM - 2:30 PM
San Antonio Convention Center-Room 225C (Meeting Room Level)
How have contemplative traditions throughout time and place utilized the primary elements of earth, water, fire, wind, and space within practices of attention and self-transformation? This panel explores the theorization of the elements as material categories in contemplation, ritual practice, and as technologies of information for ordering kinds of knowledge about human bodies and environments within South Asian and Tibetan contemplative traditions of Yoga and Tantra. Through responses representing geographically and historically diverse contemplative traditions, papers attend to the emergent theme of the elements as relational media that operate between various domains of experience: embodied and environmental; individual and cosmic; private and public; and theoretical and practical domains of contemplation.