As mentioned a couple of times before, I am going to Toronto next weekend to join the IAHR World Congress. It only happens every five years, and is a big happening in the fields of religious studies/Religionswissenschaft. This year there will also be a considerable presence of esotericism research. Marco Pasi, Cathy Gutierrez and Allison Coudert are hosting a large panel on “Western esotericism and its boundaries”, which, by systematically tackling the issue of the cultural and geographical boundaries of this concept will no doubt be an important occasion for this field of research. In addition there is the “Seduced by Science” panel, which I co-host with Tessel M. Bauduin. For anybody who’s interested, I attach more details about these two panels below.
IAHR: Two panels
Breaking the silence – and some news
Summer time has been upon me and Heterodoxology has been dead silent for a while. Unfortunately, when I look at the pile of things to do these coming months I fear it may stay that way. This is nevertheless an honest attempt at getting things rolling again. I’ll just kick off with some whimsically chosen (perhaps relevant) news:
Lux in Tenebris: Call for papers for the 3rd international congress of the ESSWE
The Visual and the Symbolic in Western Esotericism
The call for papers is out for next year’s biannual conference of the ESSWE. This is the third one: after Tübingen in 2007 and Strasbourg 2009, the 2011 conference will be held in Szeged, Hungary, on 6-10 July. The title is “Lux in Tenebris: The Visual and the Symbolic in Western Esotericism”, and should open for some interesting cross-disciplinary perspectives (art history, film studies, literary studies, cultural analysis?) on esoteric discourse, from late antiquity to contemporary times. (Also, the program includes a visit to the catacombs of the Buda castle in Budapest – wouldn’t miss it!) Deadline for proposals is November 15, 2010. I attach the full call for papers below.
Alchemy, and how to write about it: ESSWE thesis workshop
As advertised before on this blog, the European Society for the Study of Western Esotericism (ESSWE) has been organising a thesis workshop on alchemy. It took place in Amsterdam on June 24; here is a short report.
“Alchemy: Between Science and Religion” – a workshop
On 24 June the European Society for the Study of Western Esotericism (ESSWE) will organize a one-day workshop on alchemy in Amsterdam. Some of the top experts of alchemy will present papers, including Professor Lawrence Principe of John Hopkins University. Although the main focus is on alchemy and its ambiguous relation to early modern natural philosophy and religion, the workshop is intended for graduate and postgraduate students working with themes related to esotericism more generally. Since it coincides with the board meeting of the ESSWE, virtually all the leading scholars of western esotericism will be present, including Antoine Faivre, Wouter Hanegraaff, Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke, Boaz Huss, Mark Sedgwick, and Gyorgy Szonyi. They will all happily engage in discussions with students and young researchers.
In short: A great opportunity if you’re doing an MA or PhD in this area, and can make it to Amsterdam in June. Another notable perk: It’s free. For more details, check out the announcement, which I also post in its entirety below.
Conference panel: Seduced by Science
This has already been disseminated through other channels, but I’ll post it here anyway. My colleague Tessel Bauduin and I are organizing a panel at the next Quinquennial World Congress of the International Association for the History of Religions (IAHR). It’s in Toronto, it’s in August, and the title of the panel is “Seduced by Science: The culture of religion and science in the early 20th century”. We’re accepting paper proposals until April 15. See below for the details.
Heterodoxology 