Greek Orthodox Church of St George conjoined with Al-Khidr Mosque (each incorporating elements of a Byzantine basilica) above the tomb of St George/al-Khidr, in Lod/Lydda/al-Ludd, Palestine/Israel
Whether in the abundance of contact or in social isolation, all sacred environments are shared in one way or another. Even the eremitic voices - "crying in the wilderness" - establish a multitude of relations with other beings across conceptual, material and historical planes. This is, of course, as long as there are forms of distinction. The notion of sharing depends on differentiation - on an other - for one cannot share alone, with oneself only, unless perhaps there is some wordplay or a separation in the very self involved. Does sharing imply connection, or would we gain by analytically framing it more broadly, as relation (cf. Strathern 2020)?
This symposium invites analyses of sacred landscapes across different spatial and temporal frameworks. It features conversations on religious pluralism, mixture, syncretism and sharing, as well as on the actors and processes attempting to dismantle them. Speakers are particularly invited to consider the meanings, forms and values of relation cutting across scalar projects of difference (e.g. cross-religious or cross-species), focusing their attention on lifeworlds and their political renderings.
How does it happen that sacral spaces (are) conceive(d) otherwise, different from what "the thinker and perceiver has thought and seen previously" (Povinelli 2012: 456)? What conditions allow for the leap of faith and what are the outcomes? Are beliefs and practices substantially transformed? How do sacral stories, rituals, concepts and materials travel, cohabit and merge with others? How can researchers describe sacred places that are ambiguous, which criss-cross, forget borders, or amalgamate apparently disparate elements?
And, conversely, what happens when the plurality inherent to sacred domains comes to be articulated through exclusivism and the denial of others? How do persons, communities and other-than-humans cope with and respond to identitary purifications of shared spaces? Do they capitulate, endure or produce forms of political resistance? Are imperial and national models of religious subjectivity production/erasure essentially different? How much of the subjectivity engineering can sacred environments absorb? How can we rethink relation and isolation in light of historical and contemporary ripples of destruction?
The title of the symposium takes as its inspiration the composite of Khidr-George, the miraculous and syncretic Green One appearing in diverse forms around the world, particularly throughout the Mediterranean, shifting in names and biographies along the way. Khidr-George is shared by different religious communities and usually comes to be celebrated in elaborate springtime rituals. They often suggest the fragility of human knowledge, resurrect dead animals and plants, and insist on the importance of nurturing the bonds with other-than-humans. Khidr-George asks us to engage in a substantial conversation, not only on inter-faith relations, but between bodies of knowledge at times radically different. They ask for both doubt and trust.
The content of the symposium runs against the tides of systemic homogenisation and contemporary exclusivist discourses on religion. To use the words of Glenn Bowman, "[s]howing that difference can cohabit is important, but demonstrating how it does so, the socio-historical field in which it occurs, and what works against cohabitation, grounds and empowers a counter-discourse" (2019: 133). The Khidr Dialogues invite carefully contextualised reflections on religious convergences and the imaginative ways in which persons, communities and other-than-humans engage with difference.
The symposium will be organised online on the 6th of May 2021 (St George's Day/Hıdırellez), from 10:30 to 18:30 BST.
To register, click here.
This symposium invites analyses of sacred landscapes across different spatial and temporal frameworks. It features conversations on religious pluralism, mixture, syncretism and sharing, as well as on the actors and processes attempting to dismantle them. Speakers are particularly invited to consider the meanings, forms and values of relation cutting across scalar projects of difference (e.g. cross-religious or cross-species), focusing their attention on lifeworlds and their political renderings.
How does it happen that sacral spaces (are) conceive(d) otherwise, different from what "the thinker and perceiver has thought and seen previously" (Povinelli 2012: 456)? What conditions allow for the leap of faith and what are the outcomes? Are beliefs and practices substantially transformed? How do sacral stories, rituals, concepts and materials travel, cohabit and merge with others? How can researchers describe sacred places that are ambiguous, which criss-cross, forget borders, or amalgamate apparently disparate elements?
And, conversely, what happens when the plurality inherent to sacred domains comes to be articulated through exclusivism and the denial of others? How do persons, communities and other-than-humans cope with and respond to identitary purifications of shared spaces? Do they capitulate, endure or produce forms of political resistance? Are imperial and national models of religious subjectivity production/erasure essentially different? How much of the subjectivity engineering can sacred environments absorb? How can we rethink relation and isolation in light of historical and contemporary ripples of destruction?
The title of the symposium takes as its inspiration the composite of Khidr-George, the miraculous and syncretic Green One appearing in diverse forms around the world, particularly throughout the Mediterranean, shifting in names and biographies along the way. Khidr-George is shared by different religious communities and usually comes to be celebrated in elaborate springtime rituals. They often suggest the fragility of human knowledge, resurrect dead animals and plants, and insist on the importance of nurturing the bonds with other-than-humans. Khidr-George asks us to engage in a substantial conversation, not only on inter-faith relations, but between bodies of knowledge at times radically different. They ask for both doubt and trust.
The content of the symposium runs against the tides of systemic homogenisation and contemporary exclusivist discourses on religion. To use the words of Glenn Bowman, "[s]howing that difference can cohabit is important, but demonstrating how it does so, the socio-historical field in which it occurs, and what works against cohabitation, grounds and empowers a counter-discourse" (2019: 133). The Khidr Dialogues invite carefully contextualised reflections on religious convergences and the imaginative ways in which persons, communities and other-than-humans engage with difference.
The symposium will be organised online on the 6th of May 2021 (St George's Day/Hıdırellez), from 10:30 to 18:30 BST.
To register, click here.