Ways of Knowing: Graduate Conference on Religion 2013

August 29, 2013

After completing the review process for over 300 paper proposals submitted to the 2013 "Ways of Knowing: Graduate Conference on Religion," I am happy to announce that 120 graduate students and early-career scholars will gather to present their research at the second annual conference, to be held October 25-26, 2013.

Representing 65 academic institutions from across the United States and around the world, they will present papers on religion, utilizing historical, anthropological, sociological, philosophical, theological, and literary frameworks.

Hosted by the Science, Religion, and Culture Program at Harvard Divinity School and co-sponsored by the New England-Maritimes Region of the American Academy of Religion, Ways of Knowing is the largest event of its kind and represents a lively new arena for graduate students of religion to present their research.

Thirty panels, covering a broad spectrum of religious traditions, will feature two special topic modules. The first module will include five panels on ritual in South Asian, East Asian, Jewish, and Christian contexts, both past and present. Professor Michael Puett of Harvard University will be the guest speaker.

The second module will include four panels examining constructions of autonomy in modern European theology and philosophy in contexts ranging from the sixteenth to the twentieth centuries. HDS professor David Lamberth will be the guest speaker.

In addition, Ways of Knowing will host two faculty-led lunchtime discussion panels on career development: the first on academic publishing and the second on preparation for the academic job market. Professor Sherine Hamdy from Brown University will deliver the keynote address.

The conference is open to all and is cosponsored by the Office of Student Life at HDS. A registration form and the conference program will be available on the Ways of Knowing website in early September.

—by Faye Bodley-Dangelo, Conference Coordinator