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Graduate Conference in Religion and Ecology
Yale Divinity School, Old Refectory
409 Prospect Street, New Haven, CT 06511, United States
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Details
The theme of this year's conference is "Creation & Preservation." This conference will feature keynote speaker Mark Cladis, Brooke Russell Astor Professor of the Humanities at Brown and Chair of Brown's Religious Studies Department. We are also pleased to welcome acclaimed musician Henry Jamison, whose intensely lyrical, ecologically-inspired songs boast up to 91 million streams on Spotify, who will play an acoustic set at our closing reception. We are thrilled to spotlight 24 student presenters from universities around the world, alongside four workshops and a gallery of artistic works. This is an in-person conference, with the exception of two student presenters from abroad who will present over Zoom.
Creation & Preservation:
By creation we mean many things: the land, Turtle Island, erets (הארץ), the cosmos, the Word, the biosphere, the environment. But also, creativity, art, and innovation. Preservation we understand as conservation, yes: how do we keep the ravages of climate change from destroying landscapes and ecosystems; how do we manage land and agriculture; how do we relate human life to the more-than-human world? But in its desire to keep things the same, the theme of preservation must also acknowledge the element of time. We can see it not just as an effort to halt progress, but as sustenance, life in its constant flux, the living love of transient things which brings about the need to steward. How are human theologies or cosmologies related to the land on which we live? What views and methods allow us to relate wisely and compassionately to interdependent life systems? What are the implications of preservation and conservation, as opposed to or hand in hand with innovation?
Food Provided (Breakfast (light continental fare), coffee and tea, lunch, closing reception.
Vegetarian, vegan, and gluten-free options will be provided; please specify your requirements below. For anyone whose dietary restrictions we are unfortunately not able to meet, a student kitchen is available. )
Where
Yale Divinity School, Old Refectory
409 Prospect Street, New Haven, CT 06511, United States
Speakers
Carol Wayne White
Carol Wayne White (Presidential Professor of Philosophy of Religion at Bucknell University [2018-21]) specializes in Poststructuralist Philosophies, Process Philosophy, Religious Naturalism, Science and Religion, and Critical Theory & Religion. Her books include Black Lives and Sacred Humanity: Toward an African American Religious Naturalism (2016), which won a Choice Award for Outstanding Academic Titles; The Legacy of Anne Conway (1631-70): Reverberations from a Mystical Naturalism (2009); and Poststructuralism, Feminism, and Religion: Triangulating Positions (2002). White has published numerous essays in philosophy of religion and on religious naturalism; her work in philosophy and critical religious thought has also appeared in Zygon: The Journal of Religion and Science, The American Journal of Theology and Philosophy, Philosophia Africana, and Religion & Public Life. White has received international awards and national fellowships, including an Oxford University Fellowship in Religion and Science, a Science and Religion Grant from The John Templeton Foundation, and a NEH Fellowship. White is currently completing a book with Oxford UP on Anna Julia Cooper (1858 – 1964), which explores the unique set of theoretical perspectives, narrative strategies, and epistemological claims in Cooper’s distinctive model of African American philosophy. She is also doing research for another book project that explores the insights of religious naturalism expressed in contemporary North American nature poets and writers. Her keynote address, "The Sacrality of Roots: Religious Naturalism's Prelude to Living in Wonder," explores aesthetic and ethical responses to recognizing humans as natural processes.
Henry Jamison
Henry Jamison is a Vermont-based singer-songwriter whose intensely lyrical, ecologically-inspired compositions were once lauded by Big Thief's Adrianne Lenker as "songs sing me through mazes of my own sensuality and sadness, help me to feel less alone in the journey to understand myself more deeply and to face gaping wounds." He can be found on Spotify here.
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