Levinas Centenary Conference

Posted on | March 23, 2006 | No Comments

Emmanuel Levinas Centenary Conference: Levinas Today
The University of Queensland: 30 June – 1 July 2006
The Powerhouse, Brisbane Australia

Third Announcement: 22 March 2006
Extended Title Deadline 30 March 2006

Speakers
David L. Clark: Professor in the Department of English and Cultural Studies and Associate Member of the Health Studies Program at McMaster University in Hamilton, Canada.
Ghassan Hage: Associate Professor and Chair of the Department of Anthropology at The University of Sydney, Australia.

In 2006 we celebrate the centenary of Emmanuel Levinas’ birth. To mark this occasion, the European Philosophy Research Group (EPRG) at the University of Queensland is hosting an international conference entitled “Levinas Today”, contributing to a series of world-wide events designed to commemorate Levinas’ work.

Born in Kaunas, Lithuania in 1906 to Jewish parents, Levinas initially studied at Strasbourg, and then later at Freiburg where he encountered the phenomenological thought of both Edmund Husserl and Martin Heidegger. Heidegger’s Sein und Zeit (1927) was to have a lasting influence on his thought, though in a rather creative fashion. He was, along with others such as Maurice Merleau-Ponty, responsible for bringing phenomenological themes to prominence in the French philosophical world where he worked until 1995. Levinas’ work ultimately challenged Heidegger’s philosophy, and indeed the Western tradition as he saw it, for neglecting the fundamentally ethical dimension of human being. Today, his work on ethics as first philosophy and our ethical responsibility for the other remains an incisive critique of Western ways of being. Levinas reminds us that traditional ontology reduces the all important ethical relation with the other to a theoretical or cognitive relation to self. His notion of the “face to face” encounter seeks to undo this by foregrounding ethics as first philosophy. Simply put, we come into being in and through our relation with the other.

As the title of this conference suggests, we plan an engagement with Levinas’ work that is grounded in contemporary ethical issues, inviting contributions from critical scholars working both within and without the borders of philosophy as it is traditionally defined. Professor David L. Clark (McMaster University), and Associate Professor Ghassan Hage (University of Sydney) will be among the invited speakers, with others to be confirmed.

There will be no parallel sessions. The conference consists of two days of shared dialogue, with generous time devoted to discussion. Our hope is to provide the depth and intimacy required to engage ethically with Levinas’ work today. Ideally, we will publish the outcome of the conference (both papers and discussion) in an edited publication. We have chosen the Brisbane Powerhouse as the venue for the conference. It is a dynamic contemporary cultural site, positioned alongside the Brisbane River, directly connected to New Farm Park, and easily accessible (by Citycat ferry, bus, car or bike) from the city centre.

For those with children, it is exciting to note that the Powerhouse will also be host to a number of children’s activities as part of the Powerkidz Festival (26 June – 9 July 2006). Details soon to be released on the Powerhouse web site.

For further information, or submission of titles and abstracts, email levinas@uq.edu.au.

Dates:
Titles of papers/presentations: Thursday 30 March 2006
Abstracts (200-400 words): Tuesday 18 April 2006

Conference Convenors:
Dr. Michelle Boulous Walker
Dr. Angela Hirst
Tel: +61-7-3365 2616
Email: levinas@uq.edu.au

The EPRG is a group of scholars working in modern and contemporary European philosophy between CHED and the School of HPRC at The University of Queensland, Brisbane Australia.

Category: Academia, Events, Out in Vegas

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