The graduate students in Hispanic, German, Italian and Russian Studies at the Department of Languages, Literatures, and Cultures/McGill University present a conference on the topics of violence and alterity.
What, when & where
“Violence and Alterity” – LLC – Graduate Student Conference
21-22 September 2018
Department of Languages, Literatures, and Cultures at McGill University .
Keynote speaker: Professor Eliot Borenstein, NYU
What does “difference” mean? The contemporary world is answering this question abruptly and violently, further marginalising the marginalised, expelling the expelled, harassing the harassed. The violence expressed by these answers calls for an urgent critical analysis of the relationship between violence and alterity, the way the former is hidden in languages, literatures and cultures, and the way that the latter is asked to conform to capitalist interpretations of subjectivity and objectivity.
Do the concepts of identity and difference still constitute an adequate theoretical framework for understanding social and cultural relations? Instead of evoking homogeneities, should we, as Natalie Zemon Davis put it, “identify the creative and disruptive presence of “the other”—the outsider, the stranger, the alien, the subversive, the radically different—in systems of power and thought”? (The Quest for Michel de Certeau). Or shall we move entirely towards alternative conceptualizations of these two poles, which try to go beyond the dichotomy of identity and difference? Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri’s definition of multitude is just an example of how collectivity must not be seen in terms of “sameness” and “otherness” but as “a multiplicity of singular forms of life [which] at the same time share a common global existence” (Multitude, 127). However naive or debatable this definition may be, it represents an attempt to raise awareness about our common being, against marginalisation, refusal (rejection?), and expulsion – in one word: violence. More specifically, how are the questions of violence and counterviolence, as well as their interaction, to be addressed and problematized? More precisely, how should one deal with progressive, internal, and therapeutic violence (Merleau-Ponty, Fanon) or violence that causes violence (Jaspers)?
The conference will take place at McGill University on the 21st and 22nd of September, 2018. Because this conference aims to facilitate reflection and cultural intervention in the debate on violence and alterity, the diversity of the contributors and their contributions is fundamental. We therefore invite scholars in Women’s and Gender Studies, Cultural Studies, Anthropology, Literature, Translation, Media Studies and other related programs to submit abstracts regarding, but not limited to, the following topics:
Topics of interest
• Political violence
• Violence and gender
• Violence and animals
• Violence and diversity
• Colonial violence
• Nonviolence/Pacifism
• Revolutionary Violence
• Violent resistance
• Structural violence
• Violence in Music
• Cathartic violence
Deadline & how to apply
The deadline for the submission of abstracts is August 1st, 2018. Please submit a 250 word abstract in either French or English explaining the topic and main arguments of the presentation. To submit your abstract, please send it by email to llcgrad2018@gmail.com.
Other info, Links & conditions
Organising committee
David Gosselin, Lara Harwood-Ventura, Teboho Makalima, Lisa Teichman, Paolo Saporito, Benjamin Sauvé, Lidia Ponce de la Vega, Gleb Vinokurov and Zyanya López Meneses
For any enquiries regarding the programme, please contact: llcgrad2018@gmail.com
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Photo by Alisa Mulder on Unsplash