EI-AAR Call for Proposals 2024
In light of this year’s presidential theme of “Violence, Nonviolence, and the Margin,” the EI unit invites papers for a joint session with the Quaker Studies Unit that considers how particular church communities (especially, but my no means exclusively, the historical “peace churches” of Friends, Mennonites, and Brethren) concretely enact their philosophies of nonviolence and principles of peacemaking in situations of violent conflict. In particular, we hope to consider how the varieties of Christian commitments to peace come to render lived or practical ecclesiologies that equip individuals and communities for civil resistance, intercommunal solidarity, or indeed martyrdom.
Additionally, the Ecclesiological Investigations Unit invites papers that explore practices of violence and nonviolence in relation to borders and global migration. Borders are spaces of death and life. Established identities are stretched, at times inciting conflict and at other times transformation. New identities emerge. How do communities of faith engage with the precarity of borders, be they physical borders or the borders we carry in our bodies? Possible topics may include: the ecclesiologies of migrants and/or refugees, church as migrant advocate or opponent, borders and indigenous identities of church members, the church’s response to national identity and nationalism tied to exclusion of ‘others’, and the ministry of faith communities at or near borders.
Our third session is pre-arranged, featuring the co-edited volume by Cristina Lledo Gomez, Agnes Brazal and Ma. Marilou Ibita , “500 Years of Christianity in the Philippines and the Global Filipino/a: Postcolonial Perspectives” published in February, 2024. Panelists will discuss issues around indigeneity, being Filipino/a, and Christian colonialism. Our panelists will be S. Lily Mendoza, Antonio Sison, Jamina Vesta Jugo, and James W. Perkinson.
Paper Proposals must be submitted by 29th of February, 2024. You will receive a letter regarding the outcome of your proposal by 29th of March, 2024. Submissions are via the AAR PAPERS system. You must be a member of the AAR and register for the conference by June 30, 2024 to present. Please send any queries to Cristina Lledo Gomez at cgomez@csu.edu.au
This year’s AAR conference will be held in San Diego, California, between November 23 and 26, 2024. For more on the AAR, go to https://aarweb.org/AARMBR/
The members of the EI-AAR team are:
Co-Chairs
Dr. Cristina Lledo Gomez, Senior Lecturer, BBI-The Australian Institute of Theological Education
Prof. Dennis Doyle, Professor Emeritus, University of Dayton, Ohio
Steering Commitee
Dr. Aaron Hollander, Associate Director and Editor of Ecumenical Trends, Graymoor Ecumenical and Interreligious Institute
Britta Meiers Carlson, PhD student in Practical Theology, Boston University
Dr. Jason Welle, Assistant Professor of Islamic Studies, Boston College
Dra. Sandra Arenas, Dean of the Faculty of Religious Sciences and Philosophy, Universidad Catolica de Temuco, Chile
Dr. Scott MacDougall, Associate Professor of Theology, Church Divinity School of the Pacific