Religion, Identity, & Reconciliation

Emory University, Graduate Division of Religion

Graduate Student Religion Conference

March 29-31, 2001

D. Abbot Turner Center, Turner Village

1703 Clifton Rd.

For more information, please contact: 

Jennifer Saunders (jsaunde@learnlink.emory.edu), Conference Coordinator

Melissa Johnston-Barrett, (mjohnst@emory.edu), 404-325-7787, Conference Co-Director

Lisa W. Crothers, (lcrothe@emory.edu), 404-939-0574, Conference Co-Director

Biographies and Abstracts of all Participants

Schedule

Thursday March 29^th

4:00 pm	Inaugural Address ¨ “Monuments and Fragments: Religion, Identity and Spaces of Reconciliation,” David Chidester (University of Capetown) ¨ Respondent: David Little (Harvard University)
6:00 pm	Dinner
7:00–9:30 pm	Panel One - Reconciling History in Communal Identity ¨ Moderator/Respondent, Jason Mahn (Emory University, Religion) ¨ “God is in the Details: Poles, Jews, and an Ethnographic Approach to Reconciliation,” Erica Lehrer (University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Cultural Anthropology) ¨ “America Here and Over There: Unity and Identity in Twentieth-Century Methodist Reconciliation,” Morris Davis (Drew University, Caspersen School of Graduate Studies) ¨ “Bodies of Knowledge: The Tug of War over Native American Dead,” Erik Davis (University of Chicago, Religion)
Friday March 30^th
8:00 am	Breakfast
9:00-11:30 am	Panel Two - Political Conflict and Religious Rivalries ¨ Moderator/Respondent, Kevin Jaques (Emory University, Religion)  ¨ “Constructing a Multi-Religious Identity in Bosnia,” Tatta Yukie (Harvard University, Religion) ¨ “Establish No Religion: Moral Absolutes and Liberal Pedagogy in Mobile, Alabama,” Robert Daniel Rubin (Indiana University, History) ¨ “The Politics of Reconciliation: Religious Rivalry and Camaraderie in Post-Reform Indonesia,” Dicky Sofjan (Northeastern University, Political Science) ¨ “Group-Identity Conflict in Northern Ireland: Nonviolent Strategies for Effecting Positive Social Change,” Heidi Marie Tauscher (Emory University, Candler School of Theology)
11:30 am-1:00 pm	Lunch Emory Conference Center
1:00-3:00 pm	Panel Three - Creating Identities through Institutional Practices and Discourses ¨ Moderator/Respondent, Kaia Stern (Emory University, Religion) ¨ “The Way of the Cross: Religion and White Identity in Civil Rights Era Mississippi, 1954-66,” Carolyn Dupont (University of Kentucky, History) ¨ “Beyond Racial Incommensurabilities in American Revivalism,” Daniel Ramirez (Duke University, Religion) ¨ “Confessions as Testimony or Test in the Reformed Traditions,” Ted Smith (Emory University, Religion)
4:00-6:00 pm	Panel Four - Feminism, Womanism, and Reconciliation: Bodies, Ritual and Race ¨ Moderator/Respondent, Meghan Sweeney (Emory University, Religion) ¨ “Re-imagining Ritual: Ecofeminist Power and the Practice of Reconciliation,” Julie J. Kilmer (Chicago Theological Seminary, Theology) ¨ “Can’t We All Just Get Along? Womanist reflections on the myth of reconciliation,” Rev. C. L. Nash (Virginia Union University, Theology and Tangaza College, Nairobi, Kenya, Anthropology) ¨ “Daring the Divide: An Examination of White Identity in Feminist/Womanist Theological Conversations,” Sara Moslener (Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary)
7:15 pm	Graduate Student Party Susan Hylen’s and Ted Smith’s
Saturday March 31^st
8:00 am	Breakfast
9:00-11:30 am	Panel Five - Group Identities: Defining Ourselves and the Other ¨ Moderator/Respondent, Justin Holcomb (Emory University, Religion) ¨ “Reconciliation Up Close and Personal: Living Out the ‘Formula of Agreement,’” Thomas Farrington (St. John’s University, Theology and Religious Studies) ¨ “Circling Back with Fresh Eyes: The Influence of Tibetan Buddhist Practices from Nyingma Institute upon Christian Instruction in Prayer and Peacemaking at Shalem Institute for Spiritual Formation,” Sandra Costen Kunz (Princeton Theological Seminary) ¨ “Re-membering the Tsar: Burying the Past and Building the Future,” Karin Almquist (Columbia University, Religious Studies) ¨ “Reading Scriptures across Religious Lines in Colonial India: Interreligious Conflict and Reconciliation, and the Intrareligious Contestation of Identity,” David Vishanoff (Emory University, Religion)
11:30 am-1:00 pm	Lunch Emory Conference Center
1:00-3:00 pm	Panel Six - Literature as a Constructive Voice in Religious and Communal Identity ¨ Moderator/Respondent, Bryan Whitfield (Emory University, Religion) ¨ “Reconciliation: Cosmic Indicative and Earthly Imperative in the Book of Ephesians,” J. R. Daniel Kirk (Duke University, Religion) ¨ “Literature of Reconciliation: the religious and ethical dimensions of the contemporary Sri Lankan Novel,” Dominic Doyle (Boston College, Theological Ethics) ¨ “Coleridge’s Aesthetics of Reconciliation: Imagination, Power, and the Slave Trade,” Joel S. Harter (University of Chicago, Religion)
4:00-6:00 pm	Closing Summary ¨ David Chidester, University of Capetown ¨ David Little, Harvard University
7:00 pm	Student-Faculty Dinner Laurie Patton’s

Sponsored by The Department of Religion, the Graduate Division of Religion, and the Office of the Provost, Emory University and The Wabash Center for Teaching Theology and Religion.