A two-day connections conference funded by the British Society of Aesthetics to be held on Thursday, 20th February 2025 (9:30-18:45) and Friday, 21st February 2025 (9:30-18:00).
Call for Panel Presentations
In her recent work, On Violence and On Violence Against Women, Jacqueline Rose writes that ‘if we are to face down the reality of violence in our times, violence thrust deep into the life of the mind, this is…the only place to begin. ’ The ‘this’ being referred to as the starting point is not, as it happens, law or new national policies, but rather contemporary experimental fiction. Building on, and extending, Rose’s claim, this conference aims to explore the philosophy of gender-based violence in connection with the fields of aesthetic theory and practice. It seeks to create connections between those working in aesthetics and on gender-based violence from diverse philosophical perspectives.
The overarching question for the conference is: What is the role and value of aesthetics in understanding, resisting, and transforming violence against women? The organisers are seeking proposals from individuals working in the field of aesthetics to present a paper as part of a panel session. They are particularly interested in receiving proposals on the following topics:
• Aesthetics and the Politics of Gender-Based Violence
Papers addressing this theme could explore, for example, invisible or misrepresented facets of political violence in established and transitional democracies; explorations of artistic activism; environmental, gender-based, and economically influenced violence; or papers exploring theories of conflictual pluralism and decolonial feminism.
• Aesthetics and Education Against Gender-Based Violence
Papers addressing this theme could explore, for example, formal and informal uses of the arts as forms of education against violence; modalities of aesthetic education (e.g., reading/writing) as responses to experiences of gender-based violence; papers drawing on aesthetic/literary theories to explore the phenomenon of gender-based violence in education; the arts as forms of resistance to the mis-education of rationalized policies and strategies for tackling gender-based violence in society.
Format: Proposals should comprise a provisional title and abstract of no more than 500 words.
Deadline: Please submit your proposal by Friday, 13th September.
Submission Process: Please submit your proposal via the online form here.
emma.williams@voix.uk
leilaosman@voix.uk
Selection Process: The conference organisers will make a selection from the proposals, and the authors selected will be notified by the end of October 2024.
Further Inquiries: Please contact the conference organizers, Leila Osman (L.Osman.14@ucl.ac.uk) and Emma Williams (e.williams.1@warwick.ac.uk).
The organisers highly encourage early-career researchers to participate in this call, and applicants must have an aesthetic background to qualify.
