Conference archive

Details of conferences that have been previously organised and hosted by Theology and Religious Studies since the academic year of 2007/08 are available for viewing.  Please feel free to browse for further details:

• Authority in Buddhism and Christianity: 11–15 June 2009
• Jonathan Edwards and Scotland Conference: 30-31 March 2009
• Paul, Political Fidelity and the Philosophy of Alain Badiou: a Discussion of Incident at Antioch: 13-14th February 2009
• Art, Religion, Identity Symposium: 23-24 September 2008
• Memory, Mourning & Landscape: 9th June 2008 
• Modern Shi-ism & Identity: 25-27th April 2008
• Women, Word & Sacrament: 27th Feb 2008
• Sexing the Text: 7th Dec 2007

Art, Religion, Identity Symposium

by Alana Vincent

Nearly eighty delegates participated in the Art, Religion, Identity symposium held 23-24 September, in honour of Glasgow artist Hannah Frank's 100th birthday. Keynote lectures from Professor Shulamit Reinharz, Founding Director of the Women's Studies Research Center and the Hadassah-Brandeis Institute at Brandeis University, Professor Melissa Raphael, of the University of Gloucestershire, and Professor Laura Levitt, of Temple University, all addressed the role of the visual in the formation of Jewish identity. A plenary panel on the 23rd, including Glasgow's own Dr. Heather Walton, Dr. Susannah Heschel of Dartmouth University, and Dr. Heather Lynch of the Tramway Art Centre, addressed the broader issue of the role of the creative arts in the formation and transformation of religious identity, a theme that carried through to Dr. Richard Holloway's lecture on the 24th, entitled 'Art as Creative Dissonance'. A second plenary panel, including David Glasser of the Ben Uri Gallery, Dr. Alison Jasper of the University of Stirling, and Professor Eileen Yeo of Strathclyde University, also carried forth these themes.

Forty papers were presented in parallel sessions over the two day period. Some provided context to Hannah Frank's work, either directly,or by examining other Jewish artists working in the UK during the same time period. Others more broadly addressed issues arising from the conference theme, with perspectives from disciplines as broad as literature, anthropology, and philosophy, with topics ranging from representations of the Virgin Mary to the role of art in constructing national identities. Students and staff from Glasgow University were well represented, with seven papers coming from within the Department of Theology and Religious Studies, although the symposium was hardly an exclusively local event, attracting numerous delegates from continental Europe and North America.

In addition to the fine quality of papers and interdisciplinary conversation, the symposium also provided a valuable opportunity for postgraduate training. Thanks to the generous support of the University Principal, bursaries were provided to five students from the Graduate School of Arts and Humanities who performed in-situ peer evaluation of papers, to evaluate their suitability for publication. The students approached the exercise with great enthusiasm, and plans for publication are now well underway.

The highlight of the two days was an evening reception at the Scottish Parliament on the 23rd, hosted by Jim Tolson MSP.

Memory, Mourning & Landscape

by Alana Vincent

The Memory, Mourning and Landscape symposium was held on 9 June 2008.  Attendance was 60 people during the day, with numbers swelling to 80 for the evening lecture, 'Memory, Mourning and the Landscape of the Two World Wars', delivered by Professor Jay Winter of Yale University. 

Plenary papers were given by Avril Maddrell from the University of the West of England, and Professor Bridget Fowler from the University of Glasgow's Department of Sociology. Plenary presentations were also delivered by representatives of the Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland and the Imperial War Museum North. 

Thirty-two papers were delivered in parallel sessions, with presenters travelling from as far away as Australia to participate. There was a strong interdisciplinary dimension to the conversations arising from these papers, with contributions from fields as diverse as law, sociology, geography, literature, history, archaeology, visual art, linguistics, and archive studies, as well as a strong representation from theology and religious studies. Verbal and written feedback from participants has been extremely positive.

Modern Shi'ism and Identity

Women, Word & Sacrament

by Penny Stuart

In May 1968, the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland finally responded positively to a 1963 petition that women be admitted to the ministry of word and sacrament within the Church of Scotland. 

On Wednesday 27th February 2008 the Centre for Advanced Studies in Christian Ministry of the Department of Theology and Religious Studies (with generous support from the Church of Scotland Ministries Council), hosted a day Conference to celebrate and mark the 40th anniversary of the ordination of women to the ministry of word and sacrament in the Church of Scotland and to reflect more widely on the ministry of women in the Church.

The conference was very well attended, seeming particularly to catch the interest of women in ministry of various sorts. The day began with Dr. Lesley Orr tracing the historical development of the ministry of women and Rev. Dr. Anne Logan reviewing some statistical research on current trends. Bonnie Miller-McLemore, Professor of Pastoral Theology and Counselling at Vanderbilt University then delivered the Robertson lecture, 'Practicing What We Preach: The Case of Women in Ministry' to a packed hall. There was a wide range of workshop choices for the rest of the day including: exploration of research on women in ministry, 'preaching like a woman', exploring liturgy and worship resources produced by women, the sacredness of the body and relationships, reviewing the 'evangelical perspective' on the ordination of women, and the realities and challenges of the experience of being a woman minister today. The day also provided the opportunity to remember and honour some of those whose persistence had made such a significant change possible.  Celebration and thanksgiving continued as the day concluded with worship in the University Chapel, at which the preacher was Rt. Rev Sheilagh Kesting, the then Moderator of the Church of Scotland; the first ordained woman to be so.

This was a very stimulating day which brought together both those who study and teach theology in an academic context and many who are present or past 'practitioners' of ministry. There was real appreciation of this opportunity, hosted and organised by the department, to meet, to share experiences, to renew old acquaintances, to gain new insights, to celebrate what women bring to ministry.

'Thank you for a fabulous conference'             '...an excellent day' 

'I felt really fired up by the end of it all' 

Some papers from the conference are to be published in the journal 'Practical Theology' April 2009.

Sexing the Text

The Sexing the Text conference was held at the University of Glasgow on 7 December, 2007. It was hosted by the Centre for the Study of Literature, Theology and the Arts at Glasgow University and Stirling University. It was sponsored by the journals Literature and Theology and Theology and Sexuality.

The day conference explored the significance of gendered reading and writing practices in the interdisciplinary study of literature, religion and culture, providing a forum for colleagues from across the disciplines to consider and develop this dynamic area of study by bringing a number of strategies to bear on the questions of textuality and gender. The keynote speaker was Björn Krondorfer, Professor of Religious Studies (St Mary's College, Maryland), former chair of the 'Men's Studies in Religion Panel' of the American Academy of Religion and editor of Men’s Bodies, Men's Gods and Body and Bible. The afternoon plenary sessions were devoted to a panel of papers by Hugh Pyper, Lynn Robson and Heather Walton followed by the launch of two books by Heather Walton, Literature, Theology and Feminism and Imagining Theology. In explicating the tangled web of various subject positions, appropriations, textualities and sexualities, the conference papers underscored the ethical imperative behind such work. Drawing together one of the oldest 'interdisciplines' – women’s studies – and contemporary debates on authorship, gender and religion, the 'Sexing the Text' conference demonstrated the fruitfulness of interdisciplinary activity.

The conference was well attended by postgraduates, junior and senior academics from a number of different disciplines from around the UK and was a great success for the department. A number of papers from the conference were published in a special issue of Literature and Theology, vol. 22, issue 3, published in September 2008.

A more detailed conference report, which was published as part of the first issue of The Kelvingrove Review, can be read by clicking here.