Twitter Conferences and Conference Tweeting

Last updated on: June 3, 2019 at 9:17 pm By James F. McGrath

It was ironic but highly interesting to have two things pop up in my feed reader related to Twitter and conferences. One is a Twitter conference (about popular culture and pedagogy). The other is advice about tweeting decorum at face to face conferences. Here is the information about the Twitter conference: The first annual Popular Culture and Pedagogy Conference (http://popularcultureandpedagogy.org) will take place on November 11th, 2019. The theme of the conference will be: Using Popular Culture As A Tool... Read more

#CFP The Cultures of Reading in the Ancient Mediterranean World: Jews, Christians, Greeks, Romans

Last updated on: June 5, 2019 at 9:46 am By James F. McGrath

Chris Keith shared this call for papers: CALL FOR PAPERS: “The Cultures of Reading in the Ancient Mediterranean World: Jews, Christians, Greeks, Romans” Deadline for Abstracts: June 7, 2019 (note the update) Date of Workshop/Conference: October 28, 2019 Location: Duke University Ahmadieh Family Lecture Hall, Franklin Humanities Institute, Bay 4, Smith Warehouse Durham, NC 27708 Organizers: William A. Johnson (Duke University) Chris Keith (St Mary’s University, Twickenham) Rebecca Scharbach Wollenberg (University of Michigan) Confirmed Presenters and Participants: Kendra Eshleman... Read more

ReligionProf Podcast with Emily Swan

Last updated on: June 4, 2019 at 9:27 pm By James F. McGrath

The 40th episode of the ReligionProf Podcast features Emily Swan, who is a minister, an author, a Butler graduate, and a Doctor Who fan. And so you can see why we thought we should have a conversation! In the podcast we talk about those topics and many more, with particular focus on Pentecostalism and René Girard in places, as we get started by talking about the book Emily authored together with Ken Wilson, Solus Jesus: A Theology of Resistance. Some... Read more

Marveling Religion #CFP

Last updated on: May 22, 2019 at 11:00 pm By James F. McGrath

A. David Lewis shared this call for papers for a volume on “Marveling Religion” (with a pun that will hopefully be clear to all fans of comic books and superhero movies): Call for Papers: Marveling Religion: Critical Discourse and the Marvel Cinematic Universe Lexington Books (Initial Interest) Editors: Jennifer Baldwin and Daniel White Hodge Marveling Religion: Critical Discourse of the Marvel Cinematic Universe is an edited volume with interest in contracting and publishing from Lexington Books. It aims to explore central... Read more

Interview in Latest Issue of the Indianapolis Business Journal

Last updated on: June 3, 2019 at 9:26 am By James F. McGrath

The latest issue of the Indianapolis Business Journal is dedicated to the theme of innovation, and includes an interview with me about the work that Ankur Gupta and I are doing on the subject of artificial wisdom. In it I say things such as “There are some more present-day and near-future questions that I think fans of science fiction may be missing out on, that ethicists and computer scientists are not talking about quite as often as you might’ve expected.” I hope... Read more

#CFP for IJIA Special Issue: ‘dis-placed’ on Islam, Refugees, and Place

Last updated on: May 17, 2019 at 9:12 pm By James F. McGrath

This special issue of the International Journal of Islamic Architecture focuses on the spatial forms and urban consequences of forced migration. According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, the number of displaced persons has reached 70 million, the highest it has been since the end of World War II. The popular term ‘refugee crisis’ itself conceives of the refugee as a problem: an objectified person that is denied active agency and subjected to incarceration in various types of spaces of... Read more

Recalling Our Matrix

Last updated on: May 24, 2019 at 5:12 am By James F. McGrath

I missed the 20th anniversary of the movie The Matrix, which transformed science fiction, cinema, and my life in a variety of ways. Just as today’s university students are too young to remember the movie as anything other than a “classic” their parents or an older sibling introduced them to, many readers of this blog may no longer recall that the original title of my blog was Exploring Our Matrix. It began as a venue for exploring side interests such... Read more

DS9 #CFP

Last updated on: May 18, 2019 at 3:11 pm By James F. McGrath

This call for papers grabbed my attention immediately in a way that few do: CALL FOR PAPERS Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Sherry Ginn and Michael G. Cornelius, editors of the forthcoming Serializing the Apocalypse: Essays on the Never-Ending End of the World, announce their intent to publish a new collection of essays about Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. Although this series ended twenty years ago this year, a stand-alone examination of the series has not been published to date. On air from... Read more

Paradoxa #CFP – Comics and Graphic Novels

Last updated on: May 16, 2019 at 3:20 pm By James F. McGrath

A call for papers that I thought I should share: Paradoxa Volume 32 Comics and/or Graphic Novels Call for Papers (anticipated publication date: December, 2020) Editor: Vittorio Frigerio (Dalhousie University)/ This issue of Paradoxa will explore comics and/or graphic novels. American histories of comics have traditionally highlighted what they deem the indisputable U.S. birthplace of this mass-culture phenomenon, pointing to Richard F. Outcault’s Yellow Kid (1895) as the first comic ever produced. Alternately, the European view tends to favor the creation of this ever-popular medium... Read more

The Dynamics of Interfaith Podcast

Last updated on: May 22, 2019 at 11:10 pm By James F. McGrath

I decided to substitute this news for the usual Wednesday blog post about my own podcast. I am delighted to announce that Rachel Koehler’s podcast about the Center for Interfaith Cooperation in Indianapolis, “The Dynamics of Interfaith,” which I have mentioned here previously, is now live! You can learn more about it in the first teaser episode (as announced recently on the Center for Interfaith Cooperation website). Here are the first few episodes: You can find others on the podcast site.... Read more