Memes against Memes (Early Christianity Cracked)

Last updated on: December 4, 2019 at 9:46 pm By James F. McGrath

A while back Cracked offered 25 memes challenging popular misconceptions and misinformation held by people about history. Memes about memes, I suppose. A couple of them relate to early Christianity or church history. I’ve circulated memes about mythicism, fundamentalism, and a range of other topics. But there’s a question that doesn’t get explicitly asked often enough. How effective are memes at combatting memes? On the other hand, can anything other than a meme combat a meme? These aren’t easy questions to... Read more

#CFP Reading Black Mirror (and Black Mirror and Theology)

Last updated on: December 18, 2019 at 7:06 am By James F. McGrath

I’m excited that there’s a project related to theology and Black Mirror in the works. I probably should have turned down the invitation, as I have enough other things in the works. But that show is just so fantastic, I genuinely want to do this. I regularly cry or laugh with joy at episodes. While it is too late for you to join in with that project, here is another that you can still contribute to: Reading Black Mirror –... Read more

#CFP Robophilosophy Conference: Culturally Sustainable Social Robotics

Last updated on: December 16, 2019 at 10:35 am By James F. McGrath

International Research Conference Robophilosophy Conference: Culturally Sustainable Social Robotics August 18-21, 2020 Aarhus University, Denmark www.robophilosophy-conference.org Focus Once we place so-called ‘social robots’ into the social practices of our everyday lives and lifeworlds, we create complex, and possibly irreversible, interventions in the physical and semantic spaces of human culture and sociality. The long-term socio-cultural consequences of these interventions is currently impossible to gauge. While the use of ‘social’ robots in service functions, i.e. within the care-, education-, and entertainment sector,... Read more

Comics and Popular Arts Conference #CFP

Last updated on: December 9, 2019 at 7:33 pm By James F. McGrath

2020 Call for Papers / Proposals The Comics and Popular Arts Conference (CPAC) invites submissions for our 13th Annual meeting in Atlanta, Georgia, September 4-7, 2020. CPAC is an annual academic conference for the studies of comics and the popular arts, including science/speculative fiction and fantasy literature, film, and other media, comic books, manga, graphic novels, anime, gaming, etc., presented to a mixed audience of scholars and fans. The mission of CPAC is to promote scholarship on popular culture and to encourage the... Read more

Center for Health Humanities Fellowship Opportunity at MCPHS University

Last updated on: December 9, 2019 at 7:31 pm By James F. McGrath

This message came my way via Dien Ho on Facebook, drawn to my attention by A. David Lewis: Fellowship opportunities!!! After a ton of hard work, the Center for Health Humanities for which I serve as the chair can finally announce the launch of a fellowship for Health Humanities. If you are a scholar (affiliated or unaffiliated) and want to come to Boston to do some research, check us out. We pay $1,000 for a week and the fellowship can... Read more

Call for Applications for the 2020 Le Guin Feminist Science Fiction Fellowship

Last updated on: December 8, 2019 at 8:18 pm By James F. McGrath

Applications are now being taken for the 2020 Le Guin Feminist Science Fiction Fellowship to support special collections research in the UO Libraries. The fellowship is sponsored by UO Libraries’ Special Collections and University Archives at the University of Oregon. The intention of the Le Guin Feminist Science Fiction Fellowship is to encourage research within collections in the area of feminist science fiction. The UO Libraries Special Collections and University Archives (SCUA) houses the papers of authors Ursula K. Le... Read more

Graphic Canon and Chronology

Last updated on: December 12, 2019 at 1:12 pm By James F. McGrath

I enjoyed talking with A. David Lewis at ΘeoCon about comic books, graphic novels, and Canon: The Card Game. After I got back from that conference/convention, a book I put on hold at the public library: The Graphic Canon Volume 1. I think there are a variety of ways these seemingly disparate areas are intertwined, ranging from comparisons to the dynamics of canon definition and defense, to the provision of multimodal ways of interacting with texts as well as course content... Read more

Josiah: Children’s Bible Version

Last updated on: December 9, 2019 at 7:32 pm By James F. McGrath

I’ve blogged before about getting students to read texts as adults that they were previously exposed to as children. It often makes them acutely aware of the gulf between perceptions of what the Bible says and is they had growing up, and the reality of its contents. I’ve tended to use the stories of David and Samson to get at that point. Now, Fred Clark has done the same with Josiah. Here’s an extended excerpt. Click through to read the... Read more

This Is The Way (and Emails Instead of Meetings: #StarWars Edition)

Last updated on: December 10, 2019 at 5:29 am By James F. McGrath

I’m sure I’m not the only religion professor who is a Star Wars fan whose ears perked up when the Mandalorian said A former student of mine shared this meme with me, pointing out that the early Christians referred to their movement as “The Way”: Mike Duncan writes in the first post in a series of Star Wars emails: My favorite scene in the first Star Wars film is… the meeting chaired by Grand Moff Tarkin. Why? Well, it’s a... Read more

The Future of Gen Ed Recap, Part 5

Last updated on: December 9, 2019 at 7:29 pm By James F. McGrath

As I’ve been doing in past summaries of this event, let me start with recent news and other such sources that relate to this topic. First, an article in the Christian Science Monitor recently made the point: By its very nature liberal arts studies force students to dip into topics they’ve never thought about. Who might they become as adults? Their imaginations can be set free in unexpected ways, something that drilling down into a highly specialized STEM field too... Read more

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