I Desire Mercy Not Sacrifice

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Desiring Mercy Not Sacrifice

A cross-cultural dialogue imagining a political and symbolic world based on life not death: Mercy not Sacrifice.

Trinity College, November 1st 7:30 Distinguished International Inter-disciplinary Panel

The international language of sacrifice and martyrdom permeates religious and political institutions, and has been culturally enforced in countless ways.  However, the great religious leaders and prophets - radical cultural critics - insistently cried for mercy not sacrifice. Such prophets did not foretell, but imagined and ensured a better future for all of life.

Standing in that tradition, and at an interdisciplinary level, cultural theorists seek to forge new symbols, theoretical resources and spiritual and artistic practices based on life and mercy rather than on death and sacrifice. They are asking - how do we challenge the traditions whereby we constantly need to achieve our identities at the expense of victims?  Do political and religious systems always have to function this way?

This event features a panel of internationally distinguished speakers who will address the topic of Mercy from the perspectives of art, cultural theory, eco-feminism, theology, spirituality, anthropology and economics.

Speakers

Professor Bracha L. Ettinger: Artist. Psychoanalyst. Clinical Psychologist. Marcel Duchamp Professor of Psychoanalysis and Art at the Media & Communications Division, European Graduate School Learn More>

Professor Griselda Pollock: Professor of the Social and Critical Histories of Art; Director of CentreCATH at University of Leeds;  Co-Director of the Centre for Cultural Studies; Executive Member of Centres for Jewish Studies, and Interdisciplinary Gender Studies. Learn More>

Dr. Anne Primavesi: A theologian who has published groundbreaking studies on the theological implications of James Lovelock's scientific Gaia theory, as seen from an ecofeminist perspective. Learn More>

Professor Peggy Reeves Sanday: Professor of Anthropology at the University of Pennsylvania, one of founders of the anthropology of feminist anthropology, sex and gender and author of several foundational books. Academic promoter of public interest and public feminisms in anthropology Learn More>

Dr. Genevieve Vaughan. Author, theorist and activist of the Gift Economy (Homo Donans as opposed to Homo Economicus) a counter-discourse that considers mothering as a mode of distribution that coexists with or lies beneath the market economy, and challenges the inevitability of patriarchy and global capitalism. Learn More>

Chairperson: Dr. Mary Condren: Director, Institute for Feminism and Religion; Research Associate, Centre for Gender and Women’s Studies, Trinity College Dublin.

Venue: Trinity College Dublin, Edmund Burke Theatre, Arts Building (Nassau St. Entrance)
Date and Time: Thursday, Nov. 1st  7:30 pm
Fee:   €10/ €5 concessions (students and social welfare recipients)
Registration: No advance registration. Please pay at door.

Sponsors: Centre for Gender and Women’s Studies, Trinity College Dublin, and the Institute for Feminism and Religion.

Full Speaker Details

This event in being held in conjunction with our conference, Challenging Cultures of Death: Mercy Not Sacrifice.
See http://www.instituteforfeminismandreligion.org.  November 2nd  - 4th 2007 Trinity College