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Title

CfP: "New Directions in Transcultural Studies"

Date:

Date: 

5 June 2019

By October 31, 2019, the Cluster of Excellence "Asia and Europe in a Global Context" will have completed its run of some 12 years. Its main contribution to scholarship over this period has been the formulation of a transcultural perspective as a research outlook and method for the Humanities and Social Sciences. The intellectual spirit and transcultural agenda of the Cluster will continue to grow through the research and teaching activities of the Heidelberg Centre for Transcultural Studies (HCTS), the permanent institution that succeeds the Cluster.

To academically frame this continuation of the transcultural agenda at the moment of transition from Cluster to HCTS, the HCTS invites members of Heidelberg University to participate in the one-day conference "New Directions in Transcultural Studies" on Thursday, October 31, 2019. The HCTS welcomes contributions with a view to critically examining concepts and methods that have shaped the formation of the field of Transcultural Studies and its agenda over the past decade. We hope to carry the discussion further to point to new directions of growth – to fresh questions and impulses. We would encourage in particular those scholars who had participated in the activities of the Cluster Asia and Europe to join this shared conversation.

How can the transcultural approach be further refined? How can the nexus between transculturality and individual disciplines be further explored? What can individual disciplines do for Transcultural Studies and how can different disciplines benefit from Transcultural Studies? What are the possibilities and limits of a concept of culture beyond anthropocentrism? Where do we come up against the limits of a transcultural approach?

How useful is a transcultural perspective in bringing a fresh view to controversial debates of the present – such as the restitution cultural objects or understanding the rise of populism, to name only two examples.

The HCTS invites members of Heidelberg University to submit proposals for panels under the heading "New Directions in Transcultural Studies." Panel descriptions, which should not exceed two pages, should emphasize in what way the issues to be discussed during the panel are expected to broaden the transcultural agenda and to connect to new fields of research and teaching within the humanities and social sciences at Heidelberg University.

The HCTS is specifically looking for panel suggestions that include new or unusual formats of scholarly interaction and debate, formats that deviate from the common model of presentations followed by questions and answers.

Please send your application for a panel including the description of the theme, the format and envisaged contributors as one PDF of a maximum of two pages to
events@asia-europe.uni- heidelberg.de by June 17, 2019.