Efforts to discover and explain the evolutionary origins of Homo sapiens sapiens have led to a wide variety of hypotheses based on attempts to define what is particularly human about human beings. All of these attempts to understand the origins of humanity have raised fundamental questions about the complex relationship between cognition and culture. Are they two sides of the same coin? Or is culture epiphenomenal to other more basic processes? And how does religion fit into the picture?
Together with the development of symbolic thinking, the role of material culture, the role of written language and abstract thought in the development of religious systems, the rise of symbolic identities and so on, are all central areas of competence in the humanities and social sciences. Cognitive scientists are now providing us with important insights on phylogenetic and ontogenetic processes, and we would do well to listen to them. Together with insights from the humanities and social sciences on the origins, development and maintenance of complex semiotic, social and cultural systems, a general picture of what is particularly human about humans should emerge. Reflections on the preconditions for symbolic and linguistic competence and practice are now within our grasp.

• Environmental Sustainability
• Cultural Sustainability
• Economic Sustainability
• Social Sustainability

• Race and multiculturalism
• Being, embodiment and the feminine
• Equality and the political
• Power and empowerment
• Democracy and the agon
• Colonialism and neo-colonialism
• Nihilism, culture and value
• Classicism and modernity

• Theory
• Film and theatre
• Text analysis
• Iconic signs

• Translation as personal expression; issues of subjectivity in creative/poetic translations and the place of translation in the work of poets-translators; translation fostering identity/subjectivity within literary systems – for instance issues of influence as issues of translation
• Problematic types of translation; e.g. self-translation, pseudotranslation
• translation as auto/biography or self-writing, and/or instances of translation in life-writing
• How are historical/cultural, sexual, collective or other identities transferred or transformed through translation?
• Psychological/cognitive contexts of the translator and/or psychology of the writer turning to translation
• Socio-political, ideological contexts of translation. Can translation be both involved and ethical/responsible?
• Relating translational processes/products/contexts to considerations of identity and identification
• The translation of marginal and/or minority communities – translating as voicing
• How does globalisation provide new challenges for the translation of alternative/subversive/dissident narratives?
• How does or can translation engage with textual markers of identity (e.g. dialects) in circumstances such as the ones outlined above?
• Visible and invisible translators. How can translation theory, from DTS to Derrida and interpreting studies engage with issues of identity?

Zionist efforts to reshape Jewish identity and to construct a national culture have been the focus of considerable attention in recent years. Few attempts have been made, however, to examine the production of this culture as a broad interlinking of haute- and popular cultural practices, political structures, legal institutions, medical associations, economic infrastructures, and more. The relationship between this undertaking and the competing efforts of rival Jewish national ideologies – such as territorialism, autonomism, bundism and folkism – has likewise been largely overlooked.
This conference will seek to initiate a new interdisciplinary exploration of the Zionist cultural project at the nexus of national vision and public phenomenon and in its dialogue and competition with other Jewish nationalist undertakings.

La philosophie d'Emmanuel Levinas a emporté une repensée foncière de l'être, de ses catégories et de son rang. C'est une conception inédite et inouïe de la subjectivité qui en est l'enjeu, en tant qu'elle se structure comme ayant à répondre d'une responsabilité éthique irréductible à ce qu'avaient déterminé les philosophies morales et politiques sous ce vocable. Le colloque voudrait évoquer les »questions« qui viennent après la »réponse«: la nature et le statut de l'éthique selon Levinas, les modalités de son articulation avec la Justice et les requêtes du Tiers, l'exercice même de la philosophie, sa pratique et son écriture, après le dé-dire lévinassien. Il se demandera à quel avenir peut bien être promise une pensée si radicale et si audacieuse, d'un siècle à l'autre.

• Gender and the Media
• Re-visiting the Media/Cultural Imperialism Debate
• Media Law / Censorship and Regulation in the Media
• New vs Traditional Media
• Internet Studies
• ICT for Development
• Media Industries and Corporate Communication
• Media Education
• Media Networking
• Representation of Asian Identities in the Foreign Media
• Language, Rhetoric and Identity in the Media

This international conference will bring together philosophers and social scientists involved in research on theories of intergenerational justice.

• Aboriginal legal traditions, both historical and in current practice
• The tension between pluralist visions of justice and the rule of law in the administration of justice
• The role of self-determination in Aboriginal justice and law
• The Saskatchewan Commission on First Nations and Métis People and Justice Reform (and other Aboriginal justice commission reports) as blueprints for coordinating Aboriginal conceptions of justice with the Canadian justice system
• Responding more effectively to needs and values of Aboriginal communities within the justice system, including descriptions and assessments of existing innovative programs
• Comparative perspectives on efforts to integrate Indigenous conceptions of justice with public government justice institutions and the legal process

The Symposium is looking for papers from Western and non-Western traditions that seek to address the relevance of philosophy to live questions pertaining to man, society and nature. The papers should focus on specific issues and problems within any of the traditions. We are also interested in papers that will attempt comparative analyses of the underpinnings of the various philosophies or of concepts within the various regional philosophies. The Symposium also welcomes papers of a theoretical nature in the disciplines that share a boundary with philosophy, disciplines such as, critical theory, cultural studies, law, linguistics, mathematics and natural sciences, medicine, political theory, theology, etc.

• How do we understand the phenomena of, and relations between, globalization and resistance?
• What implications might the one have for the other in discourses committed to articulating viable theories of political praxis?
• Is globalization something to be resisted or a form of political resistance?
• Which among our political theories-neo-liberalist, Marxist, anarchist, and so on-appear to be most viable viable in a globalized world?
• How do philosophical concepts-such as the bio-political, the juridical, deterritorialization, hegemony, the state of exception, the multitude, etc.–help us to articulate theories of resistance and responses to globalization?
• How has globalization impacted the discourses of race, gender, sexual orientation, and class?
• How does one become a citizen in a globalized world?

• What groups and forces shaped the struggle for human rights?
• How was human rights defined and redefined over the course of the twentieth century?
• Where did its pursuit succeed, where did it fail, and why?

Federalism in Canada enables Peoples and provinces to live together. For many, it is a principle conducive to self-government, while for others it should strive to achieve efficiency. While there have been numerous recent debates on improving federalism, asymmetrical federalism is at the forefront of discussion. For some, federalism is already asymmetric; for others a formal recognition of this asymmetry in needed, especially with regard to Québec, to improve the relationship of the many Canadian components. Some see it as the end of Canada. Québec is a major player in the debate. And while francophone minorities support federalism, they are reticent to back asymmetry. Is asymmetrical federalism incompatible with the recognition of the rights non territorial minorities? How can these minorities position themselves in this debate? Finally, how can the Canadian debate on federalism benefit from international comparison, and/or be seen as a case study for the examination of the future of non territorial minorities?

In an effort to facilitate a wide-raning and interdisciplinary conversation about empire, scholars working in a variety of disciplines are invited to submit papers. We hope participants will address the issues of empire from antiquity to postmodernity, on every continent and from many cultures, including topics such as diaspora, immigration, reverse colonization, imperialism and visual culture, gender and empire, the empire in popular culture, and the construction of national, religious and ethnic identities.

Canada's multicultural situation raises many questions to be discussed in our conference: to which extent is there a possible convergence between the original models (the orality of Natives, the Euro-centrism of French and English modes of thinking and writing), and the others imported from Asia, the West Indies, Africa.)? The role of the multiculturalist policies implemented in the 1960s will be considered as well as the limits of this state-imposed pluralism. Should a recentring be called for, eventually leading to a degree of homogeneization and assimilation to a mainstream mode of thinking and writing? Or, on the contrary, should difference, exposed by Canadian pluralism, be freely asserted and seen as a dynamic construction through cross-cultural interactions, as an ongoing process not only compatible with but beneficial to the social, economic, political, literary, artistic evolution of Canada? Thus making divergence one of the major assets of the latter.

The conference will examine how states and societies manage the social and political complexity of globalisation, religious diversity and cultural pluralism, and hence respond to diasporic cultures, conflicting religious identities, cultures and communities. The conference will consider such issues as emerging religious conflicts related to fundamentalism, the evolution of citizenship and human rights, the creation of nation-state identities and the sources of both religious tolerance and violence.

Is the North-South gap receding or becoming more entrenched? What does it take to move from the South to the North? Are parts of the South descending into reinforcing traps of poverty, civil war, and state failures? To what extent is North-South conflict manifested in non-state terrorism? Is the North likely to become increasingly preemptive in its attacks on perceived Southern threats? If so, how is the South likely to fight back? Do North-South antagonisms reflect in some way the celebrated clash of civilizations thesis? Or, are we simply exaggerating the extent to which a new structural cleavage will predominate in coming years and/or how we might best interpret it? These are only some of the questions that are likely to dominate international relations discourse in the decades to come. We invite ISA members to tackle these questions, and others like them, for the San Diego meeting.

The Convention welcomes proposals on a wide range of topics related to national identity, nationalism, ethnic conflict, state-building and the study of empires in Central/Eastern Europe, the former Soviet Union, Eurasia, and adjacent areas. Disciplines represented include political science, history, anthropology, sociology, economics, geography, socio-linguistics, psychology, and related fields. The Convention will feature a section devoted to theoretical approaches to nationalism, from any of the disciplines listed above.

• Islam and Globalization
• Islamic Movements in a Globalized World
• Islam, Nation-state and Secularism
• Islam and West: Dialogue vs Conflict of Civilizations
• Roots of Dialogue and Conflict in Religious Texts
• Islam and Modernity
• Islam and Science
• Women in Muslim Societies
• Negotiating Religious and National Identities
• Case Study on Islam and Globalization: Fethullah Gulen's Movement

This conferences intends to explore questions pertaining to the cultural, intellectual, historical, social, and political experiences of African descent and African origin people in the U.S. and the broader African Diaspora in relation to quest for human rights.

• The Narration of Trauma as the Predicate to Humanitarian Law
• Trials and the Making of Collective Memory
• Trials of History; Trials in History
• Eichmann and Afterwards: Legal Institutions and Legal Sensibilities
• Humanitarian Law and Identity Creation
• Jurisprudence post-Eichmann

• Constructing and Changing National Pasts
• Myths and Memories of the Nation
• New Nations and their Pasts
• National Pasts and War Memories
• Nations as National Heritage
• Present Representations of the National Past – Music, Art, Literature and Monuments

The conference will bring together scholars/researchers from a variety of disciplines to address the sacrosanct and universal principle of human rights.

• Race-making and blackness
• Blackness in a European context
• Visual depictions of blackness
• International performance of blackness
• Blackness and the museum
• Blackness within the African diaspora
• Legal constructions of blackness
• Blackness and the problem of history
• Afro-Latino/a or Black European consciousness
• Dance and the black body

• Feminism and Governance
• Conflict, Gender, Violence, and Memory in Social and State Reconstruction
• Feminism, Citizenship and Diversity

Submissions are invited for papers on any aspect of East Asian thought, as well as comparative papers that deal with significant issues in East Asian thought. Participants from any geographic area and from any discipline are welcome. Following the first two highly successful conferences, we hope to continue fostering dialogue among scholars of East Asian thought.