Utopias/Dystopias: Modern Desires and Their Discontents

October 20th and 21st, 2006, Utrecht

I. WHAT
This seminar will address new global ideoscapes that emerge at the margins of the everyday life in various parts of the world. Critiquing Western Enlightenment narratives of a shared cosmopolitan future and the flattening of the world the seminar will engage the absurdities, contradictions and new inequities of contemporary globalization. It will not stop at critique but creatively develop an understanding of utopian visions that motivate marginalized peoples to change their world without losing sight of the dystopian possibilities of some dreams. The seminar will address historically situated conceptions and criticisms of the world from a wide variety of periods and places.

II. WHO AND WHEN
20 October
16:15 – Peter van der Veer (Utrecht University), inaugural lecture entitled:
Spirituality in Modern Society
21 October
10:00-10.45- Arjun Appadurai (New School, New York), Keynote: The Geography of Anger
10.45-11.15 Discussion
11.15-11.45 Achille Mbembe (Wiser Institute, Wits University), Notes on the Theologico-Political
11.45-12.15- Discussion
12.15-12.45 Nicholas Dirks (Columbia University), Sovereignty and Empire: Burke on
India
12.45-13.15- Discussion
13.15-14.15- Lunch.
14.15 –14.45- Jose Casanova (New School, New York)), Immigrant Religions in Secular Europe and in Christian America
14:45-15:15- Discussion
15.15-15.45 - Maha Yahya (MIT and American University Beirut), Spaces of Martyrdom
and Cities of Pleasure.
15:45-16:15- Discussion
16.15-16.45: Tea
16.45-17.15 Dilip Gaonkar (Northwestern University), The Politics of Finitude
17:15-17:45- Discussion
17.45-18.30 Reception

III. WHERE
The Seminar will take place in two different locations in the historical center of Utrecht. On the 20th the seminar will be held at the Academiegebouw of Utrecht University located at Domplein 29. It will continue on the 21st in the Utrecht University Law Department’s Raadzaal located at Achter Sint Pieter 200 (for directions please use www.anwb.nl or email katiemkirk@yahoo.com).

IV. HOW
For registration please send an email to utopiasdystopias@yahoo.com before the 10th of October. Please indicate what part of the seminar you are planning to attend. Your registration will be confirmed by email. Since seating is limited, you are urged to register as soon as possible.