A Conference with Richard Kearney
11th January 2022
University of Humanistic Studies, Utrecht
‘God is a shout in the street’. This remarkable image of God is discussed by Simon Critchley and Richard Kearney in the latter’s book Re-Imagining the Sacred (2015): a series of philosophical conversations. With Critchley, and with other influential thinkers on the meaning of religion in the secular age, like Charles Taylor, Catherine Keller and Gianni Vattimo, Kearney explores the possibility of a ‘faith of the faithless’. Although many people do not believe in an existing God anymore, images and imaginations of God still have a great impact on our culture.
Are we ‘returning to God after God’, as Kearney suggests in an earlier book, Anatheism (2012)? And if so, what does that imply for our imaginations of the human, of ourselves? How could a re-imagining of the sacred connect with a re-imagining of the human?
In ‘Re-Imagining the Human’, a seminar at the University of Humanistic Studies, and in a public lecture with the same title, Kearney will share these questions with us.
The Irish philosopher Richard Kearney is Charles Seelig professor in philosophy at Boston College, USA. Being a leading theorist on imagination and narrativity, Kearney’s work is inspired by numerous continental thinkers, like Paul Ricoeur and Jacques Derrida. He locates his studies in hermeneutics, phenomenology and deconstruction. His first major publication was The Wake of Imagination (1988), in which he investigates the history of imagination from Judaism and Antiquity to late modernity with its emerging visual culture.
The conference is organized by the University of Humanistic Studies, Utrecht (UvH), in collaboration with the ArtEZ Art Academy, Zwolle, the Thomas More Foundation, and the international research consortium Simagine.
Programme
11th January 2022, 10.00 – 17.00
Seminar with Richard Kearney
Re-Imagining the Human
Richard Kearney responds to interventions and questions
by staff members, postdoc-and PhD-researchers and students
from UvH, ArtEZ and Simagine
Chair: Laurens ten Kate
Morning session: 10.00 – 12.30
Opening by Joke van Saane,
rector magnificus of the University of Humanistic Studies
Interventions by Merel Visse, Hans Alma, Peter Sonderen
Afternoon session: 14.00 – 17.00
Interventions by Rodante van der Waal, Bram van Boxtel, Wilhelm Weitkamp
Location:
University of Humanistic Studies
Kromme Nieuwegracht 29, Utrecht
Room 1.33
Participation is free but there is a limited capacity
Please register to Laurens ten Kate: ltk@uvh.nl
English spoken
11th January 2022, 20.00 – 22.00
Public Lecture by Richard Kearney
Re-Imagining the Human
Response by Erik Borgman,
professor of public theology at the Tilburg University
Location:
Instituto Cervantes
Domplein 3, Utrecht
Participation: € 10.-
Please register here:
https://bit.ly/30tyTq0
The public lecture can be attended in person or via a live streaming
English spoken
I hope, I can come to the conference: re-imagining (the_ human) is ‘vergelijkbaar’ met re-imagining God: the disposable place of God in human is hopefull for the place humans take in the world, with or without belief You don’t have be a christian or orherwise to believe in wisdom. The wisdom of the All. I hope you have a good answer on the problems the world enterface; it’s wise to have a belief in wisdom: “what is the right thing to do’ in this turbulent circumstances,. I think God manifests Himself in the ‘praktische Vernuft ; the ethical ‘handelen’.
Thanks for you response, Yvonne! Please register with the email address (seminars) and the ticketshop link (lecture) in the flyer. Yes, Kant thought that what is ‘left of religion’ in modernity is the ethical will to obey the categorical imperative: to open oneself to the other who asserts my will. Schleiermacher, and many after him (up to Kearney) problematize a complete reduction of religion to ethics, though. A captivating debate!