tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18825684257402158632024-02-19T23:23:09.309-08:00Sacred Leaves Graduate SymposiumUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1882568425740215863.post-41560645141556541402009-03-25T21:01:00.000-07:002009-03-25T21:08:14.027-07:00The video-taped presentations for last year's memorable <strong>Second Annual Sacred Leaves Graduate Symposium and Keynote Address (Feb. 2008)</strong> are now available for public viewing at: <a href="http://www.lib.usf.edu/public/index.cfm?Pg=2008ReligionsOfBookManuscriptTraditionsInJudaismChristianityIslam10001500CE">http://www.lib.usf.edu/public/index.cfm?Pg=2008ReligionsOfBookManuscriptTraditionsInJudaismChristianityIslam10001500CE</a><br /><br />The topic for the 2008 event was: "Religions of the Book: Manuscript Traditions In Judaism, Christianity and Islam, 1000-1500 CE" These excellent scholarly presentations include PowerPoint presentations of illuminated manuscripts from the medieval era.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1882568425740215863.post-73764104970190382502009-03-25T17:55:00.000-07:002009-03-25T21:09:58.246-07:00<span style="color:#333300;">Last month's <strong>Third Annual Sacred Leaves Graduate Symposium and Keynote Address, Feb. 19-20, 2009</strong> (see schedule below) was a fine success, with scholars representing five countries at the two day event. Among the salient ideas that emerged during the event about mysticism in the medieval period, I offer the following:<br /></span><br /><span style="color:#660000;">*Mystical encounter was experienced by groups as well as individuals;</span><br /><span style="color:#000099;">*Mystical experience was expressed in art forms, including painting, architecture, song, poetry, narrative and dance;</span><br /><span style="color:#006600;">*Mystics were sometimes marginalized from institutional authority, and were powerful holy men/women seen as a threat to the fabric of society;</span><br /><span style="color:#663366;">*An emphasis on direct knowledge of God was manifest across Judaism, Christianity and Islam;</span><br />*Christianity embraced suffering in imitation of Christ as a mystical way;<br /><span style="color:#cc6600;">*The Hebrew Psalms and Song of Songs emphasize a divine love written in nature and its fertile beauty;</span><br /><span style="color:#ff0000;">*Michael Sells defines the "eroticism" of mysticism as a move beyond the confines of the body.<br /></span><br /><span style="color:#cc6600;"></span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1882568425740215863.post-86526132920691013592008-08-20T10:34:00.000-07:002009-06-23T07:06:56.809-07:00Sacred Leaves Graduate Symposium 2009<div align="center"><span style="color:#330099;">CONFERENCE AND KEYNOTE ANNOUNCEMENT--Please Post<br /></span><br /><strong><span style="color:#006600;">Third Annual Sacred Leaves Graduate Symposium<br />February 19-20, 2009<br /></span></strong><br />University of South Florida, Tampa Library, Tampa, FL<br /><br /><em>Keynote Address: <strong>Michael Sells, John Henry Barrows Professor, University of Chicago: </strong></em><br /><em></em><br /><em>"</em><strong><span style="color:#000066;">Mysticism, Longing and the Erotic in the Writings of 13th-century Sufi Master Ibn al-Arabi"<br /></span></strong><br /><span style="color:#000066;">In a period of one hundred fifty years, mystical literature in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam burgeoned across wide areas of Asia, Africa, and Europe. The author of classical texts of the Zohar and other texts of Jewish Kabbalah, the Beguines(Christian women writers who were not nuns in the formal sense), the Dominican mystic Meister Eckhart, and Sufis such as Ibn al-`Arabi and Rumi are just a few of the major figures within this efflorescence.<br /><br />In this talk, Michael Sells takes up the love poetry of Ibn al-`Arabi, both on its own terms and as an opening to the wider role of sexual and erotic themes within the mystical literature of the period. He presents several of the short poems with Ibn al-`Arabi's "Translation of Desires" both as examples of two trends of classical Arabic love poetry--the bedouin and the courtly--and as a core element in unfolding Sufi understanding of mystical union. Finally he examines the lover and beloved in Ibn al-`Arabi's poems, represented by an Arab and a Persian as emblematic of an erotics of cultural encounter that brings cultural worlds said to be incapable of bridging into a union of opposites.<br /></span><br /><strong><span style="color:#000066;">Thurs. Feb. 19, 7 p.m., Alumni Center, Traditions Hall, University of South Florida/Tampa (Sponsored by the USF Humanities Institute) </span></strong></div><div align="center"><span style="color:#000066;"><em>reception to follow</em><br /></span><br /><br /><span style="color:#006600;"><strong>SYMPOSIUM PRESENTATIONS</strong>:<br />(USF/Tampa Library, Special Collections, 4th Floor)</span><br /><br /><span style="color:#006600;"><strong><span style="font-size:130%;">Thursday, Feb. 19 </span><br /><span style="font-size:130%;"></span><br /><span style="font-size:130%;"></span></strong></span><span style="font-size:100%;"><span style="color:#006600;">12:45-1:00 p.m. <strong>WELCOME</strong>,</span> <strong>Dr. Mark I. Greenberg</strong>, Director of Special and Digital Collections</span><br /></span><br /><span style="color:#990000;">SESSION ONE: 1:00-2:30 p.m. </span><strong><em><span style="color:#990000;">Mysticism in Image and Word </span></em></strong></div><div align="center"><span style="color:#990000;">(Moderator<strong>: <span style="color:#000000;">Prof. Christine M. Probes,</span></strong> USF Dept. of World Languages </span><span style="color:#990000;">and USF Humanities Institute)<br /></span><br />*Betsy Chunko, <strong>University of Virginia</strong>, "The Holy Face and the Status of the Visual in Byzantine Art”<br /><br />*Rob Morhauser, <strong>San Diego State University</strong>, “Authenticity through Structure in Ælfric and Bede”<br /><br />*Rachel D. Gibson, <strong>University of Minnesota-Twin Cities</strong>, “Obscurity in Medieval Sufic Poetry and the French Troubadour Lyric”<br /><br /><span style="color:#006600;">2:30-3:00 p.m. </span><strong><span style="color:#006600;">BREAK<br /></span></strong><br /><span style="color:#990000;">SESSION TWO: 3:00-4:30 p.m. <strong><em>Mysticism and Society</em></strong></span> </div><div align="center"><span style="color:#990000;">(Moderator:</span> <strong><span style="color:#000000;">Prof. Miriam Esformes</span></strong>, <span style="color:#990000;">USF Dept. of World Languages)<br /></span><br />*Christine Dunn, <strong>Indiana University-Bloomington</strong>, "Ubertino of Casale’s Struggle against the `Heresy of the Free Spirit': Mysticism and Ethics in the Joachimite Sixth Era"<br /><br />*Javier Montoya, <strong>University of Florida</strong>, "<em>Locura</em>: The Spanish Inquisition, the <em>Alumbrados</em>, and Women in Sixteenth Century Toldeo"<br /><br />*Russell Hopley, <strong>Bowdoin College</strong>, “Sufis and Holy Men in Medieval Andalusia and North Africa"<br /><br /><br /><span style="color:#006600;"><strong><span style="font-size:130%;">Friday, Feb. 20</span><br /></strong></span><br /><span style="color:#006600;">8:30-8:55 a.m. </span><strong><span style="color:#006600;">Morning Welcome and Coffee<br /></span></strong><br /><span style="color:#990000;">SESSION THREE: 9:00-10:30 a.m. <strong><em>Mysticism and Judaism</em></strong></span> </div><div align="center"><span style="color:#990000;">(Moderator:</span> <span style="color:#000000;"><strong>Prof. Cass Fisher</strong></span>, <span style="color:#990000;">USF Dept. of Religious Studies)<br /></span><br />*Shon Hopkin, <strong>University of Texas-Austin</strong>, "Neo-platonism and the Jewish Longing for Zion in Medieval Spain"<br /><br />*David Shyovitz, <strong>University of Pennsylvania</strong>, "`He Has Created a Remembrance of His Wonders' : Science and Mysticism in the Thought of the <em>Hasidei Ashkenaz</em>"<br /><br />*Patrick Koch, <strong>Hebrew University of Jerusalem</strong>, "The Critique of Sanctimonious Conduct in Jewish Moralistic Writings -- A Short Survey"<br /><br /><span style="color:#006600;">10:30-11:00 <strong>BREAK</strong><br /></span><br /><span style="color:#990000;">SESSION FOUR: 11:00-12:00 p.m. <strong><em>Christian Mystical Texts I </em></strong></span></div><div align="center"><span style="color:#990000;"><strong>(</strong>Moderator:<strong> <span style="color:#000000;">Prof. Nicole Guenther Discenza</span>, </strong>USF Dept. of English</span><strong><span style="color:#990000;">)<br /></span></strong><br />*Natalia Khomenko, <strong>York University-Ontario</strong>, " `Behold, Unhurt I Swim, Playing, in the Hot Liquid': The Use of Paradox in Hrotsvit of Gandersheim's Plays"<br /><br />*Travis Neel, <strong>Southern Illinois University-Edwardsville</strong>, " `Come Let Us Go Up to the Mountain of the Lord': The Anxiety of Descent in William of St. Thierry's <em>On Contemplating God</em>"<br /><br /><span style="color:#006600;">12:00-1:15 p.m. </span><strong><span style="color:#006600;">LUNCH</span><br /></strong><br /><span style="color:#990000;">SESSION FIVE: 1:15-2:45 p.m. <em><strong>Christian Mystical Texts II </strong></em></span></div><div align="center"><span style="color:#990000;"><strong>(</strong>Moderator:<strong> <span style="color:#000000;">Prof. Gregory Milton</span>,</strong> USF Dept. of History</span><strong><span style="color:#990000;">)<br /></span><br /></strong>*Carla M. Thomas, <strong>Florida State University</strong>, "Finding Connections: 'On Ureisun of Oure Louerde' and the Lambeth Homilies"<br /><br />*Corey Wronski-Mayersak, <strong>Cornell University</strong>, “Writing Unity and Dissolution: Self-Reflection in the <em>Mirror of Simple and Annihilated Souls</em>”<br /><br />*Anna Dlabacová, <strong>Leiden University-the Netherlands</strong>, “Mysticism in the Shadow of the Burgundian Court: A New Perspective in Hendrik Herp’s <em>Spieghel der volcomenheit</em> (ca. 1455-1460)”<br /><br /><span style="color:#006600;">2:45-3:00 </span><strong><span style="color:#006600;">BREAK</span><br /></strong><br /><span style="color:#990000;">SESSION SIX: 3:00-3:45 <em><strong>Mysticism and Medieval Literature</strong></em></span> </div><div align="center"><span style="color:#990000;">(Moderator:</span> <strong><span style="color:#000000;">Prof. Gaetan Brulotte</span></strong>, <span style="color:#990000;">USF Dept. of World Languages)<br /></span><br />*Astrid Guillaume, <strong>Université Paris-Sorbonne</strong>, “Mysticism in Medieval Culture: When Omnipresence becomes Implicit” </div><div align="center"><br /></div><div align="center"><strong><span style="color:#000000;">RESPONDENT: *Prof. Anne Latowsky</span>,</strong> <span style="color:#993300;">USF Dept. of World Languages</span></div><div align="center"><br /><span style="color:#006600;"><span style="color:#990000;">3:45-4:00 p.m. <strong>Closing Discussion</strong></span> </span></div><div align="center"><span style="color:#006600;"><span style="color:#990000;"><strong>(</strong>Moderator</span>: <span style="color:#000000;"><strong>Dr. Jane Marie Pinzino</strong></span>, <span style="color:#660000;"><span style="color:#990000;">USF Tampa Library</span></span><span style="color:#990000;"><strong>)<br /></strong></span></div></span><div align="center"></div><div align="left"><br /><br />For more information, please contact:<br /><br />Jane Marie Pinzino, PhD<br />University of South Florida/Tampa Library<br />Special and Digital Collections Department<br />4202 E. Fowler Ave., LIB 122<br />Tampa, FL 33620-5400<br />(813) 974-2731<br /><a href="mailto:jpinzino@mail.usf.edu">jpinzino@mail.usf.edu</a><br /><a href="http://slgs.lib.usf.edu/" target="_blank">http://slgs.lib.usf.edu/</a><br /><br />THIS POST WAS UPDATED ON 2/18/2009<br /><br /><br /></div></span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0