News of the extended network of faculty, alumni, students, visiting researchers, and mission partners is regularly updated, and some of the big ideas or major events in Global Christianity are covered in the CGCM News.
Christianity amidst Hindutva
Recently, the Archbishop of New Delhi wrote calling for a year of prayer before the 2019 general elections in India. Jesudas Athyal comments on the fear and threat experienced by the minorities in India especially as a Hindu nationalist government is in power in an article in the National Catholic Reporter.
Expanded Spelling of “Koinonia”
In a recent post for the Martin Marty Center for the Public Understanding of Religion, Visiting Researcher Jesudas Athyal wrote about an Indian debate about the meaning of koinonia that has new implications for Christians around the world.
The Bartolomé de Las Casas Conference
“Las Casas in Hemispheric American Perspective:
II International Conference on Bartolomé de Las Casas.”
July 15-16 (Monday-Tuesday), 2019
Providence College, Providence, Rhode Island, U.S.A.
The first International Conference, “Bartolomé de Las Casas, O.P.: History, Philosophy, and Theology in the Age of European Expansion,” held in 2016, was a landmark event for Lascasian scholarship. In response to this success, Providence College is pleased to invite interested scholars to our next gathering in 2019: “Las Casas in Hemispheric American Perspective: II International Conference on Bartolomé de Las Casas.”
Conference organizers welcome academic presentations related to the life, labor, and legacy of Bartolomé de Las Casas in the larger context of Hemispheric American studies. We especially encourage proposals that employ Las Casas as a prism for the interpretation of the interaction, expansion, culture, and ancestry of Indigenous people, Africans, Europeans and Asians in the American Hemisphere. The organizers programmed this Lascasian conference to coincide with the III International Conference on the History of the Order of Preachers in America, to be held July 17-19th (Wednesday-Friday) at Providence College (Dominican conference link). Participants can benefit from and contribute to the rich combination of unique research interests afforded by these two international gatherings.
For the Las Casas’s Conference, organizers welcome scholarly reflection on the themes of contact, conquest, colonization, and conversion as found in theology, philosophy, law, literature, poetry, theater among other disciplinary approaches. Scholarly panels as well as special plenary sessions by leading scholars are planned.
Call for Papers:
Papers in Spanish, Portuguese, and English are welcomed. Interested scholars, whether presenting an individual paper or collaborating in a panel of three papers, must submit an abstract for each proposal (250-500 word, Microsoft Word, single-spaced, 12pt New Times), and the following:
- Author(s): (maximum of three) including name(s), professional title(s), and affiliation;
- Title of presentation, and relationship to Conference theme(s);
- E-mail and mailing addresses;
- Short biographical note (maximum 200 words).
- Please email paper proposals before September 1st, 2018. Send your proposal(s) to both Rady Roldán-Figueroa, Th.D. and David Orique, O.P., Ph.D. at Lascasasconference2019@gmail.com More information and details to follow.
- Approved proposals will be announced by email on December 15, 2018.
- Conference oral presentations are limited to 20 minutes (approximate 8 double-spaced pages).
Conference site in Spanish
Conference Organizers:
David T. Orique, O.P., Ph.D.
Associate Professor of History
Director of Latin American and Latino Studies
Providence College
Rady Roldán-Figueroa, Th.D.
Associate Professor of the History of Christianity
Boston University
American Society of Missiology
Friendship was the theme of this year's meeting of the American Society of Missiology. Boston University was well-represented at the conference. Twelve alumni gave papers, Amos Yong was a keynote speaker, and Anicka Fast won the award for the best paper by a graduate student.
Leibnitz Institute Fellowship Program
The Leibnitz Institute in Mainz, Germany is seeking applications for a doctoral student fellowship. The Institute has expertise in Early Modern Christianity.
Mennonite Brethren Historical Commission Award
An M.B. Studies Project Grant of $2,500 was awarded to Anicka Fast for her Ph.D. dissertation project: “Living in the same house: Contested ecclesial identity in the Mennonite and Mennonite Brethren missionary encounter in Congo, 1912–1989.” Like other sectors currently receiving attention (e.g., Mennonites and the Holocaust, Mennonites and Canadian “Indian Day Schools,” etc.), Anicka’s project considers Mennonites and the mission sector, exploring aspects of the Mennonite story that may be disturbing, given our contemporary sensibilities.
Currents, Perspectives, and Ethnographic Methodologies for World Christianity
2019 World Christianity Conference
March 15–18, 2019 | Princeton Theological Seminary
Call for Papers
An International, Interdisciplinary Conference organized by The World Christianity & History of Religions Program (Dept. of History & Ecumenics)
Princeton, New Jersey, USA
Recent decades mark a watershed in World Christianity as an emerging academic field, its development into an interdisciplinary endeavor in particular. Reflection on the complexity of Christianity as a pluricultural, global phenomenon has been robust. As was highlighted by our 2018 conference, World Christianity as a field has been shaped in large part by its distinctive historiography and diverse methodologies. In 2019, our primary focus will be ethnographic. Accordingly, a wide range of questions about the nature and relevance of ethnography to the study of World Christianity will be explored, along with the difference ethnography makes (or could make) in providing granular accounts of local Christianities around the world. Likewise, in view of the fact that ethnographic research is being increasingly incorporated into studies of World Christianity at a time when concepts of 'culture' are rigorously contested and the loci of research extraordinarily diverse, what are the major challenges scholars face? The conference seeks to explore and reflect on past practices and new directions, drawing on case studies representative of the currents and eddies of Christianity in the majority world and beyond. In short, the conference seeks to inquire into the state of the field and provide a common interdisciplinary space for intellectual encounter and exchange.
- $155.00 – early bird / $185.00 – late registration (faculty based in USA, Canada and Europe)
- $100.00 – early bird / $120.00 – late registration (faculty based in the Global South, graduate students/retirees)
- Accommodations: Limited availability (single/shared rooms) at Erdman Center on the Princeton Seminary campus. Other options for accommodation will be announced later.
United Methodist Racial/Ethnic History Research Grant
The United Methodist Racial/Ethnic History Research Grant was awarded to Dr. Ben Hartley
, Associate Professor of Christian Mission, College of Christian Studies, George Fox University in Newberg, OR, for his project entitled “Re-Assessing Methodist—Native American Encounters in the Oregon Territory, 1834-1844.”
“It is with heartfelt gratitude that I receive this Racial/Ethnic History Grant from the General Commission on Archives and History,” said Hartley. “In recent years the UMC has had a number of services of worship at Annual Conference and General Conference gatherings to express corporate repentance and a desire for reconciliation between The United Methodist Church and Native Americans in North America. These need to be followed up with many other efforts if the work of reconciliation is to continue. I am absolutely convinced that to grow in one's respect for Native American peoples one must grow in love for their history and the history that is shared among United Methodists and native peoples. I receive this research grant as a loving encouragement from United Methodist people to do so in my still-new home in the Oregon-Idaho Annual Conference. I pray that my research will inspire others to learn the stories of Native American peoples wherever they may live. Thank you!”
UNCF/Mellon Programs International Faculty Seminar
The 2018 UNCF/Mellon Programs International Faculty Seminar in Portugal and Spain, July 2-12, 2018 will be facilitated by Linda Heywood, Professor of African American Studies and History at Boston University.
African Christian Biography
The centrality of African Christians inspired the creation of the Dictionary of African Christian Biography over 20 years ago. To celebrate 20 years of collecting African biographies, the DACB hosted a conference in 2015. The fruit of that conference is a new book: African Christian Biography. Published by Cluster books, the volume will be available in July 2018.