CALL FOR PAPERS
"Being Human; Being Tamil: Personhood, Agency and Identity"
Third Annual Tamil Studies Conference
University of Toronto, May 15-17, 2008
Plenary Speakers: Prof. Vidya Dehejia, Columbia University, New York
Prof. David Shulman, Hebrew University, Jerusalem
Being Human; Being Tamil: Personhood, Agency and Identity.
The third annual Tamil Studies Conference, "Being Human; Being Tamil: Personhood, Agency and Identity", organized by the University of Toronto and the University of Windsor, will be held at the University of Toronto from May 15 - 17, 2008. The conference organizers invite submissions of paper abstracts from all disciplines and welcome abstracts with an interdisciplinary focus. Scholars, graduate students, artists, writers, performers and activists are welcome to present scholarly papers in English or Tamil at this conference. The organizers also welcome the participation of non-Tamil Studies specialists whose work addresses the theme of this conference. The organizers encourage the submission of new scholarly work that can also be included in the conference publication.
The objective of this conference, in response to questions posed by scholarly critiques of universal conceptions of the human and unified notions of identity, is to invite papers that investigate how “human” or "personhood" have been imagined, conceptualized, practiced and performed throughout history within the Tamil regions and traditions. What is the intellectual, cultural, and literary history of Tamil understandings of the human person? Was there ever a conception of a universal human being? What are the sources for imagining the self and the practices of its construction and expression? What are the continuities and transformations in Tamil conceptions of the self, particularly in defining men and women and caste identities?
What are the religious and secular sources of the self? What ritual practices have played a seminal role in constructing the idea of being human? How have texts and print shaped or altered the roles
and functions of individuals? What is the relation between geography, landscape and individual identity? How does one understand the relation between ideology and classification? In the modern era how have concepts of "individual" and "collective" rights" affected Tamil articulations of personhood, particularly in relation to gender and caste? How do diaspora and hybridity inform or structure Tamil conceptions of identity and affiliation?
Papers on the Tamil Diaspora can address subjects other than those indicated in the Call for Papers.
Proposals can also be submitted for an entire panel.
Those interested in presenting a paper or panel must submit an abstract of no more than 300 words or the full details of the panel (all the scholars and their abstracts), in the language they wish to present (English or Tamil) by August 31, 2007 to: tamils@chass.utoronto.ca
Please note that all scholars are expected to meet the costs of their accommodation, registration and transport.
The conference website, www.chass.utoronto.ca/~tamils, has details of the 2006 and 2007 conferences.
Organizers:
Chelva Kanaganayakam
Professor, Department of English, University of Toronto
R. Cheran
Assistant Professor, Department of Anthropology and Sociology, University of Windsor
Darshan Ambalavanar
Visiting Fellow, Centre for South Asian Studies, University of Toronto.
