Death Conference Program | Brown University | 2020

D E AT H a graduate student conference March 6-7, 2020

the crystal room alumnae hall

194 meeting street providence, r.i. 02906

keynote address:

death, spirituality, and the matter of blackness joseph r. winters march 6th. 6pm the crystal room, brown u. alumnae hall 194 meting st, providence, ri 02906

while there are significant differences between the respective visions of black lives matter and afro-pessimism, this presentation contends that both are expressions of black spirituality. not reducible to a particular religious tradition or institution, black spirituality names practices and modes of care that have enabled blacks to subsist within anti-black arrangements and regimes. among other things, black spirituality involves mourning, honoring the (socially) dead, and acknowledging the limits of grammar and human recognition. after developing an inchoate notion of black spirit in frederick douglass and harriet jacobs, i show how this idea illumines affinities between the movement for black lives and thinkers who insist on an antagonistic relationship between the human and blackness. joseph winters is the alexander f. hehmeyer associate professor of religious studies and african and african american studies. he also holds secondary positions in english and gender, sexuality, and feminist studies. his interests lie at the intersection of black religious thought, african-american literature, and critical theory.

friday march 6th 8:30am

registration & continental breakfast (provided)

9:15am

opening remarks stephen bush, associate professor of religious studies

9:30-11:15am

panel 1 – death, materiality, and impersonality patrick magoffin, moderating jill j. tan, yale university shifting ontologies of the corpse in a buddhist funeral home emily theus, yale university bodied permeability and the threat/promise of annihilation alison renna, yale university bacterial intimacy and the symbiotic mind: the microbial humanities,charles taylor, rosi braidotti, and your intestinal flora on death in the era of the stomach ache stephen bush, associate professor of religious studies, responding

11:00am

lunch

12:30-2:15pm

panel 2 – representing death

2:25-3:55pm

panel 3 – the sounds of death

robert kashow, moderating jonathan wright, york university outside life inside the cinema: bazin and derrida on imaging death sam maclennan, queen’s university photographing stigmata: between retrospective medicine and personal devotion gabriella costa, yale divinity school & institute of sacred music “the surgeon of head, heart, and hand:” photographed gestures of care in dr.harvey cushing’s brain tumor registry andy archer, yale divinity school preparing to die: david wojnarowicz’s acta martyrum and the futurity of queer grief nathaniel berman, rahel varnhagen professor of international affairs, law, and modern culture and religious studies, responding

noah tetenbaum, moderating bruce benedict, durham university theopoetics of trauma in the funeral hymns of charles wesley codee spinner, university of pittsburgh sounds of the afterlife: exploring the acoustemologies of 19th-century spiritualism berit goetz, yale divinity school & institute of sacred music sufjan the secular psalmist: nostalgia and eschatological hope in carrie and lowell jared lindahl, visiting assistant professor of religious studies, responding

4:05-5:50pm

panel 4 – commemorating the dead aseel azab, moderating renee cyr, university of kansas dancing with death: a performance analysis of contemporary american death rituals emily pierson, brown university until we meet again: nineteenth-century garden cemeteries and the shaping of the american afterlife k.c. mcconnell, harvard divinity school & tufts fletcher school “he was only a cat but he was human enough:” flexible personhood in the funerary rites of pets in twentiethand twenty-first century america michael hammett, columbia university honor, funerary practices, and the death paradox in reformation germany daniel vaca, robert gale noyes assistant professor of humanities, responding

6:00pm

keynote – “death, spirituality, and the matter of blackness” – joseph winters

7:30pm

dinner (provided)

saturday march 7th 9am 9:30-11:15am

continental breakfast (provided) panel 5 – death and normative responses to climate change lise miltner, moderating mac loftin, harvard university spiritual exercises for an age of climate death naomi madaras, union theological seminary sitting with the grotesque: a response to death-denial and the climate crisis kamryn wolf, union theological seminary the last diva: gaia worship in an age of ecological crisis tyler b. davis, baylor university death, disaster, and the politics of divine liberation mark cladis, brooke russell astor professor of humanities, responding

11:30am-1pm

1-2:15pm 2:15-3:45pm

panel 6 – intimacies and epistemologies of death angel calvin, moderating joanna sierks smith, university of north carolina, chapel hill sacred slaughter: hog-killings in the american south sacelia strong-sangster, western michigan university a place for the ancestors: soul dualism and the anishinabe spirit land ben szoller, university of waterloo the death (and life) of the rural catholic church: examining the amazon synod’s case for biological and epistemological diversity jae han, assistant professor of religious studies, responding

lunch panel 7 – death, praxis, ritual theory michael payne, moderating nicolas sarian, columbia university luxury, sacrifice, and the sacred: a bataillean meditation kate hoeting, harvard divinity school abortion as death: what religious studies can bring to pro-choice discourse greg church, johns hopkins university ritualizing justice: defilement, death, and social responsibility in numbers 35 susan ashbrook harvey, willard prescott and annie mcclelland smith professor of religion and history, responding

4:00pm

closing remarks joseph winters, duke university

participant bios: andy archer (they/them): andy is master of divinity candidate at yale divinity school, an artist, and a community organizer. broadly speaking, their work responds to the formation of precarious bodies and subjects under capitalism, and their research interests include affect theory, psychoanalysis, queer and gender studies, film and media, finance, and addiction. before attending yds, andy worked as studio director to the artist carolee schneeman. they currently serve as a chaplain in a long-term skilled nursing facility for people with hiv/aids. greg church (he/him): greg church is a phd candidate in hebrew bible and northwest semitics at the johns hopkins university. his research interests are focused on the intersections and social functions of law and ritual in the hebrew bible and ancient near east. greg’s dissertation work focuses specifically on the defilement of the land in the hebrew bible. in his free time, greg enjoys cooking and baking, hiking, and spending time with family and friends. gabriella costa (she/her): gabriella costa is a master’s student in religion and the visual arts at the yale institute of sacred music and yale divinity school. she graduated from fordham university with a ba in art history and english. her research focuses on the arts as a commemorative space in the 20th century. gabriella is particularly interested in ethical ideas of responsibility to the suffering and the dead. her recent work considers the visual dimensions of this obligation to the other person. renee cyr (she/her): renee cyr is a second year ma student in religious studies at the university of kansas. her research examines the performativity of contemporary american death rituals. her secondary area of research is the rise of wicca and witchcraft in the u.s. she has worked as an independent theatre artist and continues to weave practice into her academic pursuits. previously she completed a masters in theatre and performance studies from the university of maryland college park. tyler b. davis (he/him): tyler davis is a phd candidate in religion at baylor university. his recent publications include “in the hope that they can make their own future: james h. cone and the third world,” a co-authored article focusing on the internationalist vision of james cone. located at the intersection of ethics, liberation theology, and the black radical tradition, his dissertation research investigates how theological interpretations of the weather and environmental crises diagnose power relations and carry freedom dreams. berit goetz (she/her): berit goetz is a songwriter and musician pursuing an mar in music & religion at yale divinity school and yale’s interdisciplinary institute of sacred music. her scholarship considers ideology in music; the resources of “secular” artworks for spiritual formation; and the relationship between text and sound. she earned her b.a. cum laude in music history, theory and composition, with a double-major in comparative literature, at brown university. michael hammett (he/him): michael hammett is a doctoral candidate in the religion program at columbia university. his research focus is reformation era christianity, and his dissertation focuses on late medieval and early modern christian demonological narratives of the transformation of people into animals. he holds a bachelor of arts with distinction in history from duke university, a master of letters in reformation studies from the university of st andrews, and a master of arts in religion and master of philosophy in religion from columbia university. his research at st andrews focused on notions of honor and their impact on burial practices in reformation germany.

kate hoeting (she/her): kate is a master of theological studies candidate at harvard divinity school concentrating in gender and sexuality studies. she also volunteers as an abortion doula and co-founded the carleton advocacy network of doulas (can-do), one of the first collegiate doula coalitions. she is interested in religious approaches to pro-choice frameworks, the ways religious nones engage with ritual, and, of course, death. mac loftin (he/him): mac is a phd student in theology at harvard university. he studies the intersection of sacramental theology and political theology – the ways christian theologies of sacrament both prop up far-right political movements and might help to undo them. his research focuses on sacramental imagery in the work of twentieth century antifascist intellectuals like georges bataille and simone weil. sam maclennan (he/him): sam is an ma candidate at queen’s university’s school of religion, originally from calgary, alberta. before his ma, he completed a bachelor of science at queen’s university in life sciences with a focus in virology and immunology. for his master’s project, he is examining stigmata and other supernatural catholic phenomena, exploring how these occurrences are verified and contested by medical professionals as part of the development of a saint’s cult. naomi madaras (she/her): naomi madaras is a master of divinity candidate in the psychology and religion track at union theological seminary. her clinical training has been in hospitals and nursing homes in new york where she provides spiritual care to patients, families, and staff. naomi focuses on death, disability, and community-building in her work. she is part of the religious society of friends (quakers) and grew up on a farm. k.c. mcconnell (she/her): k.c mcconnell is a dual masters’ degree candidate at harvard divinity school. her research and coursework focuses on religion and nationalism in contemporary south asia, environmental policy, and animal studies. she is also interested in bio/necropolitics, the posthuman approach to death, and the semantics of funerary rites. she has previously spent her summers researching cow protectionism in madhya pradesh, india and interning at the u.s. department of state. k.c. intends to pursue a career in the public sector after graduation. emily pierson (she/her): emily is a doctoral candidate in history at brown university. her work focuses on the use of burials to articulate the identity of the deceased and beliefs regarding the nature of the afterlife. she is particularly interested in points of transition and contested identities among the dead. her dissertation explores how the garden cemeteries of the nineteenth century were used to define (and re-define) american identity and the ideal community, both among the living and among the dead. alison renna (she/her): alison renna is a second-year phd student at yale university in religion and modernity. she is interested in science studies, the history of religious studies, and the weirdness of american secularism. she graduated from franklin & marshall college with a ba in religious studies and science, technology, and society in 2018. nicolas sarian (he/him): nicolas sarian is an ma student in the department of religion at columbia university, focusing on philosophy of religion, aesthetics, and theory and history of religions. before coming to columbia, nicolas was an assistant curator at garage museum of contemporary art (moscow, russia), and lecturer in aesthetics at british higher school for art & design (moscow, russia). he completed his ba in art history & aesthetics at the university of palermo, while also studying philosophy at the university of buenos aires. he is also graduate of the ma in philosophy from king’s college london.

joanna sierks smith (she/her): joanna smith is a sixth-year phd candidate at the university of north carolina at chapel hill, where her research focuses on shifting religious sensibilities around nature, animality, and excess throughout american history. she is currently working on a dissertation that uses models of sacrifice to examine industrial slaughterhouses as sites of the hidden sacred. codee spinner (she/her): codee spinner is a phd candidate studying musicology at the university of pittsburgh. she holds a ma in musicology from the university of pittsburgh. her research interests include american music, nineteenth-century musical practice, and historical sound studies. codee is currently working on her dissertation titled, “resonant spirits: spiritualism, music, and community in lily dale, ny.” the dissertation is a study of sound and musical practice in the spiritualist community of lily dale from the 1840s to 1940. sacelia strong-sangster (she/her): sacelia strong-sangster is a master’s student in the department of comparative religion at western michigan university. her main area of research is on native american religion & spirituality, with a focus on indigenous religion and colonization, as well as the ties between space and spirituality in native american religions. ben szoller: ben szoller is a phd student in the religious studies department at the university of waterloo (canada). he has earned degrees in fine art, education, and more recently, a master of theological studies (university of toronto) with a specialization in theology and ecology. his research interests include agricultural ethics and the relationship between religious organizations and government policy. when not studying, ben can be found working for the family dairy in stratford, ontario. jill j. tan (she/her): jill j. tan is a phd student of anthropology at yale university. her work explores how the public consciousness of death and dying in singapore is shaped by the funeral profession. she notes colonial and diasporic histories in considering singaporean subjectivities of being and death. as an anthropologist, artist, and writer, she is committed to collaborative practice, co-theorization, and multimodal exploration through games, interactive performance, and poetics, amongst other media. emily theus: emily is a second-year doctoral student in the religious studies department at yale, working in the subfield of theology. prior to entering the program, she received her m.a.r in theology at yale divinity school, and her b.s. in mathematics and religious studies at the university of south carolina. kamryn wolf: kamryn wolf is a writer, performance artist, and third year master of divinity student at union theological seminary where they study ritual, desire, ecological affect, and spiritual care. in 2018 they launched a gender doula practice that supports transgender and gender nonconforming people and their communities through gender-related transitions. they reside in troy, ny with their cat djuna. jonathan wright (he/him): jonathan wright is a graduate student in cinema and media studies at york university. his research explores an experience of confusion in film viewing, drawing upon the work of stanley cavell and hans-georg gadamer. other interests include emerson’s visuality, and aesthetic evaluation in film.

this conference has been made possible by: the american academy of religion, new england – maritimes region (nemaar)

a number of research centers, institutes, and programs at brown university: the the the the the the

center for the study of race and ethnicity in america (csrea) cogut institute for the humanities graduate student council joukowsky institute for archaeology and the ancient world program in early cultures program in medieval studies

as well as several brown university departments: the the the the the the the the the

department department department department department department department department department

of of of of of of of of of

anthropology comparative literature east asian studies english hispanic studies history italian studies modern culture and media religious studies

special thanks also to: nicole vadnais, tina creamer, and the graduate students and faculty at the department of religious studies

thank you!

graphic design and images by soo joo soojoo-studio.com