Monthly Archives: September 2016

SISR/ISSR July 2017 Conference moved to Lausanne; Call for Session Proposals Extended to October 25th

Dear Colleagues:

We are writing to let you know that the SISR/ISSR Executive has made the decision to hold the 2017 conference in Lausanne, Switzerland from 4-7 July 2017, instead of in Melbourne Australia. Only very recently has it become clear that a conference in Melbourne would not be possible for financial reasons. The Executive has had to decide quickly in order to be able to guarantee a conference in 2017.  

We thank the Australian local committee and its president, Bob Dixon, for their efforts and energy and we will be able to use a considerable amount of their work for the Lausanne conference. We also hope that a ISSR conference in Australia will be possible some time in the future.

The conference in Lausanne will keep the theme “Religion, Cooperation, and Conflict in Diverse Societies”.

Because of the relocation, we make a second call for session proposals to give members a chance who would consider coming to Lausanne but would not have been able to go to Melbourne.

You can again propose until October 25th:

  • Thematic session - A session with papers on a common theme. If the theme attracts many papers, the thematic session may stretch over several slots.
  • Working Group session - A session of papers presented by those who work together on a specific project.
  • New Research Forum - Intended for students and young researchers (PhDs). The NRF usually have two sessions with a common theme and a session for free papers that do not fit into     the other ISSR thematic sessions.
  • Author Meets Critics session - A session in which an author meets scholars who criticize his/her book and responds.

The conference is bilingual.  Sessions may be in French, in English, or both.

Please submit your session proposals via our system: https://sisr-issr-conference-submission-2017.com/index.php/test/rccds2017   Before doing so, please consult instructions for conference submissions: https://www.sisr-issr.org/en/conference/instructions-for-registration-on-the-open-conference-system-religion-cooperation-and-conflict-in-diverse-societies

Attention: This is not yet the call for individual paper proposals. The call for paper proposals will be opened in mid-November.

This is a late change of plans and we apologize for any inconvenience to our members. We are convinced, however, that the ISSR conference at the new venue in Lausanne will be a success and we hope very much to meet you there.

With best wishes,

Jörg Stolz
President of the International Society for the Sociology of Religion

ISA-RC22 Newsletter #14–September, 2016

The ISA’s Research Committee 22 (Sociology of Religion) has just issued its 14th newsletter.  It is available on the RC22 website at: https://www.isa-rc22.org/newsletters/  It contains a report from the recent ISA 3rd Forum of Sociology (in Vienna), news about the next ISA World Congress, a guide to how to publish in ISA journals (by one of the journal editors), a report on the state of sociology of religion in Latin America, and a discussion-starter about the current state of theory in the sociology of religion.

Click the picture to download a copy.

(For those who don’t know, RC22 hosts this news and events blog.)

Jim Spickard
RC22 President
University of Redlands
president@isa-rc22.org

Deadline for SISR/ISSR Session Proposals is September 15th

We kindly remind you that the deadline for submitting sessions proposals for the next ISSR conference “Religion, Cooperation, and Conflict in Diverse Societies”, Melbourne, Australia, 3-7 July, 2017  is 15th September 2016.

You can find more information on the conference and on proposing a Thematic Session on the ISSR web-site: https://www.sisr-issr.org/en/conference/conference-2017-religion-cooperation-and-conflict-in-diverse-societies.

Please note that only members in good standing can be session organizers. You may pay your membership for the 2016-2017 period following this link: https://www.sisr-issr.org/en/membership

The ISSR published also the Call for the ISSR Workshop Grant and the Call for the Best Book Award:https://www.sisr-issr.org/en/awards-and-grant The deadline for both Calls is 15th September 2016 as well.

Kind regards,

Siniša Zrinščak

ISSR General Secretary

Calling All Scholars of Religion: A (Free) Invitation to Comment on a Paper Summarizing the Role of Religion in the Contemporary World

Dear RC22 Colleagues (and others who are on this mailing list)

We need your help commenting on a paper, which we — Grace Davie (University of Exeter, UK) and Nancy Ammerman (Boston University, US), and a team of twelve have prepared for the International Panel on Social Progress.

We would like to take this opportunity to introduce the International Panel on Social Progress (IPSP). You can find more about the IPSP and its ways of working here: https://www.ipsp.org/.  You will see that it exists to:

  • “harness the competence of hundreds of experts about social issues” and to
  • “deliver a report addressed to all social actors, movements, organizations, politicians and decision-makers, in order to provide them with the best expertise on questions that bear on social change”.

We and our team have written the chapter on religion, entitled ‘Religions and social progress: Critical assessments and creative partnerships’.  

Here is our Abstract:

  • This chapter starts from the premise that some 80 percent of the world’s population affirms some kind of religious identification, a proportion that is growing rather than declining. Emphasizing the significance of belief and practice in everyday lives and local contexts, we analyze the impact of religion and its relevance to social progress in a wide variety of fields. These include the family, gender and sexuality; differences and diversity; democratic governance; violence and peace-making; health and economic well-being; and care for the earth.
  • We argue that researchers and policy makers pursuing social progress will benefit from careful attention to the power of religious ideas to motivate, of religious practices to shape ways of life, of religious communities to mobilize and extend the reach of social change, and of religious leaders and symbols to legitimate calls to action. All of that, however, can be put to either good or ill, for which reason assessment of particular religions in specific contexts is essential.

Running through the chapter are five interconnected themes:

  1. the persistence of religion in the twenty-first century;
  2. the importance of context in discerning outcomes;
  3. the need for cultural competence relative to religion;
  4. the significance of religion in initiating change;
  5. and the benefits of well-judged partnerships.

The continuing need for critical but appreciative assessment and the demonstrable benefits of creative partnerships are our standout findings.

The IPSP process – see https://www.ipsp.org/process – mirrors that of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and includes a period of public comment in the autumn of 2016.  The ‘Commenting Platform’ is now open – see comment.ipsp.org. 

It would be hugely helpful if members of RC22 could take part in this.

The IPSP website will indicate how you access our chapter and how you make your comments.  Or if you prefer you can simply send us (g.r.c.davie@exeter.ac.uk; nta@bu.edu) an e-mail.