The Call for Papers portals for the ASR’s 2022 Annual Meeting are now open for paper and session proposals.
The conference theme is “Religion, Repression, and the Search for Justice”. We especially welcome presentations and sessions that speak to our theme, but we also welcome other topics of interest to the sociology of religion. Here are some possibilities:
- How and when do religious organizations, groups, or individuals attempt to control others – either internally in their own communities or externally in society at large? What rationales do they give for doing so? What techniques do they use? How do they describe their actions? What interactions do they have with non-religious institutions or actors?
- How and when do religious organizations, groups, or individuals support social justice? What rationales do they give? What techniques do they use? How do they describe their actions? What problems and possibilities do they encounter?
- How do para-religious, quasi-religious, and anti-religious groups and actors figure into this? How and why do they embrace either movements for repression or for justice? How do they conceive of what they are doing? What leads them to act as they do?
- More specifically, what role does religion, including civil religion(s), play in the recent rise of right-wing anti-democratic activism? How do these actors conceive of what they are doing? What rationales do they give for their activism? What factors encouraged or mitigated their rise?
- How do these processes within the United States compare with similar things going on in other parts of the world?
- How does religious and non-religious involvement in movements for control and for social justice affect religions’ future?
We especially encourage papers and sessions that pursue and stimulate new avenues of research and highlight innovative theoretical and methodological approaches. We welcome specialty sessions, including book events, workshops on teaching and professional development, and discussions that focus on a particular question or topic.
We are particularly interested in welcoming international scholars to our conference: in person if possible, remotely if necessary. Some of our discipline’s best work is being done outside North America. International scholarly contact is sure a way to deepen our field.
DEADLINES:
- Session proposals: March 31, 2022
- Paper abstract submissions: April 30, 2022
- All submissions should be made through the ASR website at www.sociologyofreligion.com beginning in mid-January 2022.
The Annual Meeting will be held from August 6th-8th at the Sheraton Grand Los Angeles Hotel on the corner of 7th and Hope streets in downtown Los Angeles. We will have an opening reception and awards event on Saturday evening, August 6th. We will have two plenary lectures on Sunday and Monday evenings: the Furfey Lecture by François Gauthier (Université de Fribourg) and the presidential address by James Spickard (University of Redlands). The latter will be followed by a second reception.
We will have other special events, including one focused on local religious groups engaged in social justice work. We are working with the ASA Religion Section on some joint events. These may include a panel about raising the public visibility of the sociology of religion and/or a mentoring session on various career paths for sociologists specializing in our field. We will also host a book exhibit where publishers and ASR members can display their recent work.
ASR Membership is required to organize a session, present a paper, serve as a panelist, or hold another role in the program. Participants are expected to register for the meeting by July 1, 2022.
Simply visit the ASR website (www.sociologyofreligion.com). If you are already a member, log into the membership portal, and chose “Abstract Submission” (for papers) or “Submit a Session Proposal” (for sessions) from among the 8 bouncing buttons at the page center. Fill out the form(s), click “Submit”, and you’ll get an email acknowledgement of your submission.
If you are not a member, simply join. You can do this through the website links. If you experience any trouble please contact our Executive Officer, Rachel Kraus, at ASREO@bsu.edu. If you need to renew your membership, click here.
Please send us your proposals, then plan to come to our first (largely) in-person meeting since 2019.