Scholars working under the broad umbrella of New Materialism have offered compelling reappraisals of the ways in which we know, interact with, and exist in the world. This scholarship also intersects with recent work on music and sound, which raises rich sets of questions regarding human agency, material, ethics, aesthetics, embodiment, and the subject/object dichotomy, among other issues.
We invite scholars working in the humanities, arts and sciences to submit proposals for papers and performances that engage with the themes of sound and new materialism, broadly construed. We welcome work that adopts historical, technological, analytical, philosophical, materialist, and creative vantage points, among others. Overall, this conference will direct these diverse disciplinary and methodological perspectives towards convergent and critical issues, creating new, interdisciplinary lines of enquiry and generating original research.
The one-day conference will consist of panels that comprise of papers with short reflections by a moderator, as well as an evening concert that includes opportunities for discussion. The concluding concert of work that engages with these themes from creative perspectives will afford attendees with an opportunity to consider and discuss issues concerning sound, material, and agency in a forum that contrasts with, but also complements, our events during the day. Conference participants are strongly encouraged to attend both the daytime and evening portions of the conference.
Proposals are called for:
Paper presentations of 20 minutes with 10 minutes of Q&A.
Artistic presentation of 20 minutes with 10 minutes of discussion
Submission: Proposals of no more than 500 words (300 words for artistic presentation) should be submitted as a PDF by August 14th 2019 to jc5036@columbia.edu
and include “NMAS Submission” in the subject line. If you’re applying for an artistic presentation please include three representative 2 minute audio/video examples. Please also include the title of your proposed paper and anonymize your submission. Include your name, affiliation, and contact information in the body of the email, and also nominate any audio/visual requirements for your paper or performance.
Analyzing the Mexican case of collectives of women currently looking for their disappeared relatives due to an escalation of violence related to the so-called War against Drugs that former president Felipe Calderón (2006–2012) started, this essay develops a new conception of politics grounded not only on rational thought but also on affect. These collectives put forward a materialistic, feminist, and performative mode of politics. Publicly lamenting their losses and literally digging bodies out of Mexican land, these women perform and recover the citizenship that the Mexican state has de facto disavowed of them. I propose conceptualizing them as “bad victims” since their taking action does not take away their pain; rather, the public exposure of their lament actually turns them into political agents.
Bio:
Rosaura Martínez Ruiz is Full Professor of Philosophy at the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) and a member of the National System of Researchers, level III. She was coordinator of the research projects “Philosophers after Freud” and “Philosophy and Psychoanalysis as Critical Borders of the Political.” She is the author of Freud y Derrida: escritura y psique (2013) and Eros: Más allá de la pulsión de muerte (2017). This last book has been translated into English and published by Fordham University Press (2021). She has coordinated several collective books and published articles on the intersection between psychoanalysis and philosophy and on the field of the psychopolitical. In 2017 she was awarded the Research Prize in Humanities by the Mexican Academy of Sciences; in 2019 she was a Fulbright Scholar; in 2021 she received the Sor Juana Inez de la Cruz UNAM recognition; and during the Fall 2023 she was the Tinker Visiting Professor at Columbia University. She is part of the advisory board of the “International Consortium of Critical Theory Programs” coordinated by Judith Butler.
This conference will be hosted in a hybrid format. Accepted presenters can choose to participate in person or virtually. We will provide a limited number of need-based travel awards for graduate students and underfunded scholars who wish to attend in person.
We invite paper and panel submissions from philosophers at all career stages. We highly encourage submissions from current graduate students, as well as recent Ph.D. graduates.
We welcome submissions from Latinx philosophers in any area of philosophy, including (but not limited to) Critical Theory, Epistemology, Ethics, Feminist Philosophy, History of Philosophy, Indigenous Philosophy, Latin American Philosophy, Metaphysics, Philosophy of Language, Philosophy of Mind, Philosophy of Race, Philosophy of Science, and Social and Political Philosophy.
In addition, we welcome submissions from non-Latinx philosophers working in Latin American Philosophy or whose work explicitly addresses issues relevant to Latinx and Latin American peoples.
Submission Instructions
Paper submissions require an 800–1000 word extended abstract (excluding notes and bibliography) prepared for anonymous review. The final version of the project should be suitable for a 25-minute presentation.
Panel proposals should be 1000–1500 words (excluding notes and bibliography) and should set out in some detail the focus of the proposed panel. Please only submit proposals if all proposed panelists have confirmed a willingness to attend if selected (either in person or online). Panels should include no more than three panelists and each panelist should plan to present for 20 minutes.
For both paper and panel proposals: submissions should be sent as a PDF file to latinxphilosophyconference@gmail.com. Below the submission title, include a word count and list the primary subfield(s) under which the submission falls, plus 1–3 keywords, e.g., epistemology (testimonial injustice, social epistemology). In a separate PDF file, please include your name(s), paper/panel submission title, academic affiliation (if applicable), career stage (e.g., graduate student, recent PhD graduate, associate professor), email address, preferred mode of attendance (in person or online), and whether you wish to be considered for a need-based travel award.