Call for Applications for the upcoming Feminist Critical Analysis course, which will take place in Dubrovnik (Croatia) from May 28 to June 1. Note that the extended deadline is April 28, but we urge you to apply as soon as possible.
We would also like to draw your attention to the stipends offered to doctoral/PhD students by the Inter-University Center in Dubrovnik. You can find more information here: http://www.iuc.hr/hesp-osi.php.
Center for Gender Studies Jove Ilića 165 11000 Belgrade
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Feminist Critical Analysis
Inter-University Center (IUC), Dubrovnik
May 28th to June 1st, 2012
The Center for Gender and Politics of the Belgrade University (Political Science Department), Womens and Gender Studies at Rutgers of the State University of New Jersey, and the Department of Gender Studies of the Central European University (CEU) in Budapest are pleased to announce the next annual postgraduate course in
Feminist Critical Analysis: Science, Bodies and the New Materialism.
The course will be held at the Inter-University Centre, Dubrovnik (www.iuc.hr) from May 28 to June 1 (2012).
The course is co-directed by Dasa Duhacek, Center for Gender and Politics, University of Belgrade, Ethel Brooks, Womens and Gender Studies Department, Rutgers University and Anna Loutfi, Gender Studies Department, Central European University (CEU).
The course is built on the intellectual dialogue among a diverse body of scholars from different geographical locations and the participating faculty is drawn from different universities.
Topic
The seminar invites discussion of a key issue currently bringing together disciplines from across the humanities, social, physical and life sciences: the nature of materiality. What are the significant philosophical and theoretical contributions to materialism, past and present? Why does it become necessary for political or social theory to engage with particular ideas of materialism or materiality at certain historical junctures? What does it mean to speak of the social, cultural, political and historical meanings of natural or material concepts? How might the natural sciences incorporate social theories of ontology and agency, and how might the social sciences incorporate issues around materiality as they surface in, say, neurobiology or physics? How can knowledge help situate and make sense of embodiment and lived experience? We encourage explorations of ecological frameworks that challenge reductionist, mechanistic, and exclusively molecular approaches to life and living systems. We encourage reading and debate around the work of contemporary thinkers in the fields of biopolitics who interrogate the politics of life itself? (e.g.Giorgio Agamben). We also invite discussion around the work of the new materialists. This is a rich field that takes on a wide range of modern philosophical traditions. These include, but are not confined to, vitalistic theories (e.g.Henri Bergson, Gilles Deleuze), neo-Marxian materialisms (Bourdieu, Balibar), phenomenological accounts of agency and materiality (Merleau-Ponty, Heidegger), theories of psychic power as a materialist force in the world (Nietzsche, Freud), feminist re-engagements with materiality, lived experience and biology (Moira Gatens, Elizabeth Wilson, Coole and Frost, Elizabeth Grosz), as well as social scientific investigations of problems in the neurosciences, such as the problem of consciousness or the mind-brain relation (Fernando Vidal).
ELIGIBILITY
IUC courses are conducted at a postgraduate level. All postgraduate students interested in the topic may apply for participation. Participants should seek funds from their own institutions to cover travel and accommodation costs. Limited financial support is available for participants from Central and Eastern Europe. All meetings are conducted in English.
APPLICATION PROCEDURE
A short narrative (up to 250 words) explaining your interest in the topic and your C.V. with your current complete contact information should be submitted by e-mail;
Final deadline for applications is April 28, 2012
Please send your applications to the Center for Gender and Politics University of Belgrade, Faculty of Political Sciences, at studijeroda@fpn.bg.ac.rs with Dubrovnik 2012 in the subject heading.
We are pleased to announce that socialist feminist writer and activist Sheila Rowbotham will give the third annual Frow lecture, which is entitled 'Dreamers of a new day: British and American women's alternative economic visions in the late 19th and early 20th centuries'. 
