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Conference Schedule

2024 Graduate Conference on Intimacy and Desire in the Study of Religion 
Presented by the Religious Studies Graduate Student Association of Northwestern University 

Norris University Center, 1999 Campus Drive, 2nd Floor, Lake Room |  Map

October 26, 2024

Opening Remarks
9:15am-9:30am

Panel 1: Intimacies of Land
9:30am-11:00am
Moderated by Juliana Sexauer

  1. Sadaf Ahmed: Our parents never said “I love you”: Grammars of Intimacy in Muslim Canada
  2. Tsiona Lida, Harvard University: Sacral subjecthood: On Desire in Abraham Isaac Kook’s Zionism
  3. Jeffrey Sánchez, Stanford University: Risky Business(es): Botanica’s, Public Health, and the Mis/understanding of Latinx Religion

Break 
11:00am-11:15am

Panel 2: Reading Intimacies
11:15am-12:45pm
Moderated by Daniela Rosas

  1. Jeffrey Ng, Harvard Divinity School: Embracing the Erotic: The Interplay of Celibacy and Fangzhongshu in Chinese Religious Traditions
  2. Haseena Sahib and Alina Pokhrel: Intimacy as One, Intimacy as Empty: A Comparative Reading of Sufi and Buddhist Poetry
  3. Zhujun Ma, Brown University: Practicing Intimacy in the Textual Devotional Communities: The Deity-Human Relationships in Precious Scrolls about the Goddess of Mount Tai in Early Modern China

Lunch
12:45pm-2:00pm

Panel 3: Digital and Media Intimacies
2:00pm-3:30pm
Moderated by Izzak Novak

  1. Zainab Khalid, Queen’s University: Sexuality of Absences: Feminine Embodiment in Sufi Practices of Desire
  2. Cella Masso-Rivetti, Columbia University: Romance’s Horrors in The Thorn Birds: The Production of American Desire in Catholic Fiction 
  3. Abtsam Saleh, Harvard University: The Power and Peril of Influence: Exploring Digital intimacies, Spiritual Abuse, and Accountability

Break
3:30pm-4:00pm

 

Keynote #1: Mona Oraby, Howard University

4:00pm-5:00pm

October 27, 2024

Panel 4: Sensorial Intimacies
9:30am-10:45am
Moderate by Grace Christensen

  1. Amber Stanford, Princeton University: The “Noise” of Prophet Jones
  2. Hafiz Muhammad Bilal: Exploring Intimacy and Desire in Pakistani Madrasa Education 

Break

10:45am-11:00am

Panel 5: Scholarly Intimacies
11:00am-12:30pm
Moderated by Hawkins Lewis

  1. Febi R. Ramadhan, Northwestern University: The Tale of a Suffocated Fish: Muslims with Same-Sex Attraction and the Impossibility of Queer Possibilities
  2. Ali Yıldırım, University of Minnesota, Twin Cities: Transcending Gender, Becoming Can: Intimate Scenes from a Fieldwork 
  3. Karis Ryu, Yale University: Dreaming as Method, Dreaming as Solidarity: Thoughts on Ethnographic Partnership

Lunch

12:30pm-1:45pm

 

Keynote #2: Omar Kasmani, Freie Universität Berlin

1:45pm-2:45pm

 

Keynote and Audience Conversation
2:45pm-3:45pm

Closing Remarks
3:45pm