Writing/Reading Jeremiah

Call For Papers: The Reading/Writing Jeremiah section hosts two sessions: 1) Open session - proposals are warmly invited: Cultural Production of “the Body” in Jeremiah. Key discursive moments in Jeremiah narrate the "body" of Judah and the "body" of the prophet Jeremiah. Judah is said to have "sprawled and played the whore" (2:20; 3:1-2, 6, and related passages); the bones of Judah's leaders are to be spread like dung on the ground (8:1-2); Judah's sin is said to be inscribed with an iron stylus on the people's hearts (17:1); the Law will be inscribed on hearts in the coming days of the new covenant (31:33). Jeremiah writhes in anguish (4:19), lamenting his woundedness (10:19) and articulating his experience of violation (20:7-9); he drapes his body with a loincloth that will symbolize the ruined pride of Judah (13:1-11) and must constrain his sexual energy (16:1-4); his body is cast into a cistern (38:1-13). This panel seeks to theorize ways in which ancient and contemporary cultural production of "the body" (Jeremiah's, Judah's) inscribes relations of power and vulnerability. Interdisciplinary investigations of embodiment are encouraged. 2) Invited session: Whither Jeremiah Scholarship?: Retrospective and Prospective. Senior scholars who have worked on Jeremiah will discuss how their views have stayed the same and/or changed over the past twenty-five years. The panelists are invited to address one or more of the following prompts: 1) How did the publication of the commentaries by Holladay, McKane, and Carroll energize or complicate your own position on Jeremiah? 2) What misunderstanding or inadequately theorized position regarding Jeremiah would you like to dispatch once and for all? 3) What new trajectory of interpretation for Jeremiah do you find most promising? Panelists will be encouraged to situate themselves with regard to the methodological debates accompanying the rise of postmodernism, rather than just offering views on this or that 'local' historical or literary is

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