Religious Experience in Antiquity

Call For Papers: The Religious Experience in Antiquity unit will hold 4 sessions, 3 with open calls for papers. (1) We invite paper proposals for an open session on any topic connected to Religious Experience in Antiquity. This call is open to scholars working in any period or geographical region of antiquity. We ask that you specify the texts or other material artifacts under discussion and include a clear methodological perspective. Innovative approaches are most welcome. (2) Together with the Healthcare and Disability in the Ancient World unit and the Mind, Society, and Religion unit, we invite proposals for short papers (10 min) to be circulated among participants 2 weeks before the meeting, on this topic: Medical anthropology and Disability Studies have demonstrated the significance of culture in the experience and effects of illness, as well as the (successful) treatment of these conditions. For this session, we invite papers that explore the relationship between the biological (including psychological) features of illness and the cultural responses to it. How do specific cultural instances of diagnosis or treatment (e.g., pharmaceuticals, ritual, dream incubation, isolation) interact with underlying cognitive and biological patterns? How are innate heuristics (e.g., of contagion, ingestion, transformation) expressed in specific cases in ancient texts and societies? (3) Together with several other program units, we are co-sponsoring a session in memory of Professor Elizabeth Clark. We invite papers that showcase productive engagements with an aspect of her research, highlighting future trajectories emerging from her expansive oeuvre. We particularly encourage contributions from scholars who have not been explicitly mentored by her, including graduate students and early career professionals. (4) We will hold an invited session to review Reed Carlson’s monograph, Unfamiliar Selves in the Hebrew Bible: Possession and other Spirit Phenomena (Ekstasis 9; De Gruyter, 2022).

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