chr 500-0bchr 500-0bchr 500-0bchr 500-0b
  • Home
  • About
    • DSI-NRF Flagship
    • Partnerships
    • Funders
    • Staff
    • Reports
  • Research Platforms
    • Areas of Focus
      • Aesthetic Education and the Becoming Technical of the Human
      • Migrating Violence
      • Political Theory and Philosophy
      • Visual History and Theory
      • Kinetic Objects
      • Communicating the Humanities
    • NRF SARChI Chair in Visual History & Theory
      • Postgraduate bursaries and postdoctoral fellowships in Visual History & Theory
      • Postgraduate Module In Visual History, 2023 (HIS 735/835)
    • Andrew W. Mellon Chair of Aesthetic Theory and Material Performance
    • Factory of the Arts
      • About the Factory of the Arts
      • Convening the Factory of the Arts
      • Artists in Residence
    • Laboratory of Kinetic Objects
    • Other Universals
    • Seminar Programme
    • Publications
  • Greatmore
  • Fellowship Programme
    • Fellows
    • Winter School
    • Visiting Scholars
  • Media
    • Video
    • Podcast
    • Galleries
    • Film
  • Events
    • Workshops
    • Conferences
    • Lectures
    • Special Meetings
    • Colloquia
    • Seminars
    • Exhibitions
    • Arts Events
  • News
  • Contact
✕

Planetary Humanities for Planetary Knowledge: Toward a New Research Agenda

Foreigner by Manfred Zylla (CHR/UWC art collection)

Foreigner by Manfred Zylla (CHR/UWC art collection)

Foreigner by Manfred Zylla (CHR/UWC art collection)
Foreigner by Manfred Zylla (CHR/UWC art collection)
The Planetary Humanities Workshop takes place on 2 and 3 December, 2022 in Cape Town

Building on the outcomes of an online meeting in June 2021, and a precirculated position paper, the Planetary Humanities Workshop’s aim is to identify the core questions that define the project, to clarify the fundamental concepts that ground it, and to develop strategies for continuing work.

The workshop is a collaborative project sponsored by the Centre for Humanities Research, UWC, the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, the Gerda Henkel Foundation, the University of Toronto Office of the Vice Provost International, the University of Toronto Critical Zones Project, and the University of Toronto Comparative Literature Department

For a full programme please see below link:
DOWNLOAD FULL PROGRAMME

Aim of the workshop


Our aim in this workshop will be to identify the core questions that define our project, to clarify the fundamental concepts that ground it, and to develop strategies for continuing work. Our discussion will build on the outcomes of the June 2021 online meeting and the pre-circulated position paper.

Structure of the workshop


We will meet in four 3-hour sessions as follows:

Friday 2 December:

9:00-12:00. Introduction. The idea of an academy for planetary humanities

Introduced by Dominic Sachsenmaier and Bo Strath

Respondent: Nkatha Kabira

What are the central problems and what is the basic conception of an “academy” that can further the aims set out in the position paper? What are the main points arising from the position paper? What are the consequences for our understanding of historical processes? The role of the emotions and reason in public processes? How does this affect the task(s) of the humanities?

13:00-16:00. The humanities and the limits of institutionalized knowledge.

Introduced by John Noyes

Respondent: Premesh Lalu

How do we identify the historical complicity of dominant global knowledge systems with colonialism, imperialism, epistemicide, the obliteration of non-Western ways of knowing in the wake of Enlightenment? What alternatives to Western institutionalized knowledge exist in various places? How to re-introduce alternative and often ancient knowledge systems into humanities scholarship, without them being coopted to legitimize existing institutional structures or to shore up emerging nationalisms?  How best to initiate and foster an equitable exchange of ideas across institutional boundaries, but also across the institutional wealth divide? What is the potential for universities to promote alternative forms and practices of humanities knowledge?

Saturday 3 December:

9:00-12:00. The humanities and global governance.

Introduced by Hagen Schulz-Forberg and Anna Triandafyllidou

Respondent: Sam Sadian

How do we actualize the potential for humanities research to inform a new planetary governance? In what ways does this involve a new planetary public, and what might such a public look like? How are advanced digital technologies shaping a possible ‘planetary’ governance and a planetary ‘public’? To what extend does this involve utilization of existing non-governmental and para-governmental forums, like think tanks, NGO’s, etc., and to what extent does it involve inventing new ones? How does the phenomenon of mass human migrationand of different forms of mobility (including digital mobility)  impact on humanities knowledge? Is there a way to incorporate new forms of humanities knowledge emerging on the ground in migration? What would such knowledge look like?

13:00-16:00. Concluding discussion and the outlook for developing the initiative.

Introduced by Bo Strath

Respondent: Jacob Mapara

What have we learned from the discussions? How can we consolidate the ideas developed here to take the project forward?

DOWNLOAD FULL PROGRAMME
Share
1

Recent News

September 26, 2023

On Non Western Marxisms


Read more

Images: Nafasi Academy. Credit: Kim Gurney

September 21, 2023

Publication announcement: Dr Kim Gurney, ‘Epistemic Disobedience’.


Read more
September 20, 2023

Award Announcement: Aja Marneweck, “Best Faculty Academic Impact: Creative Arts Output Award 2022.”


Read more
September 7, 2023

Oscillations Workshop: Sonic Inquiries and Practices


Read more

Search

✕

Sign Up to our newsletter


Stay up to date with the latest news and developments from the Centre for Humanities Research.




Recent Media

  • Recording: Conversation on Undoing Apartheid
    July 20, 2023
  • RECORDING: Undoing Apartheid, book launch and panel discussion.
    March 23, 2023
  • CHR Winter School, 2022: On the question of the minor
    A reading by Emma Minkley and Kiasha Naidoo
    March 2, 2023
This message is only visible to admins.
Problem displaying Facebook posts. Backup cache in use.
Click to show error
Error: Error validating access token: The user has not authorized application 1123168491105924. Type: OAuthException
Centre for Humanities Research

3 weeks ago

Centre for Humanities Research
Tomorrow, Friday 8 September, Itumeleng Wa Lehulere will be giving a talk at the University of Minnesota’s Interdisciplinary Centre for the Study of Global Change. Titled ‘Standing Stage Left at South African Theatres’ and scheduled for 19:00 – 20:00 (SAST), Wa Lehulere will reflect on his artistic journey from the late 1970s; what he calls “his comrades marathon” and a “journey of brutality, grief, and healing; breaking and mending,searching and searching...and observing”. Please make time to listen to a conversation about art as a weapon of struggle and resistance. You can livestream by following this link: buff.ly/3P6zCTB. Itumeleng’s life in the arts and political fraternities spans over thirty years. Beginning as an activist in apartheid South Africa, he was renowned as a very influential figure that many young people listened to and followed. He played a significant role in the formation of COSAS in the Western Cape, while playing a prominent role in the church, being part of the choir and playing marimba for the St Gabriel’s Catholic Church. His artistic career started as a poet, musician and dancer who later worked with Gibson Kente Productions in Johannesburg, playing lead roles along side Brenda Fassie in “Hungary Spoon”. Affectionately known as Bra E, he has conceptualized and directed a number of prominent pieces of provocative pieces for theatre, like… “You strike the woman, You Strike the Rock” “Down Adderly Street” “Gap toothed Sisters “Roxy” the musical “Diaries of my Womanhood” “Red Winter” “Echoes of our Footsteps”, all of which were played out in the major theaters of South and abroad, spanning a period of over 20 years. After completing his performance Diploma under the prolific Professor Mavis Taylor, Itumeleng worked with many Directors in Theatre that include: Barney Simon, Janice Honeyman, Ester van Ryswerk, Mark Fleishman. Itumeleng has also worked intensively with the legendary Mike van Graan at the Community Arts Project School of Popular Theatre. His best work appeared at the Market theatre under owners of The Handspring Puppet Companies Basil Jones and Adrian Kholer in a production entitled “Carnival of the Bear”. Itumeleng was instrumental in the forming of the Market Theatre laboratory alongside Mark Fleishman under the leadership of Mannie Manim and Barney Simon. Itumeleng has taught at the following institutions: Alexander Arts Center(JHB), Fuba Academy(JHB,) New world Foundation(CT), Community Arts Project(CT), and tutored at the University of Cape Town Drama School. Itumeleng was one of few actors to be contracted to the Performing Arts Council of the Transvaal(1990). He has since been commissioned by City of Cape Town (writer/director: Affirmative Action Education program) which was converted into a video drama also directed by Itumeleng. Itumeleng then moved on to found and direct for twelve years the multi award-winning Ikhwezi Annual Theatre Festival in association with the Baxter Theatre Center at the University of Cape Town under the astute leadership of Mannie Manim. The Festival was chosen as the Cultural Development Project of the year(2004). Itumeleng is also very interested and involved in writing, directing and acting in television series and movies, the latest of which was conceptualizing, writing and directing the acclaimed romantic comedy "Forced Loved" produced by Penguin Films. Itumeleng was the Artistic Director of the Jozi Bookfair, hosted by Khanya College at Wits University (2014-2016). Wa Lehulere is an intellectual who strives to tell current and thought provoking works, that speak to the times. His approach to theatre is avoiding the over use of props to encourage the actor to use his/her instrument(body and voice) to tell the story holistically. He is in residence with ICGC in August and September 2023. ... See MoreSee Less

Photo

View on Facebook
· Share

Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Share on Linked In Share by Email

Centre for Humanities Research

3 weeks ago

Centre for Humanities Research
We are thrilled to invite you to the keynote address by Gascia Ouzounian at our upcoming workshop, Oscillations: Sonic Inquiries and Practices happening rom Monday, 11 September – Thursday, 14 September 2023 at the Greatmore Humanities Hub in Woodstock. Please note that, although this is an open event, space is limited, so if you want to join us, RSVP via email to Miceala Felix at centreforhumanitiesresearch@uwc.ac.za by Monday 11 September. Gascia Ouzounian is a sonic theorist and practitioner whose work explores sound in relation to space, architecture, urbanism, and violence. She is associate professor of music at the University of Oxford, where she leads the European Research Council-funded project Sonorous Cities: Towards a Sonic Urbanism (buff.ly/44FZJXd). She is the author of Stereophonica: Sound and Space in Science, Technology, and the Arts (MIT Press 2021), and has contributed numerous articles to leading journals of music, visual art, and architecture, covering a range of topics, from sonic memories of the Armenian Genocide to sound in radical Black arts traditions to ‘counterlistening’ and women in sound art. Ouzounian’s recent projects include Scoring the City, which takes inspiration from the graphic score and other unconventional notations in experimental music to develop new modes of ‘urban scoring’ (buff.ly/3fXUFFZ); and Acoustic Cities: London & Beirut, which brought together ten artists in creating works that explore the sonic, social, and spatial conditions of two cities. Oscillations is a project by Akademie der Künste (Berlin) Centre for Humanities Research at the University of the Western Cape (Cape Town) and Deutschlandfunk Kultur / Klangkunst (Berlin). Oscillations is funded by the TURN2 Fund of the Kulturstiftung des Bundes (German Federal Cultural Foundation). Funded by the Beauftragte der Bundesregierung für Kultur und Medien (Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media). Supported by the DAAD Arts & Media Program, Kulturstiftung Schloss Wiepersdorf and the National Institute for the Humanities and Social Sciences in South Africa. For more information follow this link: buff.ly/3sMKrTC. ... See MoreSee Less

Photo

View on Facebook
· Share

Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Share on Linked In Share by Email

Centre for Humanities Research

4 weeks ago

Centre for Humanities Research
Mobile uploads ... See MoreSee Less

Photo

View on Facebook
· Share

Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Share on Linked In Share by Email

Centre for Humanities Research

4 weeks ago

Centre for Humanities Research
#MemoryLaneMonday! Throwing it back to our Winter School in August. We even managed to get schooled by our very own Phokeng Setai at the @norvalfoundation's Berni Searle retrospective, 'Having But Little Gold'. ... See MoreSee Less

Photo

View on Facebook
· Share

Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Share on Linked In Share by Email

Centre for Humanities Research

4 weeks ago

Centre for Humanities Research
We had a wonderful writing workshop and masterclass yesterday with Eoin McNamee, the CHR's inaugural #Maxeke-Robinson Research Chair. If creative writing is, according to McNamee, ultimately an act of bearing witness, then “teaching” writing is really about teaching the art of careful observation, attentiveness, and deep perception; moving from the periphery to the centre and building each piece of writing from the negative space that surrounds characters and effects. Details matter and the writer's craft entails sharp attentiveness to the minutiae of a story in order to activate the reader's sensory faculties. We had the great pleasure of welcoming colleagues from the English Department’s Creative Writing programme and hope this workshop catalyses other opportunities for collaboration. ... See MoreSee Less

Photo

View on Facebook
· Share

Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Share on Linked In Share by Email

Research Platforms

  • NRF SARChI Chair in Visual History and Theory
  • Andrew W. Mellon Chair of Aesthetic Theory and Material Performance
  • Factory of the Arts
  • Laboratory of Kinetic Objects
  • Seminar Programme
  • Publications

Recently Added

  • On Non Western Marxisms
    September 26, 2023
  • Publication announcement: Dr Kim Gurney, ‘Epistemic Disobedience’.
    September 21, 2023
  • Award Announcement: Aja Marneweck, “Best Faculty Academic Impact: Creative Arts Output Award 2022.”
    September 20, 2023
✕

SUBSCRIBE TO OUR NEWSLETTER


Stay up to date with the latest news and developments from the Centre for Humanities Research.



© 2017 The Centre for Humanities Research. All Rights Reserved. Designed By Spotkolours Design