Capturing the Seen: Medieval Pilgrimage in Aachen
January 30, 2023
Workshop: “Constructing and Performing Hope in the Premodern World” – April 13-14, 2023, Tampere University
February 8, 2023
Pilgrimage Studies Network (PILNET) of EASA (European Association of Social Anthropologists)
PILNET invites papers that explore these and related fields.
Please send abstracts (300-350 words) and inquiries to [email protected] by February 10.
Click here for the CFP from PILNET.
WORKSHOP 2023
Cambridge, England May 26-27, 2023
From Antistructure to Infrastructure: New Materialities in Pilgrimage Studies
Convenor
Simon Coleman, University of Toronto and Clare Hall, Cambridge
Location:
Clare Hall, Cambridge
Abstract
Pilgrimage is usually understood to be materialized through specific types of sacred objects— relics, shrines, scriptures, statues, temples, sacralized bodies (either living or dead). In what is planned to be an informal, intimate workshop, we encourage scholars of pilgrimage to broaden the scope of what might constitute the salient materialities of pilgrimage. A focus on infrastructure looks less at sacred objects that are put on display and more at background forms of mediation that enable flows of goods and people to and around pilgrimage complexes. The ‘peculiar ontology’ of infrastructures lies in the fact that ‘they are things and also the relation between things’ (Larkin 2013). Pathways, varieties of non-sacred building, transportation systems, guides, maps, social media, taxes, visas, administrative, medical and policing systems all embody the physical apparatuses that are necessary for pilgrimage to take place. Indeed, they may play a key rôle in determining the character of the experience, In some cases, such as the Vision 2030 agenda promulgated in Saudi Arabia, pilgrimage in the form of the Hajj and the Umrah actually contributes to the planned infrastructure of state renewal.
A focus on infrastructure has the potential to ask new questions concerning scale, governance, economy, mobility, and materiality in relation to pilgrimage.
Some areas of discussion might be:
- The visibility or hiddenness of infrastructures in pilgrimage
- The development of roads and other pathways as part of pilgrimage
- Mapping and pilgrimage
- The establishment of ‘secular’ pilgrimage buildings to complement overtly sacred places
- Social media platforms as ‘hosts’ for enabling and/or enacting sacred journeys
- Public-private partnerships in the transportation of people and goods to and from shrines
- Growth in security and surveillance systems around the organization of mass travel and gathering
- Pilgrimages as occasions of medical risk
- Accountabilities for failure in pilgrimage infrastructures
