Program
45th Annual Conference of the International Merleau-Ponty Circle
Critical Phenomenology and Merleau-Ponty’s Open Futures
Western University, London, On, Canada
Friday, October 22, 2021
9:00-9:30 ET Opening Remarks: Helen Fielding, Western University, Conference Director
Conference Opening: Anishinaabe Elder Mona Stonefish (Bear Clan)
Session 1 Universality and the Multiplicity of Worlds
Moderator: Jonathan De Souza, Western University
9:30-10:15 Juho Hotanen, University of Jyväskylä: “Changing Universality”
10:15-10:20 Break
10:20-11:05 Brooklyn Leo, Pennsylvania State University: “Merleau-Ponty’s Multiplicity of Worlds”
11:05-11:15 Break
Keynote
Moderator: Patricia Locke, St. John’s College
11:15-12:00 Gail Weiss, George Washington University: “Shared Space yet Unshared Worlds: A Critical Phenomenology of the Clinical Encounter”
12:00-1:30 Lunch and Grad Student Mentoring Session
1:30-2:45 Friday Plenary
Introduction: David Morris, Concordia University
Donald Landes, Université Laval
“The Communication of Sense and the Vestiges of Expression: Translation and the Phenomenology of Perception”
2:45-3:00 Break
Session 2 Symbolic Forms and the Limits of Perception
Moderator: Delia Popa, Villanova University
3:00-3:45 Rajiv Kaushik, Brock University: “Reading Barbaras Reading Merleau-Ponty: Reconsidering ‘Desire’ and ‘Distance’ as ‘Symbolic Forms’”
3:45-4:00 Break
Keynote
4:00-4:45 Dorothea Olkowski, University of Colorado, Colorado Springs: “Man the Hero: On the Limits of Perception for Social Interaction in Merleau-Ponty”
Saturday, Oct. 23
Session 3 Pandemic Structures Moderator: Peter Antich, Trinity College
10:30-11:15 Erik Bormanis, Stony Brook University: “Haunting, Loss, and Generality: Accounting for the Phantom in Merleau-Ponty”
11:15-11:20 Break
11:20-12:05 Talia Welsh, The University of Tennessee at Chattanooga: “Can I? A Critical Phenomenology of Gripping in the Pandemic”
12:05-12:30 Lunch
12:30-2:00 Business Meeting
Session 4 M.C. Dillon Award Winner Introduction: Joel Reynolds, Georgetown University
2:00-2:45 Corinne Lajoie, Pennsylvania State University: “Crip Disorientations and the Complexity of Belonging”
2:45-2:50 Break
Session 5 Critical Phenomenology: Affect and Genealogy
Moderator: April Flakne, New College of Florida
Keynote
2:50-3:35 Shiloh Whitney, Fordham University: “Critical Phenomenology as 'Emotional Work'? Affect in Critical Phenomenological Method”
3:35-3:45 Break
Keynote
3:45-4:30 Mona Stonefish, Anishinaabe Elder (Bear Clan): “Truth”
Sunday, Oct. 24
Session 6 Critical Phenomenology and Art
Moderator: Rachel Elliott, Brandon University
9:30-10:15 Adam Blair, Stony Brook University: “The Practice of Playful Description: Phenomenology as a Creative and Critical Poetry”
10:15-10:20 Break
10:20-11:05 Stefan Kristensen, Université de Strasbourg: “The Animal as an Artist: Merleau-Ponty and an Ecological Aesthetics”
11:05-11:15 Break
11:15-12:00 Jorella Andrews, Goldsmiths, University of London: “Pictorial Rationality, Trans- culturalism, and the Work of Art”
12:00-1:00 Lunch
Session 7 Decolonization
Moderator: Silvana de Souza Ramos, University of São Paulo
1:00-1:45 Jérôme Melançon, University of Regina: “Linguistic Assimilation and Ontological Harm: Insights from Merleau-Ponty’s Philosophy of Language”
1:45-2:00 Break
2:00-2:45 Lisa Guenther, Queens University: “Asking Different Questions: A Decolonial Reading of Merleau-Ponty’s Institution Course Notes”
2:45-3:00 Break
Sunday Plenary
Introduction: Helen Fielding, Western University
3:00-4:15 Dolleen Tisawii’ashii Manning, Queens National Scholar, Anishinaabe Knowledge, Language and Culture, Queens University: Perception’s Otherwise: Fear & Reciprocity
4:15-4:30 Conference Closing: Anishinaabe Elder Mona Stonefish (Bear Clan)
