Dienstag
30
JUL
| 09.00 Uhr | Local Responses to Global Problems:
a transcultural approach
final workshop organized by Professors Annette Hornbacher (IfE) and William Sax (SAI)
Following two workshops in Yogyakarta, Indonesia (August 2018) and Oruthota, Sri Lanka (April 2019), the third and final workshop organized by Professors Annette Hornbacher (IfE) and William Sax (SAI) and funded by the DFG will take place at CATS from 30 July to 01 August. It will focus on violent aspects of modernization and local responses to them in Sri Lanka, Indonesia, and Europe
Modernization is usually understood as a universal and pervasive process of rationalization not only of socio-political life but of the relation between humans and their environment. Although this process includes technologies allowing an unprecedented degree of rational control, and therefore associated with ideas of steady progress, it is also clearly implicated in new and unprecedented levels of violence against human beings, sustainable lifeways, even the earth itself. The devastating technocratic wars and the ‘’rational’ extinction of unwanted groups during the 20th century shows a frightening “dialectics of enlightenment” (Adorno/ Horkheimer) that is comparable – and indeed politically and materially directly related to – the global consequences of modernisation for the biosphere. New forms of agriculture (green revolution, industrial farming) have produced more food for more people at the cost of extreme environmental damage, contributing to climate change and ecosystem collapse, and closer examination shows the inherent relation between agrochemicals, agribusiness and a history of devastating wars and political violence in Europe and Asia. Dangerous substances meant to improve human life (agrochemicals, hormones, pharmaceuticals, plastic) have found their way into the human body, with poorly-understood consequences. Our exploratory meetings investigated if and how societies and individuals in Germany, Sri Lanka, and Indonesia respond, resist, or ignore such destructive side effects of global modernization. Which are the conceptual frameworks of local criticism and resistance? Which of these attempts have failed, which have succeeded, under what conditions, and why? Who are the visionaries and activists who dream of making a better world by means of indigenous alternatives in the realms of medicine, farming, politics, religion and spirituality? When do such alternatives, both past and present, restore or protect ancient techniques and practices, and when (and why) do they lead to reactionary forms of nationalism?
Participants:
Agusno, Dr. Mahar, psychiatrist, Yogyakarta
de Alwis, Dr. Malathi, anthropologist, Colombo
Cakra, I Made, environmental activist, Ubud
Hettige, Prof. Dr. Siri, sociologist, Colombo
Hornbacher, Prof. Dr. Annette, anthropologist, Heidelberg
Ninik, Supartini, social scientist, Yogyakarta
Nurrachman, Prof. Dr. Nani, psychologist, Jakarta
Pilipitaya, Dr. Senaka, physician, Anuradhapura
Sax, Prof. Dr. William, anthropologist, Heidelberg
Semedi, Prof. Dr. Pujo, anthropologist, Yogyakarta
Simatupang, Dr. Lono, theatre scholar, Yogyakarta
Sivagnanam, Prof. Dr. Jeyasankar, theatre director, Batticaloa
Stepan, Lea, M.A. doctoral candidate, Heidelberg.
Tudor Silva, Prof. Dr. Kalinga, sociologist, Sri Lanka
Wardaya, Prof. Baskara, historian and theologian, Java
The conference is closed to the general public
Adresse Centre for Asian and Transcultural Studies (CATS) tba Voßstrasse 2 69115 Heidelberg Veranstalter Centre for Asian and Transcultural Studies (CATS) Homepage Veranstalter https://www.cats.uni-heidelberg.de Kontakt contact@cats.uni-heidelberg.de |