Fwd: Summer School "Seeing Matter(s): Materiality and Visuality" (Heidelberg, July 29-August 4, 2012)

[Birgit Kellner]

Dear Indology members,

The Cluster of Excellence "Asia and Europe in a Global Context" welcomes 
applications for its Summer School "Seeing Matter(s): Materiality and 
Visuality" to take place at the Karl Jaspers Centre from Sunday, July 
29, to Saturday, August 4, 2012.

This year's Summer School "Seeing Matter(s): Materiality and Visuality" 
will explore the role of visual and material culture in the context of 
transcultural exchange processes between Asia and Europe. In 
highlighting the tensions between visual culture studies, art historical 
approaches and recent material culture studies, the Summer School will 
address questions such as: How can we move "beyond representation" to 
take on images in all their tangibility and material presence? Is "thing 
theory" a site for us to analyse the confluence of materiality and 
visuality? How can we look at images and objects differently when we 
approach them from transdisciplinary and transcultural perspectives? In 
what ways do such perspectives challenge concepts and methods of our own 
disciplines?

Another aim of our Summer School is to address the transgressing 
mobility of images and objects as a key challenge for today's 
Humanities, by tying it to current theoretical debates on this subject 
within various disciplines and testing it in case studies derived from 
the participants' research projects and regions.

The programme is designed to provide stimulating discussions and new 
inspiration for graduate and junior research work, to exchange ideas and 
test methods from individual research projects and to actively engage 
with an international group of peers and senior scholars who share an 
interest in transcultural visuality and materiality. Keynotes will be 
presented by Kenneth George (Anthropology, University of 
Wisconsin-Madison) and Janice Bardsley (Japanese Humanities, University 
of North Carolina at Chapel Hill). Invited speakers include Kajri Jain 
(South Asian Visual Culture, University of Toronto Mississauga), Sumathi 
Ramaswamy (History, Duke University), Kavita Singh (Art History, 
Jawaharlal Nehru University), and Paola Zamperini (Asian Languages and 
Civilizations, Amherst College). Contributions from Heidelberg 
University come from Christiane Brosius (Visual and Media Anthropology), 
Monica Juneja (Global Art History), Barbara Mittler (Chinese Studies), 
and Melanie Trede (Japanese Art Histories).

Applications are accepted until April 15, 2012. The application form and 
additional information on fees, scholarships and the programme can be 
found at http://www.asia-europe.uni-heidelberg.de/en/summerschool/

The Cluster's Summer School 2012 is organised by Christiane Brosius 
(Heidelberg) together with Barbara Mittler (Heidelberg) and Sumathi 
Ramaswamy (Duke), coordinators of project B4 "Transcultural Visuality". 
Christiane Brosius holds the Chair of Visual and Media Anthropology at 
the Cluster, Barbara Mittler is Speaker of Research Area B "Public 
Spheres", Sumathi Ramaswamy, Professor of History, is one of the Key 
Partners of the Cluster.

We would appreciate it if you forwarded this information to your 
colleagues and interested students and thank you for your support.

With best wishes
Dr. Alexander Haentzschel, Press Officer


--
The Cluster of Excellence "Asia and Europe in a Global Context" is an 
interdisciplinary network of researchers at Heidelberg University. About 
200 scholars examine the processes of cultural exchange between Asia and 
Europe from a global perspective.

www.asia-europe.uni-heidelberg.de