Date and place: 27 November 2015, from 1:30pm – 6pm, conference room of the Institute of Czech Literature, Na Florenci 3.

Partners: IGK 56 (Freiburg University) – CEFRES – Charles University in Prague.

Language: English.

Program

1:30: Charlotte Krauss and Clara Royer – Welcome and Introduction.

Panel 1. Moderator: Veronika Čapská (FHS UK)

1:45: Tomáš Masař (FF UK) – Czech and Finnish Mutual Interactions During  the Long 19th Century.

2:15: Nataliya Kopcha (RSUH Moscow) – Fedor Dostoevskij as a Cultural Good in Germany of the Early 20th Century: Selection, Distribution and Reception.

Panel 2. Moderator: Charlotte Krauss (Freiburg University)

2:45: Natalja Salnikova (Freiburg University) – The social and cultural life of things: Migrating household objects (Hausrat) as an identity resource.

3:15: Monika Brenišínová (CEFRES – FF UK) – Sixteenth Century Mexican Architecture: the Circulation of Forms and Ideas Between Europe and America.

3:45: Break.

Panel 3. Moderator: Ľuda Klusaková (FF UK)

4:15: Katja Plachov (Freiburg University) – Bridges or Bulwarks? The Presentation of Soviet Russia in The Mind and Face of Bolshevsim (1926). The Author René Fülöp-Miller as an Intermediate in Soviet–Western European Relations During the Interwar Period.

4:45: Daniela Hannová (FF UK) – Arab Communism Across Europe. Arab Communists in France and Czechoslovakia and the Limits of Cultural Transfers.

Panel 4. Moderator: Christian Jacques (Strasbourg University)

5:15: Cécile Guillaume-Pey (CEFRES & FMSH) – Writing from the Margins. Appropriation of Literacy and Emergence of Indigenous Movements in India and Beyond.

5:45: Linda Kovářová (FF UK) – Cultural Transfers Between City and Countryside (so called neorurals/cultural creative individuals).

From Spirit to Letter. Modes of Appropriating Script among Tribal Groups in India

Research Area 1: Displacements, “Dépaysements” and Discrepancies

Contact: cecile.guillaume-pay@cefres.cz

From the 18th century on among colonized populations, many systems of graphic signs were born in the frame of nascent religious movements. Such was the case among the Soras, a tribal group in Central Eastern India. At the end of the 1930s, a Sora school teacher came up with a script, whose letters each materialize a deity, and which came to be worshiped by the believers of the religious movement founded by him. As this holy alphabet spread, new forms of liturgy came into being and the transmission modes of ritual skills were redesigned. This research aims at understanding how an intrument of power-knowledge such as writing was reshaped by the ritual landscape in which it was rooted, and at assessing the extent to which such a medium, creatively reappropriated by the actors who got hold of it, contributes to redefining their religious practices and representations. The various forms of resistance stirred by this new way of apprehending the divine, should also be appraised—from both a social and cognitive point of view. Based on an ethnography led amidst a community, where script was first and foremost used for ritual purposes, this comparative study will appraise contexts of creation, dissemination and uses of graphic systems invented among tribal groups in 19th century India.

CV

Current situation

Associated to Centre d’Anthropologie Sociale (LISST, UMR 5193, CNRS-EHESS, Jean Jaurès University)

Education

2012: Qualification to become a university assistant professor in section 20 (Ethnology) of the University National Council (C.N.U.).

2011: PhD in Anthropology – École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales. Dissertation title: Du sang à l’écriture. Les pratiques rituelles des Sora (un groupe tribal du centre-est de l’Inde. Under the supervision of Marine Carrin (CNRS). Thesis jury: J-P. Albert, A. De Sales, M. Carrin, G. Tarabout, G. Toffin. With the degree “très honorable avec félicitations du jury” (summa cum laude).

2005: 2nd year of MA in Anthropology – École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales. Mention très bien (equ. UK 1st class degree), top of class.

2004: MA in Philosophy – Toulouse 2 Le Mirail University.

2003: 1st year of MA in Anthropology – Toulouse 2 Le Mirail University.

2003: BA in Philosophy – Toulouse 2 Le Mirail University.

2002: BA in Ethnology – Toulouse 2 Le Mirail University.

Grants and Fellowships

• Post-doctoral research grant, Yale Institute of Sacred Music (2014-2015).
• Post-doctoral research grant, Fondation Fyssen (2012-2013).
• PhD grant at EHESS (2005-2008).
• Grant of Institut National d’Histoire de l’Art (2006).

Professional Experience

2014–2015: Lecturer at Yale Department of Religious Studies.

2014 (Summer semester): Part-time lecturer at University College Cork. Courses: “Indigenous religions” (BA), “Research methods and fieldwork project” (MA).

2012–2013: Post-doctoral researcher at Fyssen, University College Cork and Queen’s University Belfast. Organization of a workshop on “Indigenous Aesthetics and Marginalised Systems of  Knowledge”. Co-organizer of a weekly research seminar (for MA and PhD students). Participations in the MA seminar “Deities, Devotion and Disciplines in Indian Religions”.

2009–2011: Organization of lecture cycles on India and teaching at Toulouse 2 Le Mirail University and at Université du Temps Libre et l’Université Populaire de Philosophie.

2005–2008: “Allocataire de recherche et monitorat” at Toulouse 2 Le Mirail University. 3 year-long PhD grant; 64 yearly teaching hours.

Research Field

• India, tribes
• Religion and identity assertions
• Aesthetical practices
• Ritual performances
• Transmission of knowledge
• Script inventions and practices

Publications

Articles in peer-reviewed journals

• “Pots-esprits et peintures-maisons chez les Sora”, in La Force des objets, Archives de Sciences Sociales des Religions (forthcoming).
• “Corps de pierres, chants et grognements”, in « La puissance divine. Actes du colloque international en hommage à Jean-Pierre Vernant », Bibliothèque de l’École des Hautes Études, Sciences Religieuses (BEHE) (forthcoming).

Chapters in Collective Works

• “Whose Centre? Gonasika, a Tribal Sacred Place and a Hindu Centre of Pilgrimage”, in M. Carrin & L. Guzy (eds.), Voices from the Periphery. Subalternity and Empowerment in India, Routledge, 2012, p. 182-202.
• “From blood to scripture. Religious conversions and the making of identity among the Sora (a scheduled tribe from Orissa-Andhra Pradesh border)”, in M. Carrin, G. Toffin & P. Kanungo (eds.), The Politics of Ethnicity on the Margins of the State: Janajati/Adivasis in India and Nepal, Primus, 2014, p. 223-239.
• “From ritual images to Animated Movies. The transformative journey of Sora paintings”, in U. Skoda, B. Lettmann & N. Kumar (dir.) Mapping Visualities: India and its Visual Cultures, SAGE (in press).
• “Between village and school, Transmission of ritual knowledge among the Sora young generation”, in M. Carrin et D. Blanc (eds.), Transfer of Knowledge and Children Agency: Rebuilding the Paradigm of Socialization, Primus (in press).
• “Du rituel au dessin animé. Trajectoires d’images divines chez les Sora de l’Andhra Pradesh (Inde)”, in R. Rousseleau (ed.), L’art d’être autochtone : figure du tribal et figurations tribales en Inde  (forthcoming).

Dictionary Entry

• “Ecritures révélées contemporaines”, in R. Azria, D. Hervieu-Leger, D. Iogna-Pratt (eds.), Dictionnaire dynamique des faits religieux. Vocabulaire des sciences sociales du religieux (submitted).

Book Reviews

• “M. Houseman, Le rouge est le noir.  Essais sur le rituel (Toulouse, Presses Universitaire du Mirail, 2012)”, L’Homme, n° 207-208, 2013.
• “A. Kedzierska-Manzon, Chasseurs mandingues. Violence, pouvoir et religion en Afrique de l’Ouest (Paris, Editions Karthala, 2014)”, Archives de sciences sociales des religions (in press).

Summary of the PhD dissertation

• C. Guillaume-Pey, « Du sang à l’écriture. Les pratiques rituelles des Sora, une tribu du centre-est de l’Inde », Archives de sciences sociales des religions, n° 160, 2012, p. 309-358.

PhD Research at CEFRES

Modes of Legitimating Lobbying in Central Europe and their Ambivalences

Research Area 2: Norms & Transgressions.

Against the background of an increasing engagement of public actors in public decision-making through a number of venues such as multi-stakeholder fora or expert groups, this research aims at grasping how such de facto involvement of private actors in the creation of norms translates into changes on a symbolic level in the status of private and public actors. The project explores these transformations on the case of lobbying, that is a set of practices of influence rather traditional in comparison to some of the new modes of influence engaged by private actors. Through the cases of Poland and the Czech Republic, this research seeks to understand how actors of a practice perceived by public opinions as transgressive and lacking legitimacy, endeavour to claim a status and political legitimacy in the public decision-making. Indeed, the processes of professionalization and institutionalization of lobbying can be observed in many countries over the past decade. In the present project, these processes are studied as loci of negotiation of involved actors’ roles and obligations, as well as of the legitimacy of their practices.

CV

Education

2011— Doctoral studies in Political science, cotutelle between Charles University in Prague under the supervision of Pr. Milan Znoj, and Paris Ouest Nanterre La Défense University under the supervision of Pr. Georges Mink.

2004-2010 : Master in Political science and French philology  (Double Program), Charles University in Prague.

Scientific Experience

January 2012 – January 2013 : Teaching assistant at the College of Europe (Natolin Campus, Warsaw), European Interdisciplinary Studies Department.

January 2011 – December 2011 : Young Researcher, Faculty of Arts, Charles University in Prague, the Center of Global Studies (centre of excellence).

Teaching

• Political sociology (mandatory course, BA level
• Private Actors in Politics (optional course, MA level)
• Introduction to Discourse Analysis (optional course, BA level).

Languages

English, French, Czech, Slovak, Polish, German.

Publications

Chapters in Books

• “Deliberativní demokracie: rozpravou za hranice liberální demokracie?”, in M. Znoj et al., Demokracie v postliberální konstelaci, Prague, Karolinum, 2014.

Articles

• “Professional Lobbyists as Representative Claim-Makers”, Human Affairs 25, n° 2, 2015, p. 142-152.
• “Politická participace jako nezaujatá angažovanost v díle Hannah Arendtové”, Reflexe 44, n° 1, 2013.
• “Le Groupe de Visegrad, 20 ans d‘une alliance à géométrie variable”, Politique étrangère, n° 1, 2012.
• “Diskursivní pojetí lobbingu jako proměnná ve výběru jeho regulačních mechanismů”, Politologická revue, n° 2, 2011.

“Slowing down” Modernity: Risky, Futile or Progressive?

Research Area 2: Norms & Transgressions

Contact: filip.vostal@cefres.cz

Filip has gained his PhD in Sociology form the University of Bristol. His doctoral research critically engaged with some leading authors on social time and acceleration in late capitalism (particularly Hartmut Rosa) and examined how and with what consequences acceleration imperative plays out in contemporary academia.

Filip’s current research still revolves around theories of social acceleration, its socio-theoretical purchase and epistemological limits. He is also exploring possible intersections of acceleration theories and science and technology studies (STS).

As a postdoctoral researcher at CEFRES, Filip s will investigate both progressive potentials as well as risky pitfalls of the so-called ‘slow ideology.’ His research will focus primarily on the question as to whether abounding calls for slowing down (modernity/ modernization) contain any progressive – and transgressive – element or whether they paradoxically account for concealed engines of social acceleration dynamic and/or dangerous political currents in the form of parochial and localist fundamentalism.

Continue reading Filip Vostal – Research & CV →