Past Projects

Spring 2017 Symposium: Ethical Subjects, Now!

Final Symposium Poster v4 1

“Ethical Subjects” has explored the relationship between law and morality, within the framework of the nation-state and beyond it. Taking the figure of Antigone as a point of departure, we have investigated how and when ethical norms coincide and conflict with laws.  We have analyzed the mobilization of such conflicts to bring about legal transformations from the abolition of slavery and the deployment of “crimes against humanity” in international law to the ethics of non-violence and contemporary legal discussions of refugee asylum and amnesty.  In joining together “top-down” and “bottom-up” approaches, we have explored the problems posed– and perspectives opened– when bodies, ideas, capital, and social movements cross and transcend borders.

“Ethical Subjects, Now!” marks the conclusion of our two-year cycle of events and we hope opens onto future considerations of “ethical subjects” as a humanistic analytic framework that is deeply engaged in present day problems in ways that are informed by an understanding of the past.

The symposium is open to the public. 

 

Ethical Subjects, Now!

Symposium May 4-5, 2017
Rutgers Academic Building, 15 Seminary Place, Room 6051

Thursday, May 4, 2017

Welcome and Introduction, 2:00-2:15

Refuge and Sanctuary, 2:15-4:15

Kathryn Abrams (Law, University of California-Berkeley), "Affect, Emotion, and Subjectivity in the Undocumented Immigrants' Movement"
Ilana Feldman (Anthropology, George Washington University), "Livable Lives in a World in Crisis: The Refugee as a Political Figure for Our Time"
Commentator: Linda Bosniak (Law, Rutgers)

Keynote, 4:30-6:00

Jacqueline Bhabha, Professor of the Practice of Health and Human Rights, Harvard
“Erratic Samaritans: Lessons from the Death of Alan Kurdi”

Reception, 6:00-7:00

Friday, May 5, 2017

Breakfast, 9:30-10:00

The International and the Human, 10:00-12:00

Karen Engle (Law, University of Texas, Austin), "The Grip of Sexual Violence in Conflict: From Human Rights to Criminal Law"
Philippa Hetherington (Slavic Studies, University College London), "Circulating Subjects in the Archives of Humanitarianism: Ariadna Tyrkova-Williams and the Fin-de-Siecle Traffic in Women Betwen Odessa and Istanbul"
Bertrand Taithe (History, University of Manchester), "Shaping the Future and the Past of Humanitarianism: The History and Epistemic Communities of Emergencies"
Commentator: Miriam Ticktin (Anthropology, The New School)

Lunch, 12:00-1:00

The Politics of Minority, 1:15-3:00

Robin Lenhardt (Law, Fordham), “The Family As Racial Project: Understanding the Real Lessons of Moore v. City of East Cleveland”
Bruno Perreau (French, Massachusetts Institute of Technology), "The Inner Voice: Minority Presence and Representation"
Commentator: Maya Mikdashi (Women's and Gender Studies, Rutgers)

Coffee, 3:00-3:15

Archive/Affect, 3:15pm—5:15pm

Tina Campt (Women's Studies, Barnard/Columbia), "Fugitives Before the Law: Black Futurity in a Photographic Frame"
Anjali Arondekar (Feminist Studies, University of California, Santa Cruz), "Make.Believe: Sexuality's Subjects"
Parama Roy (English, University of California, Davis), "On Being Eaten"
Commentator: Marisa Fuentes (History/Women's Studies, Rutgers)

Reception, 5:15