Sensing the Sacred: Religion and the Senses, 1300-1800

Keynote speakers:

• Chris Woolgar (Southampton)
• Nicky Hallett (Sheffield)
• Matthew Milner (McGill)

This two-day international, interdisciplinary conference will bring together scholars working on the role played by the senses in the experience and expression of religion and faith in the pre-modern world.

Religion has always been characterised as much by embodied experience as by abstract theological dispute. From the sounds of the adhān (the Islamic call to prayer), to the smell of incense in the Hindu Pūjā (a ritual offering to the deities), the visual emblem of the cross in the Christian tradition, and the ascetic practices of Theravada Buddhism, sensation is integral to a range of devotional practices.  At the same time, the history of many faiths is characterised by an intense suspicion of the senses and the pleasures they offer.

See conference website for further details.

Organisers: Robin Macdonald, Emilie Murphy, Elizabeth Swann