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Click here for the Call for Papers

(or here for a downloadable Word doc version)

Abraham’s travels in the Middle-East; the Exodus from Egypt, the Babylonian exile and the myths in the Hindu Epics all point to the religious significance of geographical displacements of individuals and peoples. In Islam, Muslims date their calendar from the Hijra (migration) from Mekkah to Medina. Today the pace of globalisation with accompanying mass movements of people and ideas has undermined centres of authenticity and recreated structures where the authentic variations are not only plural, but they are located both at the historic centres and at the margins.
 
Liverpool provides an excellent location to explore how religions transform when they move location. The port was a major meeting point of religions during the nineteenth century and along with London can lay claim to being one of Britain’s first multi-faith cities.

The conference invites papers that examine what happens to religious beliefs and practices when they are displaced, and what occurs to religions when new cultural practices interact with them. The focus on transformation is not only to be taken in connection with movements of people but papers are invited that deal with the issue of mutation in the broadest sense and we invite scholars from different disciplines to participate in the conference. RELIGION, MIGRATION, MUTATION is the 13th annual conference of the EASR and the second to be organised in collaboration with the BASR (British Association for the Study of Religion).

The conference will begin with registration between 10am and 4pm on Tuesday 3 September, followed by welcome addresses and the first key note lecture. It will end with a buffet lunch between 1.30 and 2pm on Friday 6 September.