CALL. 15/02/2020: Sixth Interdisciplinary Symposium on the Heritage of Western Greece with special
Sixth Interdisciplinary Symposium on the Heritage of Western Greece with special emphasis on ἀρετή aretē: virtue, excellence, goodness and a pre-conference seminar on Gorgias of Leontini plus a post-conference tour of Greek sites in Calabria Exedra Mediterranean Center, Syracuse, Sicily, 17-20 June , 2020.
FECHA LÍMITE/DEADLINE/SCADENZA: 15/02/2020
FECHA CONGRESO/CONGRESS DATE/DATA CONGRESSO: 17-18-19-20/06/2020
LUGAR/LOCATION/LUOGO: Exedra Center in Syracuse (Italy)
ORGANIZADOR/ORGANIZER/ORGANIZZATORE: Fonte Aretusa Organization
INFO: web - registration form link - fontearetusa1@gmail.com (Heather Reid)
CALL:
The cultural and intellectual legacy of Western Greece—the coastal areas of Southern Italy and Sicily settled by Hellenes in the 8th and 7th centuries BCE—is sometimes overlooked in academia. Yet evidence suggests that poets, playwrights, philosophers, and other maverick intellectuals found fertile ground here for the growth of their ideas and the harvesting of their work. The goal of the Fonte Aretusa organization is to revive the distinctive spirit of Western Greece by exploring it from a variety of disciplinary perspectives including art history, archaeology, classics, drama, epigraphy, history, literature, mythology, philosophy and religion.
Our conference takes place at the Exedra Center in Syracuse, Sicily—the cultural center of Western Greece known by Epicharmus, Empedocles, Plato, Aeschylus, Sappho, Theocritus, Archimedes, Cicero and many others. It includes guided tours of local archaeological and cultural sites, communal meals, and the possibility to witness live performances in the ancient Greek theater by the National Institute for Ancient Drama. An optional post-conference tour to important sites is also offered.
The official languages of the conference are English, Italian, and Greek – though the vast majority of participants have historically been Anglophone. Proposals for individual paper presentations, panel discussions, and creative presentations related to any aspect of the cultural heritage of Western Greece are welcome. This year, we are especially interested in proposals discussing aretē in its various forms. Abstracts for papers should be 150-300 words in length and prepared for blind review in .docx or .rtf format (not .pdf). Proposals for panel discussions should include contact information for all participants. Presentation times range from 20 minutes for individual papers to 90 minutes for panel discussions. Abstracts received by November 15, 2019 will be considered for early acceptance. Final deadline for abstracts is February 15, 2020.
Selected proceedings will be published in our series, The Heritage of Western Greece, which is indexed in JSTOR.
Please send abstracts and direct questions to Heather L. Reid fontearetusa1@gmail.com
Details on the pre-conference symposium (June 15-16), as well as the Post-conference tour will be posted in due course on fontearetusa.org. We look forward to welcoming you and offering our hospitality in beautiful Syracuse, the heart of Western Greece.