The Department of Classics and Religious Studies at the University of Iowa invites graduate students to submit paper proposals for its upcoming conference, Honoring the Past: Religion, Power, and Time. This event, held in celebration of the centennial anniversary of studying religion at the University of Iowa, seeks to explore the intersections of religion, authority, and temporal frameworks across diverse cultures, traditions, and historical periods.

The theme invites interdisciplinary approaches to questions such as:
  • How does the concept of time inform or unsettle religious authority across multiple traditions and contexts?
  • In what ways does reflecting on "Religion, Power, and Time" invite new interdisciplinary methodologies or frameworks for graduate research?
  • How are individual and collective identities informed by religious tradition, beliefs, practices, sacred texts, etc. impact the ways in which communities deal with hostile authorities?
  • How have historical events shape the current understanding of religion, power, and time?
Welcomed areas of inquiry:
  • Lived Religion
  • Transnationalism
  • Ethics and Society
  • Diasporic Religions
  • Emotion and Affect
  • History and Religion
  • Science and Religion
  • Empire and Colonialism
  • Economics and Religion
  • Ecologies and Spirituality
  • Food, Culture, and Religion
  • Material Culture and Religion
  • Protest, Dissent, and Religion
  • Space, Place, and Urban Religion
  • Pilgrimage and Sacred Journeys
  • Voluntary and Involuntary Migration
  • Religion and Marginalized Communities

We welcome submissions from graduate students in classics and religious studies and related fields, including anthropology, history, sociology, communication studies and media studies, social work, political science, philosophy, and literary studies. Papers may engage theoretical, historical, textual, digital, or ethnographic methodologies. We invite proposals that depart from the traditional paper session format, including roundtables and book discussions. 

Requirements

  • Be a graduate student at the University of Iowa

  • One-page CV (per presenter)

  • For each paper proposal, please provide a 200-word abstract (no abstract is necessary for the panel as a whole)

  • We will accept proposals until March 22, 2026, by 11:59 pm. Submitters will hear from the program committee in April 2026.