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UID:pretalx-wha-annual-meeting-korea-2026-9MXTPK@pretalx.com
DTSTART;TZID=KST:20260625T150000
DTEND;TZID=KST:20260625T163000
DESCRIPTION:With dominant global actors assertively holding forth neo-imper
 ial ambitions\, often draped in multilayered religious\, indeed messianic 
 symbology (take a recent Israeli billboard depicting Donald Trump as a ret
 urned Cyrus the Great)\, it is revealing to teach critical world histories
  of religion and empire. Across time and geographic space\, transformation
 al dynamics between religion and empire are signal for thinking deeply abo
 ut these world-making forces\, including self-reflection on our own normat
 ive perceptions surrounding matters like decolonization\, and resurging em
 pire. A foundation is built by considering how empire\, as a seminal\, end
 uring form of human governance\, is inseparable from how we come to imagin
 e the phenomenon and divine referents of religion–from ancient Near East
 ern re-envisioning of transcendence and immanence\, to the modern colonial
  mind’s pivotal role in constructing our notion of religion\, in the fir
 st instance. Following a transit through such chronological turning points
  as the Axial Age (while of course asking why we might judge it to be so)\
 , and Ibn Khaldun’s universalist yet historically bound reading of pre-I
 slamic and Islamic empires’ rise and fall\, we arrive at moments helping
  to frame our own world. Emblematic are modern Euro-American empires’ se
 eking to definitionally divide and rule religious communities\, while vari
 ously superimposing their own civilizational proselytizing\, and yet under
 going syncretic encounters with colonized religious practitioners’ own a
 gency and resistance. Today\, diverse worldwide forms of imperial messiani
 sm\, emanating from across Eurasia together with the United States’ clai
 med anointing\, underscore how the religion-empire nexus is fundamental to
  a world both eschewing and remaking globalism.
DTSTAMP:20260412T140122Z
LOCATION:Room 302 (Seats 48)
SUMMARY:Teaching World Histories of Religion and Empire in a Neo-Imperial A
 ge - Andrew M Wender
URL:https://pretalx.com/wha-annual-meeting-korea-2026/talk/9MXTPK/
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