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IMC 2019: Sessions

Session 541: Assembling Things and Humans: On the Formation of Associations, Groups, and Societies, I

Tuesday 2 July 2019, 09.00-10.30

Organiser:Tilo Renz, Collaborative Research Center 980 'Episteme in Motion', Freie Universität Berlin
Moderator/Chair:Iris Helffenstein, Collaborative Research Center 980 'Episteme in Motion' / Kunsthistorisches Institut, Freie Universität Berlin
Paper 541-aThe Social Power of Magical Things in Middle English Romance
(Language: English)
Jan-Peer Hartmann, Institut für Englische Philologie, Freie Universität Berlin
Index terms: Language and Literature - Middle English, Philosophy, Social History
Paper 541-bMaterial Objects in Arabic Philosophy
(Language: English)
Beate Ulrike La Sala, Collaborative Research Center 980 'Episteme in Motion' / Institut für Philosophie, Freie Universität Berlin
Index terms: Islamic and Arabic Studies, Philosophy
Paper 541-cTo be confirmed
(Language: English)
Claudia Reufer, Sonderforschungsbereich 980 'Episteme in Bewegung', Freie Universität Berlin
Abstract

The first of two panels featuring scholars from the interdisciplinary Collaborative Research Centre 980 'Episteme in Motion' (Freie Universität Berlin) seeks to examine different ways in which things can become associated with other things as well as with human beings, thereby producing greater units or networks. Taking as our point of departure Bruno Latour's notion of the 'assemblage', we ask whether such chains of associations should be seen as assemblages of different materialities or whether we are justified in speaking of larger collectives, to which human and non-human actors contribute in different but complimentary (and sometimes conflicting) ways. Can such chains of associations contribute to processes of knowledge change? Can we read artefacts (texts, artworks) as assemblages? Does their specific form as media turn artefacts into actors that likewise participate in the formation of collectives?