1. Globalism and Identity Formation 2. The Modern and the Postmodern 3. The ‘Human’ of the Humanities 4. Future Humanities, Future Human

Overall Theme: THE NEXT WORLD ORDER

Theme 1: Globalism and Identity Formation

• The dynamics of identity and belonging.
• Cosmopolitanism, globalisation and backlash.
• The humanities and the construction of place
• First nations and indigenous peoples in first, third and other worlds.
• Human movement and its consequences: immigration, refugees, diaspora, minorities.
• Ecological sustainability, cultural sustainability, human sustainability.
• Homo faber: the human faces of technology.
• Global/local, universal/particular: discerning boundaries.
• Differences: gender, sexual orientation, disability, ethnicity, race, class.

Theme 2: The Modern and the Postmodern

• Defining the modern against its ‘others’.
• The postmodern turn.
• Nationalism, ethnonationalism, xenophobia, racism, genocide: the ‘ancient’ and the modern.
• Governance and politics in a time of globalism and multiculturalism.
• The causes and effects of war.
• Metropolis: the past and future of urbanism.
• Geographies of the non-urban and remote in the era of total globalisation.

Theme 3: The ‘Human’ of the Humanities

• The human, the humanist, the humanities.
• What is history?
• The philosophy of ends or the end of philosophy?
• Anthropology, archaeology and their ‘others’.
• The work of art in an age of mechanical reproduction.
• Literary-critical: changing the focal points.
• Ways of meaning: languages, linguistics, semiotics.

Theme 4: Future Humanities, Future Human

• Science confronts humanity.
• Humanities teaching in higher education: fresh approaches and future prospects.
• Schooling humanities: introducing history, social studies, philosophy, language, literature and the humanities to children.
• Technologies in and for the humanities.
• The purpose of the humanities in an era of contested ends.
• The humanities in the ‘culture wars’: questions of ‘political correctness’ and the cultural ‘canon’.