Eurograd message

                *IX Lisbon Summer School for the Study of Culture*
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>*Neurohumanities*
<br>
<br>*Promises & Threats*
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>*Lisbon, July 1-6, 2019*
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>*CALL FOR PAPERS*
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>*Deadline for submissions: February 28, 2019*
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>When the US government declared the 1990s “The decade of the brain”, it
<br>aimed at raising public awareness toward the use of neuroscience for the
<br>enhancement of life quality and as a way to better address the challenges
<br>of growing life expectancy. The initiative was further supported by
<br>substantial research funding, which not only impressed public opinion but
<br>appealed to many research fields. Finding a link to brain research and the
<br>processes of the human mind, many disciplines were repositioned and adopted
<br>the “neuro” prefix, promising new insights into age-old problems by
<br>reframing them from the angle of the brain-mind continuum.
<br>
<br>Neuroscience seeks to explain how the brain works and which
<br>neurophysiological processes are involved in complex cognitive abilities
<br>like sensation and perception attention and reasoning, memory and thought.
<br>
<br>One of the most striking and unique features of the human mind is its
<br>capacity to represent realities that transcend its immediate time and
<br>space, by engaging complex symbolic systems, most notably language, music,
<br>arts and mathematics. Such sophisticated means for representation are
<br>arguably the result of an environmental pressure and must be accounted for
<br>in a complex network of shared behaviors, mimetic actions and collaborative
<br>practices: in other words, through human culture. The cultural products
<br>that are enabled by these systems are also stored by means of
<br>representation in ever-new technological devices, which allow for the
<br>accumulation and sharing of knowledge beyond space and across time.
<br>
<br>The artifacts and practices that arise from the symbolic use, exchange and
<br>accumulation are the core of the research and academic field known as the
<br>Humanities. The field has been increasingly interested in the latest
<br>developments deriving from neuroscience and the affordances they allow
<br>about the conditions and processes of the single brain, embedded in an
<br>environment, in permanent exchange with other brains in an ecology that is
<br>culturally coded.
<br>
<br>This turn of the humanities to neuroscience is embraced by many and
<br>fiercely criticized by others. The promise of the Neurohumanities, the
<br>neuroscientifically informed study of cultural artifacts, discourses and
<br>practices, lies in unveiling the link between embodied processes and the
<br>sophistication of culture. And it has the somewhat hidden agenda of
<br>legitimizing the field, by giving it a science-close status of relevance
<br>and social acknowledgement it has long lacked. Here, though, lies also its
<br>weakness: should the Humanities become scientific? Can they afford to do
<br>so? Should they be reduced to experimental methodologies, collaborative
<br>research practices, sloppy concept travelling, transvestite
<br>interdisciplinarity? Is the promise of the Neurohumanities, seen by some as
<br>the ultimate overcoming of the science-humanities or the two cultures
<br>divide, in fact not only ontologically and methodologically impossible and
<br>more than that undesirable? And how will fields like Neuroaesthetics,
<br>Cognitive Literary Theory, Cognitive Linguistics, Affect Theory,
<br>Second-person Neuroscience, Cognitive Culture Studies or Critical
<br>Neuroscience relate to the emerging omnipresence and challenges of
<br>Artificial Intelligence?
<br>
<br>The IX Summer School for the Study of Culture invites participants to
<br>submit paper and poster proposals that critically consider the developments
<br>of the Neurohumanities in the past decades and question its immediate and
<br>future challenges and opportunities. Paper proposals are encouraged in but
<br>not limited to the following topics:
<br>
<br>·      4E Cognition: embodied, embedded, enacted and extended
<br>
<br>·       performance and the embodied mind
<br>
<br>·       spectatorship and simulation
<br>
<br>·       from individual to social cognition
<br>
<br>·       mental imagery
<br>
<br>·       empathy
<br>
<br>·       memory, culture and cultural memory
<br>
<br>·       cognition and translatability
<br>
<br>·       mind-body problem
<br>
<br>·       life enhancement
<br>
<br>·       neuro-power
<br>
<br>·       (neuro)humanities and social change
<br>
<br>·       AI, cognition and culture
<br>
<br>
<br>The Summer School will take place at several cultural institutions in
<br>Lisbon and will gather outstanding doctoral students and post-doctoral
<br>researchers from around the world. In the morning there will be lectures
<br>and master classes by invited keynote speakers. In the afternoon there will
<br>be paper presentations by doctoral students.
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>*Paper proposals*
<br>
<br>Proposals should be sent to lxsummerschool@gmail.com no later than February
<br>28, 2019 and include paper title, abstract in English (max. 200 words),
<br>name, e-mail address, institutional affiliation and a brief bio (max. 100
<br>words) mentioning ongoing research.
<br>
<br>Applicants will be informed of the result of their submissions by March 15,
<br>2019.
<br>
<br>*Rules for presentation*
<br>
<br>The organizing committee shall place presenters in small groups according
<br>to the research focus of their papers. They are advised to stay in these
<br>groups for the duration of the Summer School, so a structured exchange of
<br>ideas may be developed to its full potential.
<br>
<br>*Full papers submission*
<br>
<br>Presenters are required to send in full papers by May 30, 2019.
<br>
<br>The papers will then be circulated amongst the members of each research
<br>group and in the slot allotted to each participant (30’), only 10’ may be
<br>used for a brief summary of the research piece. The Summer School is a
<br>place of networked exchange of ideas and organizers wish to have as much
<br>time as possible for a structured discussion between participants. Ideally,
<br>in each slot, 10’ will be used for presentation, and 20’ for discussion.
<br>
<br>*Registration fees*
<br>
<br>Participants with paper – 290€ for the entire week (includes lectures,
<br>master classes, doctoral sessions, lunches and closing dinner)
<br>
<br>Participants without paper – 60€ per session/day | 190€ for the entire
<br>week
<br>
<br>*Fee waivers*
<br>
<br>For The Lisbon Consortium students, there is no registration fee.
<br>
<br>For students from Universities affiliated with the European Summer School
<br>in Cultural Studies and members of the Excellence Network in Cultural
<br>Studies the registration fee is 60€.
<br>
<br>*Organizing Committee*
<br>
<br>·       Isabel Capeloa Gil
<br>
<br>·       Peter Hanenberg
<br>
<br>·       Alexandra Lopes
<br>
<br>·       Paulo de Campos Pinto
<br>
<br>·       Diana Gonçalves
<br>
<br>·       Clara Caldeira
<br>
<br>·       Rita Bacelar
<br>
<br>
<br>*Organizing Committee*
<br>Lisbon Summer School for the Study of Culture
<br>Neurohumanities: Promises and Threats
<br>
<br>*******************
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<br>
<br>********************
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