Devotion, Objects and Emotion, 1300–1700

Date: Friday and Saturday, 16-17 March, 2018
Venue: Woodward Conference Centre, The University of Melbourne, 10th floor, Melbourne Law (Building 106), 185 Pelham Street, Carlton VIC 3053
Conveners: Charles Zika, Julie Hotchin, Claire Walker, Lisa Beaven
Registrations Now Open: http://www.historyofemotions.org.au/events/devotion-objects-and-emotion-1300-1700
Full Program: http://www.historyofemotions.org.au/media/259700/devotions-program-lowres.pdf
Contact for further enquiries:
Julie Davies, daviesja@unimelb.edu.au , or 8344 5981

Religion is a cultural field in which emotions exercise a preeminent role. Feelings are integral to religion, and their significance is encapsulated in the concept of religious devotion. This symposium will focus on the relationships between religious devotion, objects and emotion in Europe between 1300 and 1700. Religious devotion promotes the exercise of a wide range of emotional expressions and behaviours that assume, communicate and give shape to the broader religious belief systems and cosmologies of which they are part. Objects used in religious practices accrue the power to arouse, channel and mediate our emotions; while their materiality and use in devotional practice can expand our understanding of the historical layering and expression of religious emotions, and how they change over time. In this way, devotional practices and objects provide a rich vantage point from which to explore the multifarious and fundamental role of emotions in individual and collective lives.