International Conference
Post-Pandemic Condition:
Biopolitics in the Aftermath of the COVID-19
7 September, 2023
National Gallery of Art, Konstitucijos pr. 22, Vilnius, Lithuania
The conference ‘Post-Pandemic Condition: Biopolitics in the Aftermath of the COVID-19’ revisits the concept of biopolitics by asking how the pandemic has redefined the political field and what new concepts and prospects it can offer for conceptualising our post-pandemic condition. The worldwide health crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic has undoubtedly signalled the need to reconsider, modify, and even transform the notion of biopolitics. Numerous attempts to do so were ranging from nearly apocalyptic visions of entirely ‘negative’ biopolitics, such as Giorgio Agamben’s collection of brief essays Where Are We Now? (2021), to surveillance-friendly ‘positive’ biopolitics, exemplified by Benjamin Bratton’s The Revenge of the Real (2021). Most of these, however, were published at the very peak of the pandemic, and therefore mostly based on different approaches of national governments towards the management of the pandemic and their implementation, and not the consequences of the pandemic biopolitics itself. Roughly three years after the breakout of the pandemic, it is time to revisit the notion of biopolitics itself and to question its viability in the aftermath of COVID-19. Many theoreticians emphasize that the pandemic cannot be separated from the existing social and political conditions which include nationalism, racism, global inequality, poverty, violence against women and LGBTQ+ people, and environmental destruction. In enduring pandemic times these conditions were radicalised and made even more unbearable. At the same time theoreticians express a need to overcome these radical inequalities and reimagine a ‘shared or common world’ (Judith Butler), ‘the world in common’ (Achille Mbembe) that would ensure a universal right to live. The universal right to live belongs to the universal community of earthly inhabitants, human and nonhuman. This implies that the conventional model of individual rights and freedoms should be revisited in favour of communal forms of existence. As Judith Butler points out, the term ‘pandemic’ derives etymologically from pan-demos, all the people, or people everywhere, or something that crosses over or spread over and through the people (What World Is This?, p. 5). Thus the post-pandemic condition implies that thinking about the insular and autonomous individual should be abandoned since every individual discovers itself in the position of interconnectedness and encroachment. The post-pandemic condition forces us to rethink ourselves in terms of ‘common immunity’ (Roberto Esposito), the transindividual (Etienne Balibar), or holobiont (Bruno Latour), and to acknowledge our debt to global ecology.
Key areas of inquiry could include but are by no means limited to:
◆ pandemic and paradigmatic shifts within and beyond the notion of biopolitics;
◆ political, economic, racial, and social implications of pandemic biopolitics;
◆ new philosophical, political and social imaginaries;
◆ the individual ‘self’ VS different forms of communal existence;
◆ immunity and immunization VS community-oriented approaches after the pandemic;
◆ individual rights and freedoms VS universal right to live;
◆ post-pandemic governmentality VS environmentality;
◆ ecological crisis, biopolitics, and the Anthropocene;
◆ affective and artistic expressions of the post-pandemic condition.
Conference format: in person.
Submission guidelines:
Deadline for abstract submission: 1 June 2023
An abstract (300 words) with a short biography should be sent to the organizers: denis.petrina@LKTI.LT
Notification of acceptance: 10 June 2023
The conference is organized by the Lithuanian Culture Research Institute and the Research Council of Lithuania.
Conference (PDF)
Mūsų svetainė naudoja slapukus (angl. cookies). Šie slapukai naudojami statistikos ir rinkodaros tikslais.
Jei Jūs sutinkate, kad šiems tikslams būtų naudojami slapukai, spauskite „Sutinku“ ir toliau naudokitės svetaine.
Kad veiktų užklausos forma, naudojame sistemą „Google ReCaptcha“, kuri padeda atskirti jus nuo interneto robotų, kurie siunčia brukalus (angl. spam) ir panašaus tipo informaciją.
Taigi, kad šios užklausos forma užtikrintai veiktų, jūs turite pažymėti „Sutinku su našumo slapukais“.
Jūs galite pasirinkti, kuriuos slapukus leidžiate naudoti.
Plačiau apie slapukų ir privatumo politiką.
Funkciniai slapukai (būtini)Šie slapukai yra būtini, kad veiktų svetainė, ir negali būti išjungti. Šie slapukai nesaugo jokių duomenų, pagal kuriuos būtų galima jus asmeniškai atpažinti, ir yra ištrinami išėjus iš svetainės. |
|
Našumo slapukaiŠie slapukai leidžia apskaičiuoti, kaip dažnai lankomasi svetainėje, ir nustatyti duomenų srauto šaltinius – tik turėdami tokią informaciją galėsime patobulinti svetainės veikimą. Jie padeda mums atskirti, kurie puslapiai yra populiariausi, ir matyti, kaip vartotojai naudojasi svetaine. Tam mes naudojamės „Google Analytics“ statistikos sistema. Surinktos informacijos neplatiname. Surinkta informacija yra visiškai anonimiška ir tiesiogiai jūsų neidentifikuoja. |
|
Reklaminiai slapukaiŠie slapukai yra naudojami trečiųjų šalių, kad būtų galima pateikti reklamą, atitinkančią jūsų poreikius. Mes naudojame slapukus, kurie padeda rinkti informaciją apie jūsų veiksmus internete ir leidžia sužinoti, kuo jūs domitės, taigi galime pateikti tik Jus dominančią reklamą. Jeigu nesutinkate, kad jums rodytume reklamą, palikite šį langelį nepažymėtą. |