Annual Pruit Symposium To Focus On Problem Of Slavery
Baylor University's annual Pruit Memorial Symposium will tackle the issue of slavery, from its historical beginnings to its current practices. "Slavery, Oppression, and Prejudice: Ancient Roots and Modern Implications" will run from Thursday, Sept. 30, to Saturday, Oct. 2, and will feature a range of lectures by eminent scholars. The symposium is sponsored by Baylor's Institute for Faith and Learning.
"Each year, the symposium explores how Christian intellectual traditions can inform our understanding of perennially important issues," said Dr. Douglas Henry, director of the Institute for Faith and Learning. "This year's program considers the woeful legacy of human oppression through the centuries and surveys the causes, debilitating effects, and complex range of Christian responses to the phenomena of slavery, oppression and prejudice. With scholars participating from around the world, and with a morally compelling set of issues at the center of the conference, we anticipate an energetic and provocative few days of discussion."
The symposium, which begins at 1 p.m. Sept. 30, will feature six plenary speakers and concurrent sessions on such diverse topics as "Slavery and Race in Scripture"; "Teaching about Slavery"; "Global Slavery and Economics, Past and Present"; and "Harriet Beecher Stowe and Her Contemporaries," among others.
Dr. Albert Raboteau, the Henry W. Putnam Professor of Religion at Princeton University, will deliver the symposium's keynote address at 7:30 p.m. Oct. 1 during a banquet on the fifth floor of the Cashion Building. He is the author of Slave Religion, The 'Invisible Institution' in the Antebellum South, which was awarded the National Religious Book Award, A Fire in the Bones, Reflections on African-American Religious History, African-American Religion and most recently A Sorrowful Joy.
Other speakers include Dr. Keith R. Bradley, the Eli J. Shaheen Professor and Chair of Classics at the University of Notre Dame; Dr. Allen D. Callahan, visiting professor at Harvard Divinity School; Dr. Jennifer A. Glancy, the Georg Professor of Religious Studies at Le Moyne College; Dr. Caleb Oladipo, the Duke K. McCall Professor of Christian Missions at the Baptist Theological Seminary of Richmond; and Dr. Ralph Wood, University Professor of Theology and Literature at Baylor.
All plenary sessions and the keynote address are free and open to the public. For a complete schedule of events, visit www.baylor.edu/IFL/Pruit2004 . For more information, call (254) 710-4805.