SKC Annual Conference 2021
Kierkegaard and the Question of Identity, Gender, and Sexuality
Identity is a key issue in Kierkegaard's authorship, and, for Kierkegaard, identity is connected with important questions concerning—among other things—autonomy, authenticity, and existential continuity. In addition, gender and sexuality play a prominent role in the authorship, and Kierkegaard's understanding of these various aspects of our identity are central to his account of what it means to be a human self.
However, the sociocultural understanding of gender and sexuality has changed dramatically since Kierkegaard's death, as has the very concept of human identity. It is obvious that present scholarly work on questions concerning identity, gender, and sexuality in Kierkegaard's authorship cannot avoid taking these sociocultural changes into consideration. Therefore, the SKC Annual Conference 2021 will examine how our understanding of Kierkegaard's account(s) of identity is (are) affected by these changes in our understanding of gender and sexuality.
A number of more particular questions arise from this basic research question: What do female and male signify in Kierkegaard's texts? What is the role of sexuality in The Concept of Anxiety? Does Kierkegaard's relational theory of the self operate with essential, and basically non-relational notions of sexuality and gender? What are the roles assigned to the female figures in authorship? How are we, today, to understand Kierkegaard's marked distinction between female and male despair? Which conceptions of gender are in play in the "Seducer's Diary"? How would Kierkegaard's account(s) of identity hold up when subjected to an intersectional analysis of identity markers such as sexuality, class, race, and gender? Are there male and female forms of discourse present in Kierkegaard's texts? What is the status of and role played by sensuality in Kierkegaard's approach to human identity? Is Kierkegaard's implicit reader (as expressed in "my dear reader") gendered? What have been the reactions—in philosophy, literature, and gender studies—to Kierkegaard's understanding of gender and sexuality?
For this year's conference, the Søren Kierkegaard Research Centre invites papers that deal with these and other questions concerning the complex intersection(s) of identity, gender, and sexuality in Kierkegaard's authorship.
The conference will be held online on August 11-13. You can sign up for the conference here.
Programme
Wednesday, August 11
13:00-13:15 Joakim Garff: Words of Welcome
Afternoon Session (Chairperson: George Pattison)
13:15-13:45 Alison Assiter: “Kierkegaard on Process, Paradox and Gender”
13:45-14:15 Discussion
14:15-14:30 Break
14:30-15:00 Deidre Green: ”Reconciling with Finitude”
15:00-15:30 Discussion
15:30-16:00 Henning Nörenberg: ”Identity Politics. A Kierkegaardian Response”
16:00-16:30 Discussion
Thursday, August 12
Morning Session (Chairperson: Lilian Munk Rösing)
10:00-10:30 Mélissa Fox-Muraton: ”On the Limits of Normative Discourse and Intimate Self-Determination: Kierkegaardian Existential Ethics and the Language of Sexuality”
10:30-11:00 Discussion
11:00-11:15 Break
11:15-11:45 Henrik Jøker Bjerre: ”The Priority of the Other: Sexual Relations in Kierkegaard and Lacan”
11:45-12:15 Discussion
12:15-13:15 Break
Afternoon Session (Chairperson: Vincent Delecroix)
13:15-13:45 Henrike Fürstenberg: ”(Self-)Impregnation and Dependence: The Pseudonyms and their (Accounts on) Wives”
13:45-14:15 Discussion
14:15-14:45 George Pattison: ”'But I, I who am nothing': A Meditation by Kierkegaard's Female Pseudonym”
14:45-15:15 Discussion
15:15-15:30 Break
15:30-16:00 Frances Maughan-Brown: ”Figures of Women”
16:00-16:30 Discussion
Friday, August 13
Morning Session (Chairperson: Ingolf Dalferth)
10:00-10:30 René Rosfort: ”Challenging Identity: Kierkegaard, Bias, and Intersectionality”
10:30-11:00 Discussion
11:00-11:15 Break
11:15-11:45 Carlota Salvador Megias: ”‘In Whose Image I Form Myself:’ A Queer/Transgender Counter-Reading of “The Seducer’s Diary”
11:45-12:15 Discussion
12:15-13:15 Break
Afternoon Session (Chairperson: Ettore Rocca)
13:15-13:45 Roe Fremstedal: Personal identity without sex or gender: Minimal self and Kierkegaard reconsidered
13:45-14:15 Discussion
14:15-14:30 Joakim Garff: Concluding Words