CFP: Trade and Religion (SBL Buenos Aires, July 2015)

Call for Papers: Trade and Religion (SBL IM Expressions of Religion in Israel Section, Buenos Aires, July 20-24, 2015)

For the 2015 meeting in Buenos Aires, Expressions of Religion in Israel invites papers that explore the role of merchants in facilitating the exchange of religious symbols and ideas. Moving beyond the recourse to trade as a general hypothesis explaining the diffusion of disembodied ideas, this session will focus on trade as a mode of exchange taking place in the physical world, involving material goods and carried out by human agents. We welcome papers that investigate concrete cases of traderelated transmission of religious symbols and ideas based on material and/or textual evidence. Case studies might deal with, for example, archaeological traces (moulds, shipwrecks, etc.) of the trade of goods such as figurines or amulets, or texts documenting traders and customers as agents in the exchange of religious objects and ideas.

Paper proposals should be submitted online through the SBL website here: http://www.sblsite.org/meetings/Congresses_CallForPaperDetails.aspx?MeetingId=26&VolunteerUnitId=235

The deadline for submission is February 11, 2015. For further information, please contact Bernd U. Schipper ([email protected]).