Launch of Institute for Religion, Culture and Public Life
Thursday, November 6, 1-6:30pm
Rotunda, Low Memorial Library
To celebrate its inauguration, the Institute hosted an afternoon of public lectures on religion in contemporary society convened by co-directors Mark C. Taylor, Chair of Department of Religion and Alfred Stepan, Wallace Sayre Professor of Government.
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SALMAN RUSHDIE in conversation with Gauri Viswanathan IRCPL Launch Event) * Opening Remarks by Lee C. Bollinger * Introduction by ORHAN PAMUK |
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The Past and Future of Religion & Toleration (IRCPL Launch Event, 11/6/08) Toleration Faculty Working Group with Charles Taylor, Emeritus Prof. of Philosophy |
- Launch Program -
The Past and Future of Religion & Toleration, 1-2:30 pm
Columbia faculty, including Karen Barkey, Rajeev Bhargava, Akeel Bilgrami, Ira Katznelson, Sudipta Kaviraj, Alfred Stepan and Nadia Urbinati, discussed the history of toleration in Western society and beyond with Charles Taylor, Emeritus Professor of Philosophy at McGill University and Templeton Prize-winning author of A Secular Age (2007).
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Art, Religion and Politics Guggenheim Abu Dhabi, 3-4:30 pm • Thomas Krens, Director of Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation |
Director of Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation, Thomas Krens discussed Guggenheim Abu Dhabi, the latest addition to the foundation’s global network of museums that continues to facilitate the complex and often difficult art of negotiating cultural differences.
At the launch, Krens spoke on his remarkable collaboration with architect Frank Gehry in creating a museum that is socially, politically and economically transformative. As conflict rages between and among different factions in Islam and tensions with the West persist, Guggenheim Abu Dhabi will serve as an unprecedented platform for reasonable dialogue, ongoing education and continuing cultural exchange.
If the task of the artist is, as Schiller insisted, to transform the world through art, then Krens and Gehry are, perhaps, the most important artists working today. The wager of the Guggenheim in Abu Dhabi is that the intersection of art, architecture, religion and politics need not lead to fatal conflict but can actually promote cooperation and mutual understanding.
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Religion and the Imagination, 3-4:30 pm • Salman Rushdie, acclaimed author and recent winner of best novel to have won the Man Booker Prize for Midnight’s Children (1981). |
Author Salman Rushdie has said, “The novel can offer, which very few other kinds of writing can, to take you inside people’s hearts and minds and make you see how it is. Or at least a version of how it might be.” (The Guardian, London).
With the resurgence of religion in recent decades, it has never been more important to imagine the alternative realities in which people live. By creating narratives that translate different visions into a shared discourse, the novelist plays a critical social and political role in today’s world.
At the launch, Rushdie spoke on the importance of the literary imagination in representing conflicting religious perspectives. He was introduced by Orhan Pamuk, the 2006 Nobel Laureate in Literature, with welcoming remarks by Lee C. Bollinger, President of Columbia University. His discussion took place with Gauri Viswanathan, Professor of English and Comparative Literature at Columbia.
Audio of this Event (40mb mp3)
IRCPL Launch in the Press
“God for the Godless: Salman Rushdie’s Secular Sermon”
Time | November 8, 2008
“Salman Rushdie: The Outlook is ‘Bleak’”
The New York Observer | November 7, 2008
“Rushdie Kicks Off Religion Institute”
The Columbia Spectator | November 7, 2008
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