Carnevale Symposium  March 15-16, 2004

Processions, Parades, and Propaganda

2:00 - Opening Remarks David Pharies, Chair RLL

2:10 - 2:45
Panel Discussion   Origins and Evolution
Chair - Mary Watt, RLL
Panellists: Robert Wagman, Hans Mueller, Richard Burt   

3:00 - 3:50
Christopher Kleinhenz, University of Wisconsin
"Procession and Progression in Dante's Divine Comedy"
Introduction by : Michael Paden, RLL

4:05 Reception and Official Opening of the MEMS Reading Room , Dauer 237
 

Tuesday, March 16

11:45-12:35
Panel Discussion : Modern and Early Modern Perspectives
Chair - Will Hasty, Germanic and Slavic Studies
Panelists:  Mary Watt, Terry Harpold , Ben Hebblethwaite

1:55-2:45
Michael McGrath, Georgia Southern University
"Counter-Reformation Culture: Religious Processions in Golden Age Spain"
Introduction by Shifra Armon, RLL

Closing Remarks: Will Hasty and  Mary Watt, Co-Directors of the Nascent Center for Medieval and Early Modern Studies
Panels and lectures in Dauer Hall 219

Why Carnival? And why Processions, Parades, and Propaganda?

This colloquium intends to engage humanities scholars, both students and faculty, in an interdisciplinary study of the phenomenon of “Carnival” and the use it makes of Processions and Parades in the propagation of Social, Religious and Political Ideals. With its roots in antiquity and its many manifestations still vital in an increasingly secular and globalized society, pre-lenten revelry and in particular, its formalized manifestations, present scholars with innumerable opportunities to explore human thought, spirituality and interrelations.

This year's colloquium then focuses on exploring the origins and evolution of the processions that form an integral part of organized and formalized Carnival celebration as well as the continuing role of such manifestations in today’s world. The pre-lenten merry-making of Christian tradition has long been associated with a period of pronounced theatricality, marked especially by the wearing of masks and the comic reversal of societal norms. Thus a study of Carnival necessarily requires not only an examination of the underlying religious faith and traditions that engendered the festival, but also an examination of the norms that the festival seeks to reverse, together with the myriad aspects of the realization of such reversal, especially the plastic and the performing arts (music and theater).

The study of the Carnival phenomenon thus necessarily raises issues of religion, sociology, music, theater arts, philosophy and anthropology. Accordingly, this colloquium stands as the embodiment of the interdisciplinary essence of Humanities.

--Mary Watt

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