Organizer: Department of English and Cultural Studies, CHRIST (Deemed to be University), Bengaluru, India
"For a knowledge of intimacy," wrote Gaston Bachelard in The Poetics of Space (1958), "localization in the spaces of our intimacy is more urgent than determination of dates." This emphasis on situating knowledge on understanding not only what we know but where and how we know it lies at the heart of contemporary Humanities scholarship and of this Faculty Development Programme. The task of the scholar today extends beyond close reading of texts. It requires locating them within the broader social, cultural, political, historical, and technological conditions that produce, sustain, and contest meaning. This FDP affirms that the movement from text to context is not a departure from the Humanities, but their deepest vocation. It creates a temporary intellectual commons where scholars from diverse fields converge. Drawing on Hannah Arendt’s reminder that "thinking does not lead to truth; truth is the beginning of thought," the programme offers a space for productive friction between perspectives, generating new ways of seeing and knowing. The programme moves across four intersecting registers: the intersection of scientific methods and humanistic inquiry; language policy and plurilingual education; aesthetics and the expanding literary text; and the critical possibilities of Digital and AI Humanities. Together, they explore one central question from multiple directions: what does it mean to read the world when the world itself is changing the conditions of reading? The seven sessions do not merely run in parallel they speak to one another. From the archaeobotanist reading dental calculus to the policy scholar interpreting data, the dancerphilosopher engaging aesthetics, the linguist examining the classroom, the comparatist exploring virtuality, and the digital humanist analysing algorithms, all are engaged in the same vital practice: contextual reading. This is the Humanities at their most alive, necessary, and daring. In the spirit of Friedrich Nietzsche’s call in The Gay Science (1882) to “live dangerously” in order to harvest existence’s greatest fruitfulness, this FDP invites participants to step beyond the safety of familiar disciplinary boundaries. It encourages engagement with the complexity of lived reality and renewed confidence that meaning though always contested remains profoundly worth pursuing.
Dr. Robert C. Power, Adjunct Research Fellow, School of Biological and Environmental Sciences, University College Dublin, Ireland
Topic - "From Molecules to Meaning: Scientific Methods in the Humanities"
Dr. Vinod Kumar Mishra, Associate Professor, School of Public Policy and Governance, Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS), Hyderabad
Topic - "Data Science and Inclusive Public Policy"
Prof. Rekha Menon, Professor of Liberal Arts and Sciences, Berklee College of Music, Boston, USA
Topic - "Reading Beyond the Page: Indian Philosophy, Aesthetics, and the Arts as Humanities Text"
Dr. K. M. C. Kandharaja, Assistant Professor, Department of Sciences and Humanities IIITDM, Kancheepuram, Chennai, India
Topic - "From Policy to Practice: NEP 2020 and the Future of Language Education Research in India"
Dr. Darshana Samaraweera, Deputy Director General, Faculty of Languages, Humanities and Social Sciences National Institute of Education, Sri Lanka
Topic - "Technology as Context: Reimagining English Language Education in South Asia"
Prof. Ipshita Chanda, Rtd.Professor of Comparative Literature, English and Foreign Languages, University, Hyderabad, President, International Comparative Literature Association (ICLA) 2025–2028
Topic - "Reading Virtuality"
Dr. Steven S George, Postdoctoral Research Associate, Department of History, King’s College London
Topic - “Thinking with Machines : Digital Humanities to AI Humanities”
Note: The joining link and the detailed programme schedule will be shared with all registered participants via email and/or the official WhatsApp group.
Contact:
Dr.Rupesh Kotte: 9550138529
Mr.Ajay Kurian: 9821407466
Mr. Pranshu Kumar :7016196807
Ms. Swathi Rajeevan: 8289902236
For any enquiry: dpecs@christuniversity.in
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