Past events
Below is an archive of ITIA events dating back to 2000.
2012 ITIA Conference: Theatrical Theology
Theatrical Theology: Conversations on Performing the Faith, took place from 15 to 17 August. The conference featured plenary papers by David Brown (St Anrews), Shannon Craigo-Snell (Louisville Seminary), David Cunningham (Hope College), Jim Fodor (Bonaventure), Tim Gorringe (Exeter), Ivan Khovacs (Canterbury Christ Church) and George Pattison (Oxford). Visit the website for more information.
Micheal O'Siadhail reading: 17 April 2012
Longtime friend of ITIA, poet Micheal O'Siadhail read from his latest collection, Tongues (Bloodaxe, 2010), on Tuesday, 17 April 2012 at 5:30 pm in Parliament Hall, South Street, St Andrews. Micheal first visited ITIA in 2000, and in 2003, 2005 and 2009 he read excerpts from some of his previous collections of poetry, The Gossamer Wall (Bloodaxe, 2002), Love Life (Bloodaxe, 2005) and Globe (Bloodaxe, 2007). Visit and join Micheal's Facebook page here.
2010 ITIA Conference: Theology, Aesthetics & Culture: Conversations with the Work of David W Brown
This conference was held in St Andrews, 6-8 September 2010 and provided a forum for careful theological, historical, biblical, philosophical, and literary engagement with five major Oxford University Press volumes from David Brown FBA, the Wardlaw Professor of Theology, Aesthetics, and Culture at the University of St Andrews: Tradition and Imagination (1999), Discipleship and Imagination (2000), God and Enchantment of Place (2004), God and Grace of Body (2007) and God and Mystery in Words (2008).
Speakers included:
- Margaret R. Miles (Graduate Theological Union)
- William J. Abraham (Southern Methodist)
- Richard Bauckham (Cambridge)
- Tina Beattie (Roehampton)
- Gordon Graham (Princeton)
- Charles Taliaferro (St Olaf College)
- Graham Ward (Manchester)
- Jeremy Begbie (Duke)
- Gavin Hopps (ITIA, St Andrews)
- Clive Marsh (Leicester)
- Ben Quash (King's College London)
- Trevor Hart (ITIA, St Andrews)
Poetry Reading: Micheal O'Siadhail reads from 'Globe'
On 16 November 2009 ITIA was pleased once again to host a reading by the poet Micheal O’ Siadhail. Micheal performed a selection of his work, including poems from his most recent collection Globe (Bloodaxe, 2007).
2009 ITIA Conference: Reversed Thunder: the Art of the Psalms
Few texts can have had a more decisive impact on Western culture across the centuries than the Psalter. This conference, which took place from 31 August–3 September 2009, brought together artists, biblical scholars, historians, literary critics and theologians to explore ways in which the ‘reversed thunder’ of the Psalter has shaped the identity not only of the Jewish and Christian traditions, but also of the wider Western culture. More information...
The 34th Annual International Byron Conference
In the summer of 2008, ITIA and the University of St Andrews School of English were very proud to co-host the 34th Annual International Byron Conference, which took place 14-18 July.
The conference theme was 'Serious Laughter' and gathered esteemed Byron scholars from around the world, including Richard Cronin (Glasgow), Christopher Ricks (Boston) and Susan Wolfson (Princeton).
2007 ITIA Conference: The Offence of Beauty
What can a theological perspective on beauty offer to the arts today?
In recent decades, among those who practise, think and write about the arts, the notion of beauty has often come under deep suspicion. For many who have not dismissed it as irrelevant, it has even become a matter of offence. For some, beauty is an offence against truth, a lie in the midst of a world that is so obviously not beautiful. The quest for beauty in the arts is the quest for an illusory consolation, signalling a primal human urge for order in a world we cannot bear to admit is destined for futility. More information...
2006 ITIA Research Colloquium: Patterns of Promise
Hope is an inherently imaginative human disposition. While securely rooted in something revealed, Christian hope nonetheless also engages our imagination. In hope, faith reconfigures the shape of what is familiar in order to 'pattern' the contours of God's promised future. In the process, the present is continuously re-shaped by ventures of 'hopeful' and expectant living. In art, this same 'poetic' interplay between past, present and future takes particular concrete forms, furnishing vital resources for sustaining an 'ecology of hope'. This Colloquium explored our artistic and imaginative engagements with the shape of things to come.
Speakers:
- Richard Bauckham (St Andrews): 'Eternity in a Lilypond: Claude Monet's Nymphéas'
- Anna Williams (Cambridge): 'Time and space: suggestions from paradise'
- Paul Fiddes (Oxford): 'Patterns of hope and images of eternity: listening to Shakespeare, Blake and T.S. Eliot'
- Daniel Chua (King's College, London): 'Echoes of hope: or how time travels in Monteverdi's L'Orfeo and Beethoven's Fidelio'
- Patricia Bruininks (Hendrix College): 'Positive affect toward the future: understanding the process, sources, and temporal nature of hope'
- Trevor Hart (St Andrews): 'Nothing is impossible! eucatastrophic consolations in theology and literature'
Poetry Reading: Micheal O'Siadhail reads from 'Love Life'
ITIA, in conjunction with Bloodaxe Books, hosted poet Micheal O'Siadhail who read from his latest collection Love Life, which took place on 10 October 2005 in Parliament Hall, University of St Andrews.
'In Love Life one of our most thoughtful and accomplished poets finds a fresh intensity and reach. In four sequences Micheal O’Siadhail tells of a life in love moving through the passionate erotic, the dramas of wooing, promising and quarrelling and the day-by-dayness of home. ... The seasons of love unfold – young love opening to intimacy, growth into commitment and the slow transformations of life together. Throughout, the core theme recurs: a lifetime’s amazement at the mystery of one woman. The book culminates in the subtleties and variations of growing old while revelling in the love of life à deux.' (from the back overleaf to Love Life)
Third from the Left Theater Company
Third from the Left is an independent theater company comprised of current and former ITIA postgraduates. Their 2004-2005 season featured two productions in St Andrews: The Saint Plays by Eric Ehn from 9-12 March at the Crawford Arts Centre (now the Barron Theatre); and The Creation of the World and Other Business by Arthur Miller at the Byre Theatre from April 14-16 April.
ITIA Spring Colloquium 2004: Coming to Our Senses
ITIA's 2004 colloquium focused on the role of the senses in our apprehension of God and the world, seeking to take fully seriously the rich diversity of our nature as embodied beings within God's creation, and inquiring into the religious and theological significance of this ineradicable physicality.
As in past conferences, the focus was interdisciplinary, drawing together scholars and research students from within St Andrews and elsewhere. The colloquium was a great success, gathering some sixty participants and providing the basis for a high quality volume of papers which is currently being edited for publication.
Here & Back Again: Tolkien on Fairy Stories
In honor of the 60th anniversary of Tolkien's lecture 'On Fairy Stories' given at University of St Andrews, ITIA held a one-day Tolkien event on 8 March 2004. This event featured papers by Kirsten Johnson (ITIA postgraduate), Colin Duriez, and Loren Wilkinson; a reading of Tolkien's original lecture by BBC 4 radio presenter Nigel Forde; and culminated in the delivery of the 2004 Lang Lecture given by David Lyle Jeffrey from Baylor University.
ITIA Spring Colloquium 2003: Over the Waters
The colloquium explored the relationship between the poetic and the heuristic, testing the claim made by Paul Ricoeur and George Steiner (among others) that in our complex symbolic engagements with the human world we 'invent' in both senses of the word. Our approach was deliberately inter-disciplinary--drawing upon biblical, philosophical, theological, scientific, ethical & aesthetic perspectives--to inform what was nonetheless an unashamedly theological engagement with our theme.
In addition to papers and discussion, the colloquium included evening receptions, a guided exhibition viewing and a musical performance. More information...
The Naming of Willie Brown
'The Naming of WIllie Brown: One Evening's Journey through the Park' is a one-man show created by and starring Ivan P Khovacs (ITIA postgraduate). Ivan played to a sellout crowd at Crawford Arts Centre (now the Barron Theatre) in St Andrews on 18 & 19 March 2003.
Poetry Reading: Micheal O'Siadhail reads from 'The Gossamer Wall'
On 18 February 2003, the Institute welcomed writer Micheal O'Siadhail, who read from his latest collection The Gossamer Wall: Poems in Witness to the Holocaust (Bloodaxe Books, Tarset, 2002 and Time Being Books, St Louis, 2002).
ITIA Spring Colloquium 2002: Performance & Responsibility
What sort of thing is Christian identity, and how might it be 'played out' on the stage of the world? How far is such identity contingent on a tradition which informs and nurtures it; and how far is it a matter of creative spontaneity and improvisation?
The conference considered the metaphor of performance, in the context of reflection on what it means to be the church in a pluralist and increasingly post-Christian culture. It also included performances by actor Bruce Kuhn and the Northcliff string sextet (featuring ITIA postgraduate Michelle Stearns). More information...
James MacMillan & Michael Symmons Roberts
A conversation with James MacMillan and Michael Symmons Roberts Chaired by Professor Michael Alexander School of English, 10 May 2002.
Oxford Summer School 2001: Capturing the Imagination
Nearly one hundred students enrolled for this week long conference, led by Trevor Hart and Steven Guthrie, and entitled: Capturing the Imagination: Rediscovering the Depths of Faith and Discipleship.
In addition to lectures by Professor Hart and Dr Guthrie, the summer school featured small group seminars, led by theologians, authors, actors, visual artists and musicians. Ivan Khovacs, (ITIA postgraduate), was among the seminar leaders.
This event was hosted by Wycliffe Hall, Oxford, in collaboration with Regent College.
ITIA Spring Colloquium 2001: Transfiguring Flesh
This ITIA colloquium (26-27 March 2001) gave particular attention to the theme of transfiguration. Some of the papers presented considered the ways in which, in symbolic engagements with the world, the spiritual 'takes flesh'—as physical reality becomes a vehicle for the exploration and communication of that which transcends it. Others explored the ways in which the flesh itself becomes a transfiguring force in human life through its being taken up and handed back in poiesis or artistry of one sort or another.
Speakers:
- Jeremy S Begbie, Associate Director of ITIA, Reader in Theology, St Mary's College, University of St Andrews; Affiliated Lecturer in Theology, University of Cambridge
- Robert Crawford, Professor of English, Director of the Scottish Writing Centre, University of St Andrews
- William A Dyrness, Professor of Theology and Culture, Fuller Theological Seminary, Pasadena, California, USA
- Steven R Guthrie, Postdoctoral Research Fellow at ITIA, St Mary's College, University of St Andrews
- Trevor A Hart, Director of ITIA, Professor of Divinity, Dean of the Faculty, St Mary's College, University of St Andrews
- Patrick Sherry, Professor in Philosophical Theology, Lancaster University.
- Rosemary Wright, Senior Lecturer in Art History, University of St Andrews
Music, Words & the Word: An Exploration in Music & Theology
On 15 March, 2001, Professor Jeremy Begbie addressed a capacity audience at University of St Andrews Lower College Hall, in a presentation which included images, recorded and live music. The lecture was followed by a reception at St Mary's College and a postgraduate research seminar discussion the next day.
Micheal O'Siadhail
In February 2000 the Theology and Imagination project welcomed the Irish poet Micheal O'Siadhail. Mr O'Siadhail spoke to Professor Hart's 'Theology & Imagination' module on imagination, language and the poetic image. He also presented a public reading of his poetry to a capacity audience at the University Lower College Hall.
Paul Ricoeur
On 31 May 2000, the Theology and Imagination project hosted a seminar with the eminent philosopher, Paul Ricoeur. Professor Ricoeur addressed questions on a wide range of themes arising from his own seminal work on imagination, narrative and hermeneutics.
In addition to postgraduates and staff from the School of Divinity, the seminar attracted a large number of visitors from other departments in the University.
The seminar was chaired by Professor Hart.
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