48th ABS Annual Conference

This stream will gather academic faculty, graduate students, undergraduate students, K-12 teachers, and practitioners in the field of literature and the literary arts. The purpose is to begin collectively exploring how the literary arts can best contribute to the betterment of humanity by analyzing professional and academic discourses in this field through the lens of the conceptual framework guiding the work of the Baha'i community. Special attention will be paid to both recent and long-standing frameworks found in literary studies, including those on race, multilingualism, globalism, Black feminism, peace studies, and virtue ethics. We will explore questions pertaining to theory, methodology, and pedagogy – and will consult on how we might develop our capacities to contribute to the advancement of thought in these domains, especially given the precarity of some areas of the discipline in our present moment. Some pre-readings will be assigned.