Conference: Pop Cultures and Ecstatic States of the Body, 1950s-1980s, 30.09.-02.10.2021, Copenhagen

University of Copenhagen; Kristoff Kerl, Detlef Siegfried, Robert Stephens, and Olaf Stieglitz (Web)
Time: 30.09.-02.10.2021
Venue: Copenhagen
During the 1950s, pop cultures became a phenomenon on a global scale. From the beginning, ecstatic states of the body – caused by the use of substances, by experimenting with different sorts of sexuality, by immersing into music and dancing, by reaching out to religion and spirituality – played an important part in pop cultures. Pop cultures and ecstatic bodies often depended on and referred to each other. States of ecstasy and trance, on the one hand, constituted driving forces in the shaping and the development of pop cultures. On the other hand, pop cultures created and spread new types of ecstasies and new practices of getting ecstatic.
Relying on concepts of ‘doing ecstasy,’ ‘controlling ecstasy,’ and ‘representing ecstasy,’ the conference examines important aspects of the entanglement between pop cultures and ecstatic bodies. Case studies include, e.g., punk music, Hollywood films, and marijuana usage, and they range geographically from Europe and North America to India or Nigeria, together exploring the role of gender, race, age, spaces, travelling, and various other aspects related to the corporeal dimensions of ‘getting high.’
Read more and full program (Web)
Panels

  1. Framing Ecstasy
  2. Doing Ecstasy 1: Gender
  3. Doing Ecstasy 2: Spaces
  4. Doing Ecstasy 3: Travel
  5. Controlling Ecstasy
  6. Representing Ecstasy in the Media

Registration by writing an email to ecstatic_pop_cultures@gmx.de.
Source: HSozKult