Antiquitopia

At the International Society of Biblical Literature meeting in Buenos Aires last month, I gave a paper entitled, "Place, Movement, and Community: A Critical Reading of Hebrews 11."  It was received rather well - somewhat to my surprise.  And I had a nice Q&A session with a lot of questions from Lawrence Schiffman of Dead Sea Scrolls fame, interestingly enough - especially interesting since, unlike my book, I did not once refer to the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice in particular or the Dead Sea Scrolls in general.  By the way, Buenos Aires is a fantastic city for a conference. The following is my abstract.  For anyone who wants a copy of the paper as delivered in Buenos Aires, please email me at my Illinois College account (Jared.Calaway@mail.ic.edu): Borrowing insights from spatial theorists, such as Henri Lefebvre and Edward Soja, and anthropologists of movement (whether pilgrimage, emigration, or dislocated populations), this paper will explore t...

I am reading Yi-Fu Tuan's very clearly written, Space and Place: The Perspective of Experience . In his chapter on "Architectural Space and Awareness," which ranges from China, ancient Sumer, medieval European Cathedrals to modern architecture, he discusses the symbolic importance of space in a larger coherent worldview that is reflected in how we build, whether a home, a village, a church, or a skyscraper. While much of the chapter emphasizes continuities in how each society constructs its buildings and shelters in relationship to its larger symbolic system (to borrow a phrase from Mary Douglas), he notes something different is now happening in the modern world. Firstly, because of the high rates of literacy, the use of material and physical symbols are fading as the importance of verbal symbols rise: "verbal symbols have progressively displaced material symbols, and books rather than buildings instruct" (117). But there is something more, or something le...