April 4th -6th, 2019

Judith Halberstam famously claimed that monsters are “meaning machines” that can be used to represent a variety of ideas, including morality, gender, race, and nationalism (to name only a few). Monsters are always part of the project of making sense of the world and our place in it. As a tool through which human beings create worlds in which to meaningfully dwell, monsters are tightly bound with many other systems of meaning-making like religion, culture, literature, and politics. Of Gods and Monsters provides focused space to explore the definition of “monster,” the categorization of monsters as a basis of comparison across cultures, and the relationship of monsters to various systems of meaning-making with the goal of understanding how humans have used and continued to use these “meaning machines.”

Through this conference, we hope to explore the complex intersections of monsters and meaning-making from a variety of theoretical, academic, and intellectual angles. Because “monsters” are a category that appears across time and cultural milieus, this conference fosters conversations between scholars working in very different areas and is not limited in terms of cultural region, historical time, or religious tradition. As part of fostering this dialogue, Douglas E. Cowan served as this event’s keynote speaker, while archival researcher and cryptid expert Lyle Blackburn offered a second plenary address. 

Keynote Speakers

Lyle Blackburn portrait

Lyle Blackburn

Doug Cowan portrait

Doug Cowan

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  • Panel # 1: Strange Creatures from World Mythology

     

    The Idea of Evil and Messianic Deliverance in the Satpanth Ismaili Tradition of South Asia

    Wafi Momin

    The Institute of Ismaili Studies in London

     

    Shapeshifters and Goddesses: Monstrosity and Otherness in the  
    mysticism of Gloria Anzaldúa

    Stefan Sanchez

    Rice University

     

    The Powers Controlling the Voice over the Uncompleted Death Throughout Tokugawa Japan (1603-1838)

    Frank Chu

    The University of Edinburgh

     

     

    Panel # 2: Monsters of the Himalayas

     

    Of Monsters & Invisible Villages: Nags myi rgod Tales of the Tibetans of Gyalthang

    Eric D. Mortensen

    Guilford College

     

    Monstrous Beings of the Chöd Ritual

    Victor Gabriel

    University of the West

     

    The Scent of a Monster: Fumigation Rituals during the Buddhist New Year in Ladakh

    Rohit Singh

    Middle Tennessee State University

     

    Medicine, Magic, and the Yeti

    Lee Weiss

    Temple University

     

    Panel # 3: Monsters of the Ancient Near East

     

    The Monsters Within: Rape and Revenge in Genesis 34

    Leland Merritt

    Claremont School of Theology

     

    The Mesopotamian Demon Lamashtu and the Monstrosity of Gender Transgression: Textual and Iconographic Explorations

    Madadh Richey

    University of Chicago

     

    “The Calls Are Coming from Inside the House!”: The Israelite Woman as Monstrous Abject in Pentateuchal Legal Texts

    Brandon Grafius
    Ecumenical Theological Seminary

    Moderator: Rebecca Raphael, Texas State University

     

    Panel #4: Monstrous Popular Culture I

     

    Monster Outbreak: an Examination of Patterns Typical to a Monster Flap

    Blake Smith

    MonsterTalk podcast

     

    To Eat or To Be Eaten: CHEW and the Problem of Monstrosity

    Elena Pasquini

    University of Glasgow

     

    Monsters Among Us: The Cathartic Carnage of American Horror Story

    Heidi Ippolito

    University of Denver/Iliff School of Theology

     

    Panel # 5: Bigfoot and American Cryptozoology

     

    Thomas Jefferson: Monster Hunter! – Cryptozoology and National Identity 

    Justin Mullis

    University of North Carolina at Charlotte

     

    Bigfoot and American Monster Culture

    Timothy Grieve-Carlson

    Rice University

     

    The Religious Dimensions of Bigfoot

    Joshua A. Paddison

    Texas State University

     

     

    Panel # 6: Monstrous Popular Culture II

     

    “But forth he came, this shivering crasy cold”: The Monsters of Early Modern Meteorology

    Christopher Gilson
    Northwestern State University of Louisiana

     

    Revulsion, Reverence, and Romance: Exploring the Uncanny in N.A. Sulway’s Rupetta

    Christopher L. Porter

    Our Lady of the Lake University

     

    The Apocalyptic Framing of Blood Meridian or the Evening Redness in the West from John’s Book of Revelation

    Sky Hawkes

    Our Lady of the Lake University

     

    The Odd One Out: Images of Monsters in Tahar ben Jelloun's "La petite à la burqa rouge"

    Lavinia Horner

    Kansas State University

     

    Panel # 7: The Monstrous Other

     

    Topophilic Perversions: Fetishizing Sites of Monstrosity in American Dark Tourism

    Whitney May

    Texas State University

     

    Will the Real Monster Please Stand?

    Crystal Silva-McCormick

    Texas Lutheran University and St. Edward’s University

     

    Creepy Nsima: Horrific Quotidian Monsters as a Study on Mozambican Public Life

    Joel Christian Reed

    The Demographic and Health Surveys Program