<div dir="ltr"><div dir="ltr"><div id="gmail-:1kk" class="gmail-a3s gmail-aiL"><div dir="ltr"><div>Dear CaMP Readers,</div><div>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;line-height:normal;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif">We will be chatting with Elayne Oliphant in two weeks about her book, The Privilege of Being Banal.<br></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;line-height:normal;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif">She
has asked us to read chapter 5, and the introduction if you would like
some more context. Please read as much as you can, but do feel free to
join us even if you haven't managed to read everything. <br></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;line-height:normal;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif"><br></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;line-height:normal;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif">PLEASE NOTE: The reading group now meets from <b>12-1 pm</b></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;line-height:normal;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif">on the last Friday of the month.<br></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;line-height:normal;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif"><br></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;line-height:normal;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif"><br></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;line-height:normal;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:11pt">The readings can be found here:</span><br></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;line-height:normal;background-image:none;background-position:0% 0%;background-size:initial;background-repeat:repeat;background-origin:initial;background-clip:initial;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"><br></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;line-height:normal;background-image:none;background-position:0% 0%;background-size:initial;background-repeat:repeat;background-origin:initial;background-clip:initial;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif">Chapter 5:</p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;line-height:normal;background-image:none;background-position:0% 0%;background-size:initial;background-repeat:repeat;background-origin:initial;background-clip:initial;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"><a href="https://www.dropbox.com/s/bx3sk2o01tufjxd/Oliphant%2C%20Chapter%205.pdf?dl=0" target="_blank">https://www.dropbox.com/s/bx3sk2o01tufjxd/Oliphant%2C%20Chapter%205.pdf?dl=0</a></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;line-height:normal;background-image:none;background-position:0% 0%;background-size:initial;background-repeat:repeat;background-origin:initial;background-clip:initial;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"><br></p><div>Introduction:</div><a href="https://www.dropbox.com/s/usnmz1g4s4nrypd/Oliphant%2C%20Introduction.pdf?dl=0" target="_blank">https://www.dropbox.com/s/usnmz1g4s4nrypd/Oliphant%2C%20Introduction.pdf?dl=0</a></div><div><br><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;line-height:normal;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif">The meeting will be <b>12-1 pm</b> EST on August 26th, and can be</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 12pt;line-height:normal;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif">reached by clicking on this Zoom link:<br><br><a href="https://iu.zoom.us/j/949202698" style="color:rgb(14,113,235);box-sizing:border-box;background-image:none;background-position:0% 0%;background-size:initial;background-repeat:repeat;background-origin:initial;background-clip:initial;text-decoration-line:none;font-family:Lato,Helvetica,Arial;font-size:14px" target="_blank">https://iu.zoom.us/j/949202698</a><br></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;line-height:normal;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif">Looking forward to seeing you all virtually,</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;line-height:normal;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif">Ilana</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;line-height:normal;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif"><br></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;line-height:normal;font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif">Press blurb:
France, officially, is a secular nation. Yet Catholicism is undeniably a
monumental presence, defining the temporal and spatial rhythms of
Paris. At the same time, it often fades into the background as nothing
more than “heritage.” In a creative inversion, Elayne Oliphant asks in <i>The Privilege of Being Banal </i>what, exactly, is hiding in plain sight? Could the banality of Catholicism actually be a kind of hidden power?<br><br>
Exploring the violent histories and alternate trajectories effaced
through this banal backgrounding of a crucial aspect of French history
and culture, this richly textured ethnography lays bare the profound
nostalgia that undergirds Catholicism’s circulation in nonreligious
sites such as museums, corporate spaces, and political debates.
Oliphant’s aim is to unravel the contradictions of religion and
secularism and, in the process, show how aesthetics and politics come
together in contemporary France to foster the kind of banality that
Hannah Arendt warned against: the incapacity to take on another person’s
experience of the world. A creative meditation on the power of the
taken-for-granted, <i>The Privilege of Being Banal </i>is a landmark study of religion, aesthetics, and public space.
</span></p>
</div><div><br></div><div><br></div><div>
<p><b>Fall Semester</b><br></p><p>August 26th - Elayne Oliphant, The Privilege of Being Banal</p>
<p>September 30th- Xochitl Marsilli-Vargas, Genres of Listening</p>
<p>October 28th- Juan Pablo Pardo-Guerra, The Quantified Scholar</p>
<p>November 18th- Scott MacLochlainn, The Copy Generic</p>
<p> </p>
<p><strong>Spring Semester</strong></p>
<p>January 27th - Nick Seaver, Computing Taste</p>
<p>February 24th- Marlene Schäfers, Voices that Matter</p>
<p>March 31st - Michele Friedner, Sensory Futures</p>
<p>April 28th - Dick Bauman, A Most Valuable Medium</p></div></div></div></div></div>