Buil­ding and Sus­tai­ning Alter­na­ti­ve Scho­lar­ly Publi­shing Pro­jects Around
the World

The Public Know­ledge Pro­ject is plea­sed to announ­ce that, in part­ner­ship
with the Freie Uni­ver­si­tät Ber­lin, the Third Inter­na­tio­nal PKP Scho­lar­ly Publi­shing Con­fe­rence will be held from Sep­tem­ber 26 – 28, 2011 in Ber­lin, Ger­ma­ny. This is the first time that the PKP Con­fe­rence is being held out­side of Van­cou­ver, Cana­da, and we look for­ward to mee­ting more mem­bers of the gro­wing, inter­na­tio­nal PKP user com­mu­ni­ty. Given that the land­mark Buda­pest Open Access Initia­ti­ve, laun­ched in Decem­ber 2001, will be cele­bra­ting its first deca­de, the con­fe­rence invi­tes explo­ra­ti­ons of the les­sons lear­ned, suc­ces­ses achie­ved, and set­backs over­co­me in our shared attempts to increase and open access within scho­lar­ly publi­shing. The first and second PKP con­fe­ren­ces brought tog­e­ther a remar­kab­le array of pre­sen­ta­ti­ons and par­ti­ci­pan­ts from around the world, and we anti­ci­pa­te an equal­ly valuable expe­ri­ence in 2011.

wei­ter­le­sen “Third Inter­na­tio­nal PKP Scho­lar­ly Publi­shing Con­fe­rence” »

Hind­sight: The Pro­mi­se and Peril of Loo­king Back­ward

Alt­hough the idea of hind­sight is fre­quent­ly asso­cia­ted with the bia­ses, dis­tor­ti­ons, and out­right lies of memory–as in the infa­mous “20–20” sce­na­rio or the con­vic­tion that one “knew it all along” – Mark Free­man main­ta­ins that this pro­cess of loo­king back­ward over the ter­rain of the past can also ser­ve as a pro­found source of insight, under­stan­ding, and self-know­ledge. Con­sider Tolstoy’s har­ro­wing tale of Ivan Ily­ch, revi­si­ting his past on the eve of his death, only to rea­li­ze that the life he had been living was a lie. Con­sider as well the many times in our own lives when, upon revie­w­ing the past, we are able to see what we could not, or would not, see ear­lier on.

Hind­sight is also inti­m­ate­ly con­nec­ted to what Free­man calls nar­ra­ti­ve reflec­tion: Through the distance con­fer­red by time, we can look back on past expe­ri­en­ces and see them anew, as epi­so­des in an evol­ving sto­ry. As important as “being in the now” and “living in the moment” are, it is no less important to pau­se at times and, by loo­king back­ward, seek to dis­cern tho­se aspects of
expe­ri­ence that might other­wi­se escape our noti­ce. Far from neces­s­a­ri­ly lea­ding to decep­ti­on and lies, the­r­e­fo­re, hind­sight can lead to wis­dom and inde­ed truth – of a sort, Free­man con­tends, that is only available in retro­s­pect.

In addi­ti­on to ser­ving as a cen­tral site of self-know­ledge, hind­sight plays an inte­gral role in the pro­cess of moral growth. For, through hind­sight, the­re emer­ges the oppor­tu­ni­ty not only to see the pos­si­ble errors of our ways but to tran­s­cend them and ther­eby to move on to bet­ter ways of being in the world. Dra­wing on psy­cho­lo­gy, phi­lo­so­phy, lite­ra­tu­re, and per­so­nal expe­ri­ence, this wide-ran­ging volu­me offers an insightful and enga­ging explo­ra­ti­on of the role of hind­sight both in dis­cer­ning the per­so­nal past and in deepe­ning moral life.

wei­ter­le­sen “New Book by Mark Free­man” »

Call For Papers (Exten­ded Dead­line)
Mar­xism and Psy­cho­lo­gy Con­fe­rence
The Uni­ver­si­ty of Prin­ce Edward Island
August 5–7, 2010
Web­site: http://vre.upei.ca/mprg/
Cont­act: marfken@upei.ca

Sub­mis­si­on Dead­line: Febru­ary 1, 2010 (Exten­ded Dead­line)

In the histo­ry of social thought, it is dif­fi­cult to find a more divi­si­ve figu­re than Karl Marx. For many, the mere men­ti­on of his name con­ju­res up images of tota­li­ta­ri­an regimes domi­na­ting near­ly every aspect of an individual’s exis­tence. Yet for others, Marx’s cri­tique of the capi­ta­list mode of pro­duc­tion draws atten­ti­on to the fact that our beliefs, thoughts, and desi­res ine­vi­ta­b­ly emer­ge against the back­ground of spe­ci­fic cul­tu­ral, his­to­ri­cal, and social prac­ti­ces.

The pur­po­se of this con­fe­rence is to bring stu­dents, scho­lars, and acti­vists tog­e­ther to dis­cuss exci­ting issues at the inter­sec­tion of Mar­xism and Psy­cho­lo­gy. While it is clear that a num­ber of orga­niza­ti­ons are making important con­tri­bu­ti­ons to this area of stu­dy, we belie­ve that the time is right to open up a space for stu­dents, scho­lars, and acti­vists from a varie­ty of disci­pli­na­ry back­grounds to reflect on the role that Mar­xism can play in psy­cho­lo­gi­cal theo­ry, rese­arch, and prac­ti­ce.

In brin­ging tog­e­ther scho­lars at the fore­front of rese­arch in Mar­xism and Psy­cho­lo­gy, we also hope to give new stu­dents and acti­vists an oppor­tu­ni­ty to inter­act with indi­vi­du­als who have made signi­fi­cant con­tri­bu­ti­ons within this area. By orga­ni­zing an impres­si­ve coll­ec­tion of ple­na­ry par­ti­ci­pan­ts, we hope to fos­ter an envi­ron­ment whe­re stu­dents, acti­vists, and scho­lars can iden­ti­fy poten­ti­al gra­dua­te advi­sors, rese­arch assistants, and par­ti­ci­pa­to­ry inves­ti­ga­tors. This year, con­firm­ed ple­na­ry par­ti­ci­pan­ts include:

wei­ter­le­sen “Mar­xism and Psy­cho­lo­gy Con­fe­rence” »

Ros­kil­de Uni­ver­si­ty, Den­mark, 26 to28 May 2010

This con­fe­rence focu­ses on the ever­y­day prac­ti­ces of per­sons, and the inter­play bet­ween actors and social struc­tures in ever­y­day life. Ever­y­day life in the Nor­dic and Euro­peans socie­ties is cha­rac­te­ri­zed by an unpre­ce­den­ted rup­tu­re of eco­no­mic and poli­ti­cal sys­tems, cul­tu­ral mea­nings and indi­vi­du­al iden­ti­ties. Glo­bal and envi­ron­men­tal chan­ges force us to revi­se and recon­sider our way of life and affects us at all levels of exis­tence. It appears as if that which seems sta­ble today will be ren­de­red unsta­ble tomor­row. The con­fe­rence focu­ses on the­se chan­ges and trans­for­ma­ti­ons and aims to deba­te and dis­cuss how this can be unders­tood and explo­red. What theo­ries, metho­do­lo­gies and ana­ly­ti­cal con­cepts help us to stu­dy the trans­for­ma­ti­ons of ever­y­day life in chan­ging socie­ties?

wei­ter­le­sen “Sub­jec­ti­vi­ty and Lear­ning Con­fe­rence” »