Imagination, authenticity, creativity, spirituality, divinity, archetypes and symbols, dreams and synchronicities emerge from and take us into the borderlands of liminal experiences—limen is Latin for “threshold.” Borderlands connotate wilderness and transition zones. Borderlands can also be represented by the almond shaped mandorla formed by two overlapping circles in the vesica piscis. In this keynote, Jean Shinoda Bolen will serve as a guide to the borderlands—where creativity emerges. Crossing to Avalon, Close to the Bone, Ring of Power and Goddesses in Everywoman came out of unexpected borderland experiences. To write from soul invites synchronistic help.

Jean Shinoda Bolen, MD. Is a Jungian analyst, psychiatrist, feminist, internationally known author and speaker and principal advocate at the UN for the 5th World Conference on Women. She was a Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at University of California San Francisco and is a Distinguished Life Fellow of the American Psychiatric Association. She is the author of thirteen books (including Atalanta: the Indomitable Spirit of Artemis, fall 2014 pubdate) in 85 foreign translations and has contributed to 24 anthologies. Her most recent books,The Millionth Circle, Urgent Message from Mother, and Like a Tree bring activism and archetypes together.  To learn more about her work, see jeanbolen.com

ASWM is pleased to announce that Sylvia Marcos will be a conference keynote speaker for Friday March 28th. Her presentation, entitled “Duality and Divinity: Gender and Eros in Mesoamerican Spirituality” is highly anticipated.

Sylvia Marcos is a scholar committed to indigenous movements throughout the Americas. As a university professor and researcher she has proposed a new vision in the field of feminist critical epistemology, Mesoamerican religions, and women within indigenous movements, while promoting an antihegemonic-feminist practice, theory and hermeneutics. She is the author of Taken from the Lips: Gender and Eros in Mesoamerican Religions (Brill, 2006), and editor of Women and Indigenous Religions (Praeger, 2010), and Dialogue and  Difference: Feminisms Challenge Globalization (Palgrave Macmillan, 2005).

Dr. Marcos, who is the founder of the Anthropology and Gender Institute of Anthropological Research at the Universidad Autonoma de Mexico (UNAM), is a research associate in Religion and Society with the Escuela Nacional de Antropología e Historia (ENAH) and has received several awards and scholarships in Women’s Studies in Religion at Harvard University. She has been a visiting professor, scholar in residence, and guest professor at universities around the world, including Smith, Mount Holyoke, Amherst, Hampshire, and University of Massachusetts, University of California, Harvard University, University of Ljubljana, Slovenia, Claremont University, and University of California at Riverside, among others. She has been a guest lecturer at several universities in Brazil, Ecuador, Peru, Argentina, Bolivia, Colombia Venezuela, Trinidad and Tobago and Cuba. In the Philippines, India, Indonesia, Taiwan, United States, Japan, South Korea, Canada, France, Germany, New Zealand, Turkey, Egypt, Jamaica and Kurdistan.

Check our Blog for more conference details and other news!

Third National Conference
March 28-29, 2014

“Borderlands: Scholarship as Pilgrimage and Mystery”

2014 NATIONAL CONFERENCE SAN ANTONIO, TX 

CONFERENCE REGISTRATION

Registration is now open for our Third National Conference, to be held on the River Walk in San Antonio, TX, on March 28-29, 2014. The conference title is Borderlands:  Scholarship as Pilgrimage and Mystery.  

Join us to address themes that reflect scholarship on the modern borderlands– between Mexico and the US, between myth and reality– and the rich Native American and Latina traditions of the Southwest.

Click here to register for the conference.

KEYNOTE PRESENTATIONS

We are delighted that our program for 2014 will feature keynote presentations by Dr. Jean Shinoda Bolen, Dr. Sylvia Marcos, and Laura Fragua-Cota.

HOTEL ROOM REGISTRATION

We have negotiated a special room rate ($109 plus taxes, single or double occupancy) at the conference site hotel, El Tropicano Riverwalk (applicable both to our conference and to the preceding day’s Matriarchal Studies Day).

To register for a hotel room click here. Or call 888.474.5701 and mention ASWM.

TOPICS AND THEMES

This conference will address these topics and themes:
Mesoamerican and Native American Mythologies, Genders and Myth, Animal Mysteries, La Virgen de Guadalupe, Place Wisdom, Methodology, Asian Goddesses and Traditions,  Matriarchal Studies, and Archaeomythology.

Proposals have been accepted and the conference schedule is being finalized. Meanwhile the  post that announced our call for proposals will give you more information about the nature of the 2014 Conference.

Matriarchal Studies Day
March 2014

FLASH: On Thursday, March 27, our conference will be preceded by a separately-sponsored Matriarchal Studies Day.  This one-day event will be in the same location, and feature international speakers on historic and contemporary issues of non-patriarchal cultures.

 

About ASWM

The goal of ASWM is to support the work of those whose scholarly/creative endeavors explore or elucidate aspects of the sacred feminine, women and mythology.

You’ll find posts about all this and more on our News blog posts.

Our most recent event was our 2013 Regional Symposium in Minnesota.

Learn more about academic programs in women’s spirituality, and read our book and film reviews.

See About Us  to read the mission statement and meet the board.  If you’re so inspired, Join Now!  We will soon have a member-only web site with many additional resources.

For the past decade, ASWM has been developing events related to scholarship and education.  We have held regional symposia annually, and two national conferences.  Check out our Past Events.

We honor outstanding scholarship in all its forms through our program of awards for the arts, literature, and dissertations.

We also present the Demeter Award for Leadership in Women’s Spirituality, on alternate years.  Winners are Margot Adler and Charlene Spretnak.

We have a commitment to including artists in the dialogue—see our invitational Art Gallery of members’ works and the page called Myth in Living Rituals.

ASWM’s logo is based on a Bee Goddess plaque from Rhodes.  Learn more about Bees and their symbols.