Dear All,

the summer comes to an end and we all prepare to go back to our academic
endeavours, I would like to encourage all CAAR members to send in a contribution for our next conference to be held in Paris as the deadline approaches.

The topic of the conference links to a subject matter that enhances our work in the Humanities. As Johnnella E. Butler reminds us, “ the most generative site of knowledge of the human condition, transgression of repressive and oppressive thinking, and transformation of attitudes toward difference and power in higher education is that of the humanities.”

The search for wholeness and identity involves a matrix of balance where the East and the West meet, where the spiritual, the emotional, the physical and the rational are all part of a desirable whole which asks that we live to the fullest by reaching our strongest emotions which in words of Audre Lorde will bring us “ a sense of satisfaction to which, once we have experimented it, we know we can aspire” .

Let us assume this responsibility for transformation, focusing on the mediation through literary and academic activities between black knowledges and social transformation, along with personal freedom and a profound reflection on our immediate communities.

I will see you all in Paris.

Silvia Castro-Borrego
University of Málaga (Spain).