Public Health after Covid: Beliefs, Religion and Competing Epistemologies

Communities of trust, expert knowledge, reliability of evidence, and competing rationalities have become central issues in public health responses to the global pandemic. This conference foregrounds how religious identity has been a significant factor in shaping, producing, and permeating individual and collective discourses and choices around health, healing, and vaccination. These discussions have had significant impacts upon individuals’ health, as well as affecting national and international policies related to Covid-19.

In response, this conference will explore a plurality of contemporary global framings that relate to beliefs about health and healing, particularly those pertaining to religious worldviews. It will explore how various competing and marginalised understandings are drawn upon by individuals and groups when making choices about health and wellbeing. Attention will be given to both the beneficial and detrimental effects that these diverse worldviews may have for health with specific attention to the recent pandemic.

Event details:

Please note this is an in-person event only and registration is required. The conference format is as follows:

• Conference Day 1 - Friday 26 May 9:30 - 17:00
• Film Screening: Harmoni - Friday 26 May 17:30 - 19:30
• Conference Day 2 - Saturday 27 May 9:30-17:00

--

The film screening explores collaboration between faith-based and traditional healers and mental health professionals in Indonesia to improve mental health care (often framed as possession) and eradicate human rights abuses.

If you have any questions about this event please refer to the BA events FAQs or email [email protected]. If you are interested in being emailed recordings of the event and announcements of subsequent publications, please register your interest by emailing [email protected].

The conference is in collaboration with Theology and Religious Studies at King’s College London and Inform, based at King’s College London.

--

Friday 26 May includes:

Discussion on Global and Plural Paradigms of Belief, Health and Healing: Focus on Asia

• Discussion chaired by Karen O’Brien-Kop, King’s College London Including:
• Prof. Dominik Wujastyk, Professor of Classical Indian Polity and Society, University of Alberta, Canada
• Prof. Dominic Steavu, Assistant Professor of Daoism and Chinese Buddhism, University of California, Santa Barbara, USA
• Dr. Suzanne Newcombe, Senior Lecturer in Religious Studies, The Open University and Honorary Director of Inform, Based at King's College London, UK

AND

Pluralist Revivals and Reactions to Covid-19 in Local Contexts

• Discussion chaired by Prof. Erminia Colucci, Middlesex University including:
• Dr. Hormoz Ebrahimnejad, Lecturer in History, University of Southampton, UK
• Prof. V Sujatha, Professor of Sociology, Jawaharlal Nehru University, Delhi, India
• Dr. Abel Ugba, Lecturer in Centre for African Studies, University of Leeds, UK
• Dr. Liora Sarfati, Senior Lecturer (Associate Professor), Department of East Asian Studies, Tel Aviv University, Israel

--

Film Screening: Harmoni

Film Screening and discussion with the Director of Harmoni, Dr Erminia Colucci (see film preview at the bottom of this page).

Harmoni is an output of a UKRI-funded research project (https://movie-ment.org/together4mh/) which used film and participatory methods to explore attempts by mental health workers to establish collaborations with faith-based and traditional healers to prevent the use of coercion and provide care for persons affected by mental illness. The film focuses on the site of Dr Colucci's fieldwork in Indonesia and the understandings of both possession and mental illness in this locality.

--

Saturday 27 May includes:

Transnational Approaches to Health and Healing in the time of Covid-19

• Discussion chaired by Dr. Mark Sinclair, Lecturer in Philosophy, Queens University Belfast including:
• Prof. C. Pierce Salguero, Associate Professor of Asian History and Religious Studies, The Abington College of Pennsylvania State University, USA
• Prof. Joana Bahia Professor of Social Anthropology, State University of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
• Dr David Robertson, Senior Lecturer in Religious Studies, The Open University, UK
• Dr Eugenia Roussou, Senior Researcher, Centro em Rede de Investigacao de Antropologia, Lisbon, Portugal

AND

Contemporary Clashes - Competing Paradigms in the Post-Covid Age

• Discussion chaired by Professor Chakravarthi Ram-Prasad, FBA, Politics, Philosophy and Religion, University of Lancaster, UK including:
• Prof. Kin Cheung, Associate Professor of East and South Asian Religions, Moravian University, USA
• Dr. Quinton Deeley, MD, Senior Lecturer in Social Development and Neuroscience, King's College London and Consultant Neuropsychiatrist in the National Autism Unit and Neuropsychiatry Brain Injury Clinic at the Maudsley and Bethlem Hospitals, UK
• Dr Azita Chellappoo, Lecturer in Philosophy at the Open University, UK
• Dr Benson Igboin, Senior Lecturer, Department of Religion and African Culture, Adekunle Ajasin University, Nigeria
• This event is funded by The British Academy Conference Fund and the Wellcome Trust, in collaboration with Theology and Religious Studies at King’s College London and Inform, based at King’s College London.

[Image credit: Getty Images]

Know what’s Happening Next — before everyone else does.

Get App

Host or Publisher The Open University, FASS