<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(42, 42, 42); font-family: Tahoma, Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; "><p class="ecxMsoNormal" align="center" style="line-height: 19px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; margin-left: 0px; text-align: center; ">
<b style="line-height: 17px; font-weight: bold; "><span style="line-height: 40px; font-size: 20pt; font-family: 'Segoe UI'; ">“Sacred Ground in the Academy: Researching Religion in a Secular Institution”</span></b></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal" align="center" style="line-height: 19px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; margin-left: 0px; text-align: center; "><b style="line-height: 17px; font-weight: bold; "><span style="line-height: 40px; font-size: 20pt; font-family: 'Segoe UI'; ">Public Lecture at Macquarie University</span></b></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal" style="line-height: 19px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; margin-left: 0px; text-align: justify; "><span style="line-height: 24px; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Segoe UI'; "> </span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal" style="line-height: 17px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; margin-left: 0px; text-align: justify; "><span style="line-height: 18px; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Segoe UI'; ">Macquarie University’s Department of Media, Music, Communication and Cultural Studies are pleased to announce<b style="line-height: 20px; font-weight: bold; "> “Sacred Ground in the Academy: Researching Religion in a Secular Institution”</b>, a joint public lecture featuring Associate Professors John Potts and Stuart Piggin on <b>November 10<sup style="line-height: 17px; ">th</sup></b> at Macquarie University.</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal" style="line-height: 17px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; margin-left: 0px; text-align: justify; "><span style="line-height: 18px; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Segoe UI'; "> </span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal" style="line-height: 17px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; margin-left: 0px; text-align: justify; "><span style="line-height: 18px; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Segoe UI'; ">Associate Professors <b style="line-height: 20px; font-weight: bold; ">John Potts </b>and <b style="line-height: 20px; font-weight: bold; ">Stuart Piggin</b> will discuss the tensions and contradictions of conducting research on religion in a deeply secularised academy and the challenges sacred and religious viewpoints pose to secular scholarship.</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal" style="line-height: 17px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; margin-left: 0px; text-align: justify; "><span style="line-height: 18px; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Segoe UI'; "> </span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal" style="line-height: 17px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; margin-left: 0px; text-align: justify; "><span style="line-height: 18px; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Segoe UI'; ">John Potts is Associate Professor in Media at Macquarie University. He has published five books, including <i style="line-height: 20px; font-style: italic; ">A History of Charisma</i>. His lecture entitled, “Heavens Below: The Religious Impulse in a Secular Age”, explores the religious underpinnings of various forms of secular cultural and political expression. This discussion of the secularisation of religious thought and practice includes reference to oppositional politics, environmentalism, cultural studies and arts.</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal" style="line-height: 17px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; margin-left: 0px; text-align: justify; "><span style="line-height: 18px; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Segoe UI'; "> </span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal" style="line-height: 17px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; margin-left: 0px; text-align: justify; "><span style="line-height: 18px; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Segoe UI'; ">Stuart Piggin is the Director of the History of Christian Thought and Experience in the Ancient History Department, Macquarie University. His books include two published by Oxford University Press on disaster and Australian Christianity, which are not two accounts of the one phenomenon. Associate Professor Piggin will be speaking to a lecture entitled, “Adventures in Desecularisation: Researching Religious Experience in Ancient, Feminist and Australian History”. Secularism typically privileges a reductionist approach to religion, thereby reducing the role of religion in social history. This lecture explores what happens when the historian seeks to look at history from the perspective of those who made it and takes seriously the significance of religion in shaping historical and social change.</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal" style="line-height: 17px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; margin-left: 0px; text-align: justify; "><span style="line-height: 18px; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Segoe UI'; "> </span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal" style="line-height: 17px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; margin-left: 0px; text-align: justify; "><span style="line-height: 18px; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Segoe UI'; ">The public lecture is free and open to the public.</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal" style="line-height: 17px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; margin-left: 0px; text-align: justify; "><span style="line-height: 18px; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Segoe UI'; "> </span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal" style="line-height: 17px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 1.35em; margin-left: 0px; text-align: justify; "><b style="line-height: 17px; font-weight: bold; "><span style="line-height: 26px; font-size: 17pt; font-family: 'Segoe UI'; ">Details</span></b></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal" style="line-height: 19px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; margin-left: 0px; "><b style="line-height: 17px; font-weight: bold; "><span style="line-height: 24px; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Segoe UI'; ">Time: </span></b><span style="line-height: 24px; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Segoe UI'; ">4.00-6.00pm</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal" style="line-height: 19px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; margin-left: 0px; "><b style="line-height: 17px; font-weight: bold; "><span style="line-height: 24px; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Segoe UI'; ">Venue: </span></b><span style="line-height: 24px; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Segoe UI'; ">Y3A.T1, Macquarie University </span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal" style="line-height: 17px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; margin-left: 0px; text-align: justify; "><span style="line-height: 18px; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Segoe UI'; "> </span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal" style="line-height: 17px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; margin-left: 0px; text-align: justify; "><i style="line-height: 17px; font-style: italic; "><span style="line-height: 18px; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Segoe UI'; ">For further information please contact Dr. Holly Randell-Moon at: </span></i><a href="mailto:holly.randell-moon@mq.edu.au" style="line-height: 17px; font-weight: inherit; text-decoration: underline; color: rgb(0, 104, 207); cursor: pointer; "><i style="line-height: 17px; font-style: italic; "><span style="line-height: 18px; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Segoe UI'; ">holly.randell-moon@mq.edu.au</span></i></a></p>
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<span style="line-height:17px;font-family:Tahoma, Verdana, Arial, sans-serif"><pre style="line-height:17px;text-indent:0in !important;white-space:normal"><span style="font-family:monospace, Verdana, Arial, sans-serif">Dr. Holly Randell-Moon</span><br>
Department of Media, Music, Communication and Cultural Studies<br>Faculty of Arts<br>Macquarie University, NSW 2109<br>Australia</pre><pre style="line-height:17px;text-indent:0in !important;white-space:normal"><span style="line-height:17px;font-family:monospace, Verdana, Arial, sans-serif"></span></pre>
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