Bishop's College to conduct Dalit Theology Symposium

Bishop's College with the support of the World Council of Churches - Programme on Just and Inclusive Communities and the South Asia Regional Council of CWM, will be organizing an International Symposium on Dalit Theology in the 21^st Century. The Symposium will be held at IITD, Kolkata between the 13^th and 18^th of January 2008 and will bring together 30 theologians and activists from around the globe  

For the last three decades Dalit Theology has been involved in shaping an alternative paradigm of an Indian Christian Theology. Seeking to articulate the real life experiences of a majority of the Indian Church , Dalit theology has presented itself as an authentic Indian Theology that has challenged the global theological community with its vision and insights.  

Today, three decades later, we are standing on the threshold of a new generation of Dalit theology. Dalit theologians, who having been inspired by the pioneers of Dalit theology, also recognize that Dalit theology needs to reinvent and contextualize itself to the concerns and demands of the 21st century. The need of the new millennium is to facilitate critical and creative conversation among emerging voices in Dalit theology and to re-present the particular resources of Dalit theology as a theology of life for all. To this end Bishop's College intends to initiate a collaborative discourse among younger theologians committed to Dalit emancipation in the Indian church and society at large. The symposium promises to initiate a new direction for Dalit Theology, among the papers to be included at the symposium include at least nine papers from a Dalit Feminist perspective, thereby filling a felt lacuna within Dalit Theological discourse.  

It is our intention that the symposium will result in the publication of a collection of wholly new essays that reflect the new concerns and methods of a younger generation of Dalit theologians that we believe will offer a new direction to Dalit Theology.