Department of Religion and the
Hofstra Cultural Center present
Annual Lecture in Critical Spiritualities In the Absence of Death: Disappearance, Archival Erasure, and Collective Practices of Mourning with DR. EGE SELIN ISLEKEL Dr. Ege Selin Islekel is Assistant Professor of Philosophy and Affiliated Faculty Member of Race and Ethnic Studies at Texas A&M University. Her book, Nightmare Remains: The Politics of Mourning and Epistemologies of Disappearance (2024), investigates epistemic and political resistance in collective acts of mourning in Turkey and Latin America. This event will explore the political significance of disappearance through the lens of improper burial—practices such as enforced disappearance, airdropping, mass burial, or the obstruction of burial altogether. Contemporary politics functions by organizing the conditions under which mourning is possible or foreclosed, and disappearances are a part of this work. But the strategic deployment of mourning in response to disappearances is a practice of resistance, which produces alternative modes of knowing, remembering, and archiving.
Co-sponsored by the Hofstra College of Liberal Arts and Sciences; Rabinowitz Honors College; Center for "Race," Culture and Social Justice; Departments of Comparative Literature, Languages, and Linguistics, History, Philosophy and Sociology; Programs in Africana Studies, Jewish Studies, Latin American and Caribbean Studies, LGBTQ+ Studies, Peace and Conflict Studies, and Women’s Studies.
Monday, October 20, 2025 11:20 a.m.-12:45 p.m. Leo A. Guthart Cultural Center Theater Joan and Donald E. Axinn Library, First Floor, South Campus Admission is FREE and open to the public. To RSVP visit events.hofstra.edu. For more information, please call the Hofstra Cultural Center at 516-463-5669 or visit hofstra.edu/culture.