Invited Presentations & Closed Conferences
2018 “On (not) explaining the domestic miracle.” Paper presented at “Ethnographies of explanation and the explanation of ethnography: beyond ethnographic foundationalism?” Closed conference at the University of Cambridge, March 22nd-23rd.
2018 “Miracles, in the Future Imperfect.” Keynote presented to GloPent conference,at VU University in Amsterdam, February 9th.
2018 “Anthropology and Systematic Theology.” Paper presented to NOSTER thematic interdisciplinary seminar “Changing the tacks: exploring new directions towards an interdisciplinary study of the lifeworlds of believers, A dialogue between cultural anthropology and systematic theology,” VU University in Amsterdam, February 8th.
2017 “Speculative Religion and the Belief/Discipline Complex.” Paper presented at colloquium for department of Religious Studies, UNC Charlotte, March 13th.
2016 “The divine and demonic psychic economy of character.” Paper presented at “Anthropology of Character” conference, St. Andrews University, September 1st.
2016 “Ontology without grounds: Ethics, Religion, and the Ontological Turn.” Weekly seminar, Brigham Young University, April 8th.
2016 “Pentecostal dualism, ontological monism, and the amoral charism.”Paper presented at “Pentecostal Dualism” Conference, University of Bergen, April 6th. [Paper read in my absence due to intervening family emergency].
2016 “Signs and Wonders.” Public conversation with the artist Michael Stevenson about his one man show “Signs and Wonders.” Midway Contemporary Art, Minneapolis Minnesota, April 2nd.
2016 “WhySpinoza called it The Ethics: On religion and salvaging anthropology’s ontological turn.” Paper presented to UCSD Humanities Center working group Politics, Ethics, Ontology: An Inquiry into the Ontologies of Nature, February 26th.
2015 “Anthropology, Theology, and the Problem of Incommensurability.” Paper presented at the John Tempelton Foundation “Theologically-Engaged Anthropology: What Can Theology Contribute to Cultural Anthropology and ethnography?” Conference, University of Georgia, September 21st.
2015 “Bringing Discipline to Heel,” Paper presented at “Christianity and Discipline” Conference, University of Edinburgh, September 10th.
2015 “The Cunning of Protestant Language.” Keynote paper presented at “Word letter and language in Christian culture” Conference, University of Helsinki, June 23rd.
2015 “New.” Paper presented at the Terms of Faith Conference, London School of Economics, June 20th.
2014 Introduction to the plenary session “Can we have our nature/culture dichotomy back, please?” at ASA14 Decennial “Anthropology and Enlightenment” conference, University of Edinburgh, June 22nd.
2014 “On Ethical Work and ‘Miracle Work’: Extensive Circuits and Insensitive transformations on the edges of Charismatic Prayer.” Paper presented at the SSRC Comparative Ethnographies of Prayer Conference, London School of Economics Department of Anthropology, May 17th.
2014 “After the Denominozoic: evolution, differentiation, denominationalism.” Paper presented to the UCSD Department of Anthropology Christianities Workshop, May 12th(expanded version of “After the Denominozoic” paper give at the 2013 Wenner-Gren Symposium on “The Anthropology of Christianity).
2014 “‘The Lord Says You Speak as Harlots’: Intensity, Affect, and Affectation in American Neo-Pentecostal Language.” Paper presented to the University of Edinburgh Social Anthropology Seminar, February 7th.
2014 ”The Third Wave and the Third World: The Role of Missions and Global Christianity in the Foundation of the American Neo-charismatic Movement.” Paper presented to University of Edinburgh Centre for the Study of World Christianity: Seminar Programme, January 21st.
2013 “After the Denominozoic: evolution, differentiation, denominationalism.”Paper presented at Wenner-Gren Symposium #147 on “The Anthropology of Christianity: Unity, Diversity, New Directions,” Paper presented March 8-15, at Tivoli Palácio de Seteais, Sintra, Portugal.
2013 “Deterritorialized Spirit, Reterritorialized Submission: Charismatic personhood, Pentecostal portability, and the in/dividualism debate in the anthropology of religion.” Paper presented to Rice University’s departments of Anthropology & Religion, January 30th.
2012 “Surprise and Submission as Virtual Field: Pentecostal and Neo-Charismatic Christianity in Southern California and Beyond.” Paper presented to the University of Cambridge Division of Anthropology, November 26th.
2012 “The Willing Subject, or the Subject of Will? Pharmacological, Devotional, and Political Aporias of Personhood in Neo-Charismatic Southern California.” Paper presented at “The Will,” SSRC conference organized by Kevin Lewis O’Neill and Tomas Matza, University of Toronto, September 29th.
2012 “Surprise and Submission as Virtual Field: Pentecostal and Neo-Charismatic Christianity in Southern California and Beyond.” Paper presented to the University of Edinburgh Social Anthropology Department, June 12th.
2012 “Does God Exist in Methodological Atheism? On Tanya Luhrmann’s When God Talks Back and Bruno Latour.” Paper presented at the Comparative Christianities Conference, University of California San Diego, April 28th.
2012 “The Devil in SoCal.” Paper presented to the Warren Scholars Seminar, UCSD, February 7th.
2012 “Denominational Differentiation: Foucauldian Ethics, Charismatic Affects, and the Anthropology of Christianity in Southern California.” Paper presented to William & Mary College, January 27th.
2010 “Durkheim, Whitehouse, and Memory’s Time: Notes on Binary Systems, Composites and Intensities, and the Cognitive Anthropology of Religion.” Paper presented at MERBEAR, UCSD-UCLA Workshop Series on Culture and Mind, October 22nd.
2010 “Southern California, the Dark Side of Planet Foucault: Ethics, Subjectivity, and the Anthropology of Christianity.” Paper presented to the London School of Economics Anthropology Department Friday Seminar, October 15th.
2008 “No Caller I.D. for the Soul – demonization, discernment, and the unstable subject of Protestant language ideology.” Presentation to Rice University Mellon Dissertation Fellowship Working Group, August 30th(expanded version of ‘No Caller I.D. for the Soul” paper give at the 2007 Society for the Anthropology of Religion meeting).
2007 “Perils of Pauline, or, Disjuncture, Continental Philosophy’s New Political Paul, and the Question of Progressive Christianity in a Southern Californian Third Wave Church.” American Studies Colloquium at Reed College, March 20th (expanded version of ‘Perils of Pauline’ given at American Anthropological Association).
2007 “Demonization, Charisms, and Subjectivity in The Vineyard.” Paper presented at the conference “Ritual Practice in Charismatic Christianity,” University of Copenhagen, Center for African Studies, Copenhagen. February 3-4, 2007.
2006 “Between Stewardship and Sacrifice: Agency and Economy in a Southern California Charismatic Church.” Paper presented at Reed College, August 8th(expanded version of ‘Stewardship to Sacrifice in Southern California Neo-Charismatic Culture,’ given at the 2005 biannual meeting for Society for Anthropology of Religion).
2005 “Hearing from God in Southern California.” Talk presented to the Psychodynamic Seminar at the Department of Anthropology, University of California San Diego.
Conference Presentations
2018 “Other senses,” Paper presented as part of “Author Meets Critic Panel: Martijn Oosterbaan’s Transmitting the Spirit: Religious Conversion, Media and Urban Violence in Brazil,” GloPent conference,at VU University in Amsterdam.
2017 “Latter Days.” Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Anthropological Association.
2017 Untitled paper for the roundtable “Critique as Horizon, Critique as Specter.” Presented at the biannual meeting of the Society for the Anthropology of Religion.
2016 “Religious Speculation and the Belief/Discipline Complex: Crisis and Apostasy in the Mormon Church and a Return of Speculative Thought.”Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Anthropological Association.
2015 “Charisma:Amateurism::Word:Commodity.” Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Anthropological Association.
2015 “Introduction:The Seriousness of Anthropology: Religion, Ontology, Critique.” Presented as part of the Invited Panel “The Seriousness of Anthropology: Religion, Ontology, Critique,” an invited panel of the Society for the Anthropology Religion. Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Anthropological Association.
2015 “Nations without States and States without Nations: Christian Nationalism and Christian Withdrawal in Southern California.” Paper presented at the biannual meeting of the Society for the Anthropology of Religion.
2014 “Apocalyptic Diversity, the Ethnography of Martyrs, Demonic Anthropology and Having a Heart: A Topography and Topology of Alterity Among American Charismatic Evangelicals.” Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Anthropological Association.
2014 “Cosmology and transhumanism, Mormons and utopia.” Paper presented at ASA14 Decennial “Anthropology and Enlightenment” conference.
2013 “Divine Monologue and Sensual Heterogeneity: Prophecy, Authority, and Subjectivity in American Charismatic Christianity.” Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Anthropological Association.
2013 “Anthropological Virtuality’s Virtuality: Why a turn to Deleuze in the Anthropology of Religion?” Paper presented at the 2013 biannual meeting of the Society for the Anthropology of Religion.
2012 “Deterritorializing Spirit, Reterritorializing Submission: Language, Exchange and Selfhood in Neo-Charismatic California.” Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Anthropological Association.
2012 “Does god exist in methodological atheism? Notes on object orientated ontology from the ethnography of Southern Californian Neo-Charismatics.” Paper presented at the 2012 annual meeting of the American Ethnological Society.
2012 “Apostolic Networks in the Third Wave of the Spirit: An Interdisciplinary Discussion – John Wimber and the Vineyard.” Paper presented as part of the panel “Theology Symposium: Apostolic Networks in The Third Wave of The Spirit: An Interdisciplinary Discussion,” at the 2012 annual meeting of the Society for Pentecostal Studies.
2011 “I’m sorry Lord for the thing I’ve made it: The Worship-commodity and the metastases of the confessional.” Paper presented as part of “Confessions’ Tidemarks, Traces, And Legacies: Confession, The Confessional, And the Confession of Faith In The Anthropology Of Christianity And Beyond,” an invited panel co-sponsored by the Society for the Anthropology of Religion and the Society for Psychological Anthropology.
2011 “An Empirical Miraculous: The Church Growth Movement, the Vineyard, and the Evangelical roots of a Charismatic Christianity.” Paper presented at the 2011 biannual meeting of the Society for the Anthropology of Religion.
2010 “Notes towards the global demonic subjective economy.” Paper presented at the 2010 annual meeting of the American Anthropological Association.
2010 “‘The Postmodern’ as New Dispensation: An Apocalyptic Cultural Turn in a Post-Apocalyptic Christian Milieu.” Paper presented at the 20th International Association for the History of Religions Quinquennial World Congress, August 20th.
2009 “‘Saved again for the very first time’: continuity and disjuncture in second generation Charismatics and Pentecostals.” 2009 annual meeting of the American Anthropological Association.
2009 “Law and Vision – Pauline Militancy and Neo-Charismatic Ecstasy.” Paper presented at the 2009 biannual meeting of the Society for the Anthropology of Religion.
2008 “‘We’re Just Followers of Jesus’ – Transcendence, Political Contestation, and the Death of Religion in Southern Californian Neo-Charismatic Christianity.” Paper presented as part of “Liberal Religiosities,” an invited American Anthropological Association panel co-sponsored by the Association for Political and Legal Anthropology and the Society for Anthropology of Religion sections.
2007 “No Caller I.D. for the Soul – demonization, discernment, and the unstable subject of Protestant language ideology.” Paper presented at the 2007 biannual meeting of the Society for the Anthropology of Religion.
2006 “Perils of Pauline, or, Disjuncture, Continental Philosophy’s New Political Paul, and the Question of Progressive Christianity in a Southern Californian Third Wave Church.” Invited Paper presented at the 2006 annual meeting of the American Anthropological Association.
2005 ‘“The Postmodern” as New Dispensation: Uncertainty and the Future in the Southern California Neo-Charismatic Church.’ Paper presented at the 2005 annual meeting of the American Anthropological Association.
2005 ‘Stewardship to Sacrifice in Southern California Neo-Charismatic Culture.’ Paper presented at the 2005 biannual meeting of the Society for the Anthropology of Religion.
Jon Bialecki 