Upcoming Conferences
Thirty Years of Mennonite/s Writing IX: Responding to the Past, Creating the Future, Goshen (Ind.) College, Sept. 29-Oct. 2
This conference was originally planned for October 2020 to mark the 30th anniversary of the first Mennonite/s Writing conference in Waterloo, Ontario, in 1990. Since 1990, seven more conferences have helped to establish Mennonite literature as a presence in both creative writing and literary criticism. “Responding to the Past, Creating the Future” hopes to reflect on this history, celebrate new and ongoing work, and encourage the Mennonite/s Writing project as it moves into its fourth decade. The conference will include a day of pre-conference workshops for students, creative writers and teachers.
Register at https://www.goshen.edu/academics/english/mennonites-writing/ (early bird deadline: Sept. 1).
Departing Canada, encountering Latin America: Reflections on the centenary of Mennonite emigration from Canada to Mexico and Paraguay, University of Winnipeg (also livestreamed), hosted by the Centre for Transnational Mennonite Studies, Oct. 21-22
The year 1922 marks the beginning of the largest group emigration in Canadian history, when several thousand Low German-speaking Mennonites from Manitoba and Saskatchewan began to establish their first colonies in northern Mexico. Their emigration was accompanied by plans for a major settlement of Mennonites in the contested Paraguayan Gran Chaco that would begin later that decade. Both were products of conflict with provincial authorities over English-language education but also reflected internal tensions over acculturation and technology use. Since these seminal migrations of the 1920s, internal growth and sub-migration has resulted in the establishment of Low German Mennonite communities throughout Mexico and Paraguay as well as in Belize, Bolivia, Argentina, Colombia and Peru. The majority of the roughly 250,000 Low German-speaking Mennonites now living in Latin America are descendants of that initial migration to post-revolutionary Mexico a century ago.
The conference will be held in person, with a live video stream available. Register for this free event, in either format, at https://ctms.uwinnipeg.ca/events/departing-canada/
The Contemporary Relevance of Desiderius Erasmus (working title), a symposium celebrating the successful completion of a campaign to create a $1 million-plus endowment for the Mennonite Library and Archives, Bethel College, North Newton, Kan., Nov. 4-5
Although the goal was met in spring 2020, the pandemic has prevented any public celebration before now. This symposium will center on Erasmus, including a keynote address by Greta Kroeker, associate professor of history at the University of Waterloo (Ontario), and a virtual display of the 16th-century Erasmus texts at Anabaptist Mennonite Biblical Seminary, Bethel College, Conrad Grebel University College, Eastern Mennonite University and Goshen College. Kroeker will be speaking in person at Bethel; the conference will be livestreamed. More information is forthcoming (see bethelks.edu).
(Rescheduled from 2021) Joining Voices Together, biennial Worship and the Arts Symposium, Bethel College, North Newton, Kan., Nov. 12
The symposium continues the celebration and exploration of the new hymnal of Mennonite Church USA and Mennonite Church Canada, Voices Together, which was introduced to congregations in 2021. The symposium will include plenary and break-out sessions, and will feature resource people who were deeply involved in putting together the new hymnal. For more information, see https://www.bethelks.edu/academics/convocation-lectures/worship-arts-symposium