This inter-disciplinary and multi-disciplinary conference aims to explore contemporary definitions, meanings and expressions of hope. In particular, it will seek to examine the individual, social, national and international contexts within which hope emerges as well as its counterpart, hopelessness.

The theme and the sense of uncertainty pervades the start of the twenty-first century. Although young, the past bears witness to the brutality of genocides, atrocities, terrorism which acts to counter-balance economic, political, technological and ecological aspirations. Medicine and bio-ethics are split between those who foresee the worst implications for persons and those who foresee the promise of genetic engineering. Cultural conflicts likewise offer scope for grave apprehension or the hopeful anticipation of a culturally enriched shared world. This project is committed to the view that now is the time look at the main spheres in which there seems to be a pendulum between fear and hopeful expectation, with a view to thinking out constructive strategies for exploration.

Papers, workshops and reports are invited on any of the following possible areas for discussion;

1. Human awareness of the passage of time; changing attitudes to what H.G. Wells called ‘the shape of things to come’. What are the possible bases for thinking about the future?
2. Expressions of these attitudes in contemporary culture – portrayals in art, cinema, literature, radio, science fiction, theatre, tv
3. The psychological basis of fear of the future. Why millennial hopes are matched by millennial fears
4. The concept of a new age. Utopian thinkers; Dystopian visions. The connection with political movements. What do new agers want? Hedonism and the simple life. The fear of longevity. The fear of loneliness
5. Hopelessness, despair, indifference and resignation. The meaning of life
6. The science of the future. Prediction, risk and disaster management
7. The phenomenology of hope. What is this phenomenon that we call hope? How does it live and seemingly thrive in difficult times? How is it sustained? How is it invoked? Is there any difference between those who seem to be more hopeful than others?
8. Does hope and the act of hoping/or the predisposition to hope differ from culture to culture? What are those variances and what accounts for them? How is hope differently instantiated among cultures? What are those instantiations?
9. The notion of open and closed futures
10. The role and place of religion and religious movements.
11. Risk, possibility and hope.
12. Envisaging possible futures. The question of choice. Cultivating hope. To boldly go.

These are indicative themes. Papers are welcome on these and related themes.

Papers will be considered on any related theme. 300 word abstracts should be submitted by Friday 2nd June 2006. If an abstract is accepted for the conference, a full draft paper should be submitted by Friday 1st September 2006.

300 word abstracts should be submitted to the Organising Chairs; abstracts may be in Word, WordPerfect, PDF or RTF formats.

Dr Rob Fisher Inter-Disciplinary.Net Priory House, 149B Wroslyn Road Freeland, Oxfordshire OX29 8HR

Stephen Morris Independent Scholar, New York, USA

Stephen Neff University of Pennsylvania, USA

The conference is part of the ‘Probing the Boundaries’ programme of research projects. It aims to bring together people from different areas and interests to share ideas and explore various discussions which are innovative and exciting.

All papers accepted for and presented at this conference will be published in an ISBN eBook. Selected papers will be developed for publication in a themed hard copy volume.

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