Forthcoming will be a couple of posts here about my touristy adventures in San Francisco. On the other blog I will post my reactions on the conference itself, and some of the papers I heard.
But first, because I am officially delirious, I have written a poem:
Attenuating Seasons And Days
Oh, shall I count the many ways
that the outstanding papers
over the course of several days
without flurries or frivolous capers
cited the man, Asad (power!)
quietly, with reverence, as if for vespers
while I leaned forward with a glower
(religion, history, and the secular)
listening to essays hour after hour?
Talal "no universal definition of religion" Asad
Talal "reads more than enough Foucault" Asad
Talal "at least he doesn't write in French" Asad!
Please don't leave a comment telling me how much I suck - yes, I know that I can't write poetry. But I had fun doing it, and besides I went to talk on anthropology and poetics - so there!!
