Invited Keynotes, Lectures & Conferences

Race, Refugees and the Moving-Right Show: Arendt’s Ambiguous Analysis of ‘Secular’ Liberal Nation-States.  Maastricht University Faculty of Arts and Social Science Seminar. Maastricht, Netherlands. January 16 2024. 
 
From True Religion to Racism: The Spirit/Flesh Binary, Dancing with the Devil (or Demonization) and Dehumanisation (in Europe). Roundtable on Genealogies and Intellectual History at Religion and the Liberal Scripts Expert Workshop. Berlin, Germany. June 8-9 2023. 

Dehumanisation: Race, Religion and the European Witch Hunts. PKC Millins laureate keynote lecture. Witch Hunts, Race, & the Persecution of Women, Antiquity to the 21st Century. Florence 14-15 February 2023 .

Antisemitism and Islamophobia as Forms of Dehumanisation: The European Problem. European Conference on Politics and Gender. University of Ljubljana Slovenia. 6-8 July 2022. 
 
European Ontologies: Blacks, Jews and White Supremacy – A Reply to Mills. A Tribute to Charles Mills – Spinoza Symposium. University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam. June 16-17 2022. 

Islamophobia and the Politics of Replacement. Invited Respondent to Mattias Gardell for The Politics of Replacement. Demographic Fears, Conspiracy Theories, and Race Wars Conference. Amsterdam. 28-29 June 2021.

Good Jew, Bad Jew: ‘Managing’ Europe’s Others. Invited Lecture for Lecture Series: Memory Politics and Minority Managements in Contemporary Europe Freie Universitat Berlin, Berlin Graduate School: Muslim Cultures and Societies. May 4th 2021.
 
The masked differences of race, religion and secularism: Europe’s post-Shoah silence. Invited Keynote for Conceptualising Difference Conference. Aberdeen University. April 2021. 

Thinking Race and Religion. Masterclass. Sophia, Belgisch Netwerk voor Genderstudies. March 16th 2021.  https://www.sophia.be/nl/event/masterclass-thinking-race-and-religion-with-prof-dr-anya-topolski-2/.  
 
Rejecting the Rhetoric of Uniqueness: The First Step Towards Semitic Solidarity. Invited Lecture for Configurations of Race,R eligion and Language in Modern Knowledge. Institute of Islamic Studies at the Freie Universitat Berlin, Berlin Graduate School: Muslim Cultures and Societies. June 6th 2019.

Anti-Semitism and Islamophobia: The Real Judeo-Christian Heritage. Invited Keynote Lecture for European Academy on Religion and Society. VU Amsterdam, 17-18th October 2019. 

Race, Religion, Sex: Hidden Histories, Concealed Constellations, Invisible Injustice Invited Keynote Lecture for Gender, Race, Religion: Deconstructing Regimes of Invisibility, European Society of Women in Theological Research (ESWTR). KU Leuven, 12-15 September 2019 

Race, Religion and Refugees: Arendt’s Ambiguous Analysis of Nation- States. Invited Keynote Lecture for Hannah Arendt: Challenges of Plurality. Paderborn University. 13th – 15th December 2018

The dangerous discourse of the ‘Judeo-Christian’ myth: Masking the race-religion constellation in Europe. Invited Lecture  for Edward Said Lecture Series – 40 years after ‘Orientalism’– Configurations of Knowledge/Power today. Freie Universitat Berlin, Berlin Graduate School: Muslim Cultures and Societies. November 1 2018. 

The Race-Religion Constellation Research Presentation. Race, Religion, Secularism RRS Conference Network Launch, UvA Amsterdam and Radboud Nijmegen. Oct 21-23 2018.  

Women & Power Response to Mary Beard.  Humanities Book Project. Radboud University Nijmegen. August 23rd 2018 

A Changing Same? Imagining Diasporic Polities beyond the Race-State.  Shifting the Geography of Reason XV: Ways of Knowing, Past and Present . Caribbean Philosophical Association (CPA) & La Société sénégalaise de philosophie (SOSEPHI) at Université Cheikh Anta Diop de Dakar (UCAD) Dakar, Sénégal – June 20–22, 2018  

Black Radical Thought Summer School with dr. Tony Bogues. The Black Archive, Amsterdam July 16th to July 22nd. 

Secularism, Multiculturalism & Religion. OZSW Political Philosophy Winter School Lecture. Radboud University, January 19th 2018.  

Contesting the Categories of Race, Religion and the Secular. Europe Contested. Radboud University Nijmegen. November 23-25 2017.    

Good Jew, Bad Jew … Good Muslim, Bad Muslim: “Managing” Europe’s Others. Jewish Friends. Contemporary Figures of the Jew. Freie Universitat Berlin. 16-19 October 2017 (Invited).

‘Judeo-Christian’ Europe’s Practice of Divide et Impera: Masking the Race-Religion Constellation’. Critique of Religion; Framing Jews and Muslims in Public Debate and Political Theory Today, in the Light of the Genealogies of Such Framing. University of Amsterdam, Nl, 21-24 June 2017. (Invited)  

The Race-Religion Constellation: Language, Liberation and Colonialism. Modernités Contestées – Modernities Contested. Universite Cheikh Anta Diop (UCAD), Dakar, Senegal. May 27-29 2017. 

Is Israel Europe’s Prodigal Son? Jewishness Unveils the Limits of the Westphalian Race-State. Critical Theory in the Humanities Resonances of the Work of Judith Butler.  Vrij Universiteit Amsterdam, Netherlands. April 5-8 2017. 

A Genealogy of the ‘Judeo-Christian’ Signifier: A Tale of Europe’s Identity Crisis Arab-Jewish Engagements on “Regionalism and Borders”. Bruno Kreisky Forum for International Dialogue, Vienna, Austria. December 1-4 2016. (Invited) 

Conceptualising Europe’s Race-Religion Constellation. Philosophy of ‘Race’ and Racism. Oxford University, UK, 26-28 June 2016.  

Rethinking Political Community. A Response to Brian Klug’s Revisiting ‘Je Suis Charlie’: Framings, Freedoms and Frictions. Leuven, KUL, May 11 2016.  

Antisemitism and Islamophobia: Managing Europe’s Others, Then and Now. Ethnicity, Race, and Racism Seminar, Edge Hill University, UK. 25 September 2015. 

Towards a European Communitas: a Political Identity Beyond Exclusion. Immunity and Modernity: Picturing Threat & Protection. KU Leuven. May 27-29th 2015.  

A Genealogy of the ‘Judeo-Christian’ Signifier: A Tale of Europe’s Identity Crisis. HEIRS conference ‘History, Memory and European Integration’. Maastricht University, Netherlands. June 5-6th 2014. 

A Tale of Europe’s Identity Crisis by Way of the ‘Judeo-Christian’ Signifier. Europe, The Very Idea: Exploring Europe as a Philosophical Concept and Project Bristol University, UK. May 9-10th 2014.  

 The ‘Judeo-Christian’ Tradition A Genealogy of Europe’s Identity Crisis. Is there a Judeo-Christian Tradition?University of Antwerp, Belgium. February 12-13th 2014. 

The Islamophobic Inheritance of the Resurrected Saint Paul: From F.C. Baur’s Judeo-Christianity to Badiou and Žižek’s Event. Understanding the ‘Muslim question’. Towards a genealogy of multiculturalism and the minority question in the post WWII Western-Europe. Freie Universität Berlin–Blankensee Colloquia. Jan 8-9 2014.

 London Critical Theory Summer School. Birkbeck College, UK. July 1-12 2013.  

Challenging the Frame of ‘The Jewish Question’: The Problem that is Fortress Europa K.U.Leuven-Nijmijgen Covenant. Valbeek, Belgium. June7-8th 2013. 

Challenging the Frame of ‘The Jewish Question’: The Problem that is Festung Europa Understanding the ‘Muslim question’. Freie Universität Berlin–Blankensee Colloquia. May 31st -June 1st 2013.

When one is attacked as a Jew … one must respond as an Oriental: Hannah Arendt and Edward Said in a Semitic Dialogue Hannah Arendt Circle, Antwerp, Belgium May 21st ­ 23rd 2013.  

The Future of Religious Pluralism in Europe. International Workshop at the Institute for Advanced Study in the Humanities. Essen, Germany. 17-18 May 2013.

Tzedekah: The True Religion of Spinoza’s Tractatus International Conference ‘The Radical Enlightenment: The Big Picture and its Details’ Free University Brussels Thursday 16 – Friday 17 May 2013.

 Edward Said Memorial. Centre for the Humanities, Utrecht University. April 2013. 

The Tractatus is a Christian-European, not a Jewish, Event: Spinoza on True Religion. L’actualité du Tractatus de Spinoza et la question théologico-politique Centre de théorie politique, Université Libre de Bruxelles January 23-25th 2013.   

Global Justice without Global Democracy? A Response to Andrea Sangiovanni’s paper Solidarity in the EUGlobal Justice and International Economic Institutions Institute of Philosophy, KU Leuven August 29-30th 2012. 

Was European Multiculturalism Destined To Fail? Debating Multiculturalism Dialogue Society, Istanbul TurkeyMay 3-5th 2012. 

International PhD School Tracing Colonialism and Orientalism in Social and Political Thought funded by European Research Council (ERC) as part of the OECUMENE Project, The Open University, Milton Keynes, UK. 8 February 2012. 

Antisemitism Yesterday, Islamophobia Today: Some Reflections on European Exclusion From Hannah Arendt Ethnic and Pluralism Studies Conference University of Toronto, Canada January 26-7 2012. 

An Ethics of Relationality: Destabilising the Genocidal Frame of Us vs. Them. Preventing Genocide University of Antwerp, Belgium. November 24-5th 2011. 

Deconstruction Exclusions: Response To J. Manemann’s “Political Theology in a Globalising World”. Theology Colloquium. Leuven, Belgium. May 4th 2011.  

Drones Can’t Bring About Peace: Only Ethics Can ! 3TU Ethics Conference. University of Utrecht, Netherlands. April 13th 2011.  

The Case of the Kunduz Airstrike: Moral Responsibility in the Military. Moral  Responsibility: Analytic Approaches, Substantive Accounts and Case Studies. University of Ghent, Belgium. 18-19 October 2010. 

Refusing to Wait for the Political Moment: An Alternative Judaic Reality. Waiting For the Political Moment. Universiteit Utrecht & Erasmus University Rotterdam, Netherlands. June 16-20th 2010.

Military Ethics Without Banisters: A Critique of Just War Theory. War and Peace: An Interdisciplinary Conference. Prague, Czech Republic. May 2010.

Peacekeeping: The ‘Ethical’ Warfare of the Future?. Erasmus Intensive Programme on Cosmopolitanism, peace and conflict with Judith Butler. Utrecht Universiteit. January 25-February 12th, 2010. 

On Tolerance & Freedom of Expression: A Response to Glen Newey. Centre for Ethics, Social & Political Philosophy. Leuven, Belgium. December 10th 2009. 

Critical Reflections on Power, Exclusion & the Stranger: A Response to Etienne Balibar. A World Without Politics? Leuven, Belgium. September 18th 2009. 

Introduction to a Roundtable on Gender & Politics. Centre for Ethics, Social & Political Philosophy. Leuven, Belgium. September 16th 2009. 

Critical Reflections on Sari Nusseibeh’s Once Upon a Country. K.U.Leuven Think Tank on Territory, Rights and Identity. Leuven, Belgium. May 26th 2009. 

Critical Reflections on Laclau’s On Populist Reason. K.U.Leuven-Nijmijgen Covenant. Nijmegen, Netherlands. January 23rd 2009. 

Protestantism and Its Discontents: A Response To Helena Rosenblatt. In Search of A Lost Liberalism: Constant, Tocqueville and The Singularity of French Liberalism. International Conference at the Philosophy Faculty of the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium. Dec 12-14th 2008. 

The Plurality of Judgment: Arendt’s Agonistic Public Space. (Summer School 2008) Netherlands School for Research in Practical Philosophy & Centre for Ethics, Social and Political Philosophy. Leuven, Belgium, August 24-28 2008.

Responsible Freedom or Free Responsibility? Responsibility, God and Society: Theological Ethics in Dialogue.International Conference and Book Launching in the Theology Faculty of the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium. May 7-10 2008.

Empowering or Disempowering Power? Arendt vs Foucault. Foucault Graduate Spring School at the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium. March 17-21 2008.

Athens & Jerusalem: Hannah Arendt and Emmanuel Levinas in Dialogue.  Workshops in Political Theory at the Manchester Metropolitan University, England. September 3rd 2007.   

Hannah Arendt: The Promise of the Political. Workshops in Political Theory at the Manchester Metropolitan University, England. September 4th 2007.   

Working To Create Nomos?: A Response to Hans Lindahl. Citizenship and Cosmopolitanism in Hannah Arendt HIW, K.U.Leuven, Belgium. Friday Dec. 15th 2006.   

Is Levinas a Rabbi?: A Response to Sean Hand. Radical Passivity Colloquium: On Emmanuel Levinas Jan Van Eyck Academie in Maastricht, Nl. Friday Nov. 24th 2006.

The Meaning and Origins of the Political: Reading Emmanuel Levinas’s ‘Peace and Proximity’. Levinas and the Political: First Annual North American Levinas Society (NALS) Conference at Purdue University, USA. May 12-15th 2006.

Universal Political Messianism: A Dialogue with Emmanuel Levinas’ First Talmudic Reading. On the Outlook: Figures of the Messianic (Junior Scholars Conference) at the University of Antwerp, Belgium. May 10-11th 2006.

From Ashes to Ashes: Emmanuel Levinas and the Reduction of Judaism. Erasmus European Intensive Program in Paris, France. September 5th-16th.

The Past as a Possible Obstacle to Poland’s Future: The Need for Forgiveness, Reconciliation and a Dialogue with the Jews of the Diaspora. International Conference ‘Eastern European Countries and the Challenges of Globalisation’ at the Adam Mickiewicza University in Poznan, Poland. Jan 23rd 2003.

The Relationship between Judaism, Judaica, and the Western Philosophical Tradition Graduate Student Conference ‘The Western Philosophical Tradition and its Relationship to Other Philosophical Traditions’K.U.Leuven, Belgium.  Oct 24th 2002.