The Relevance of Jean-Paul Sartre today

The Sartre Societies of Japan and the United Kingdom will hold their annual conferences in 2009. Both societies have given their approval for a special workshop to be added to each event, where Sartre specialists from Canada, France, Japan, and the United Kingdom will discuss the relevance of Jean-Paul Sartre to contemporary debates. The first workshop, attached to the Japanese conference, will be entitled: 'Sartre and Contemporary Ideology'; the second workshop, attached to the UK conference: 'Sartre and Contemporary Politics'.

Whilst each society holds its conference annually, to date there has been little collaboration between the different national societies, and especially with Japan. Neither Japanese speaker involved in this application has ever attended the UKSS. This project also provides a unique opportunity for early career researchers and postgraduate students, from both the UK and Japan, to attend these events and to benefit from international exposure. These participants would not have the opportunity to dialogue across the Societies were it not for this project. The workshop papers will subsequently be published in international journals in Canada, France, Japan and The United Kingdom, notably in Sartre Studies International, PhaenEx, Revue de Philosophie française, Littérature, and Les Temps Modernes. We hope that a sustainable dialogue will develop from these two workshops, enabling further research collaboration between the participants and the societies.