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Reimagining Knowledge at the Frontiers of the Human
Established in 2022 at Bankura University, the Centre for Research in Posthumanities (CRP) is a dynamic hub for transdisciplinary scholarship that challenges anthropocentrism, rethinks relational ontologies, and confronts planetary crises. Under the leadership of Dr. Sukhendu Das, CRP has emerged as India’s pioneering institute dedicated to posthumanist thought, bridging continental philosophy, environmental ethics, literary studies, and critical theory.
The CRP aspires to:
Promote cutting-edge research in the emerging field of posthumanities
Encourage dialogue between the sciences and the humanities
Rethink the entanglements between bodies, technologies, ecologies, and politics
Convened by Dr. Sukhendu Das
🗓️ 17 June 2025
Title: “Environment in Theory & Praxis: Critical Encounters”
Role: Coordinator
A focused academic gathering exploring intersections of environmental philosophy, critical theory, and posthuman praxis in contemporary ecological discourse.
🗓️ 3–4 April 2025
Title: “‘Thinking Other-Wise’: Posthumanism and Human-Animal Studies”
Role: Convenor
This conference engaged with multispecies ethics, biopolitics, and posthuman-animal relationalities through a transdisciplinary lens.
📚 International Symposium
🗓️ 16 December 2024
Title: “Posthumanism and the Animal Question”
Role: Convenor
A symposium focusing on the animal turn in critical theory, interrogating species boundaries and posthuman ethics.
🗓️ 2–3 March 2024
Title: “Posthuman Condition in the Anthropocene”
Role: Convenor
This event critically examined the entanglements of the Anthropocene with ecological collapse, non-human agency, and speculative futures.
YouTube Link: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLg3329QGSM9uD9g97bYD3VMx-qqZiwdyd&si=G39_tnADzrXMneiG
YouTube Link: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLg3329QGSM9ubXkG9iEJRUz_bquskpXNr&si=130dto7UmZhX3UZV
🗓️ 6 November 2023
Speaker: Prof. David Houston Jones
Title: “From Testimony to the Forensic: Traces of the Posthuman in Late Beckett”
🗓️ 27 October 2023
Speaker: Dr. Hannah Simpson
Title: “Disability & Interdependency: Resisting Enlightenment Humanism in Waiting for Godot”
🗓️ 15 October 2023
Speaker: Dr. Annette Balaam
Title: “A Work in Progress: Samuel Beckett in the Age of Hybrid Reality and the Posthuman”
🗓️ 23 September 2023
Speaker: Dr. James Martell
Title: “The Sovereign’s an (Old) Stancher: Post-Human Post-Sovereign Remains in Samuel Beckett’s Oeuvre”
🗓️ 31 July 2023
Speaker: Prof. Thomas J. Cousineau
Title: “The Exekias Complex: Doing It Twice in Waiting for Godot”
🗓️ 11–12 February 2023
Title: “Humanities at the Crossroads: Re-configuring (Post)human Ethics, Aesthetics and Politics”
Role: Convenor
This event facilitated interdisciplinary dialogue on evolving ethical, aesthetic, and political paradigms in posthumanist thought.
YouTube Link: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLg3329QGSM9uqYhWyU90aIgduZ7N76QBh&si=zW8_hhVHMjDc7qPK
YouTube Link: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLg3329QGSM9sK5UdEbi53Vo7augBcveSr&si=3hGxJrbadX0rDHQ0
The Centre for Research in Posthumanities (CRP), Bankura University, organized a poignant lecture series in 2022–2023 to pay homage to three pioneering continental philosophers—Bruno Latour(1947–2022), Jean-Luc Nancy (1940–2021), and Bernard Stiegler (1952–2020)—whose transformative ideas profoundly shaped posthumanist thought and continental philosophy. This series was conceived not only as a tribute but also as a sustained engagement with the legacies of these thinkers, whose works have transformed modern thought across disciplines—challenging human exceptionalism, exposing the politics of technics and memory, and rethinking community, relationality, and the posthuman condition.
📖 Lecture 1: In Memoriam: Bruno Latour
🗓️ 12 December 2022
Speaker: Prof. Graham Harman (Southern California Institute of Architecture, USA)
Title: “Latour and the Way Forward”
Summary:
In a compelling and forward-looking address, Prof. Harman—one of Latour’s most well-known interlocutors—reflected on the ontological legacy of Bruno Latour’s work. From actor-network theory to modes of existence, Harman explored how Latour decentered the human and dismantled the modern dichotomy of nature and society. The lecture also traced the intersections of Latour’s ideas with speculative realism and object-oriented ontology, arguing that Latour’s thought remains indispensable for reimagining political ecology in the Anthropocene.
📖 Lecture 2: In Memoriam: Jean-Luc Nancy
🗓️ 17 January 2023
Speaker: Prof. Ignaas Devisch (Ghent University, Belgium)
Title: “With or Without You: Jean-Luc Nancy's Being-With Reinvestigated”
Summary:
Prof. Devisch offered a profound and nuanced reading of Nancy’s concept of being-with and inoperative community. He discussed the ontological implications of co-existence, finitude, and shared embodiment in Nancy’s philosophy, showing its urgent relevance to contemporary social and political life. The lecture was both scholarly and intimate—a reflection on Nancy’s life-long commitment to relational ontology.
📖 Lecture 3: In Memoriam: Bernard Stiegler
🗓️ 22 January 2023
Speaker: Dr. Ross Abbinnett (University of Birmingham, UK)
Title: “The Politics of Stupidity: Reflection and Desire in Stiegler’s Critique of the Information Economy”
Summary:
Dr. Abbinnett offered a sharp critique of the psycho-political effects of digital capitalism through the lens of Bernard Stiegler’s thought. Focusing on the disintegration of attention, memory, and individuation under algorithmic governance, the lecture explored how Stiegler theorized the ‘pharmacological’ nature of technics—both a poison and a cure. The talk emphasized the political urgency of rethinking education, care, and responsibility in the age of automation.
📖 Lecture 4: In Memoriam: Jean-Luc Nancy
🗓️ 6 February 2023
Speaker: Dr. Daniele Rugo (Brunel University London, UK)
Title: “Jean-Luc Nancy: Thoughts to Begin With”
Summary:
In a poetic and introspective presentation, Dr. Rugo revisited Nancy’s writings on the body, freedom, death, and community. With attention to Nancy’s style and method, the lecture emphasized thought as an open process—a beginning rather than an end. Nancy’s fractured and fragmentary approach was presented as both philosophical and deeply ethical, calling for vulnerability and co-existence in an exposed world.
The In Memoriam Lecture Series was a space for critical mourning and philosophical continuation. By gathering scholars to reflect on the legacies of Latour, Nancy, and Stiegler, the CRP fostered a unique intellectual community grounded in shared loss, hope, and responsibility.
Through these lectures, the Centre honored not only the thinkers but also the provocations they left behind—provocations that challenge us to think otherwise, to recompose community, and to reorient life in the age of crisis.
🗓️ 5 January 2023
Title: “Posthuman Aesthetics: New-Age Representations”
Role: Curatorial Lead
A curated exhibition featuring multimedia artworks and experimental installations reflecting on aesthetics in the posthuman era.
🗓️ 30 November 2022
Title: “Posthuman Subjectivities: Investigative Strategies”
Role: Convenor (Jt.)
An academic platform examining emergent subjectivities, embodiment, and consciousness in a posthuman context.
🗓️ 10–11 September 2022
Title: “New Age Critical Posthumanities: Transdisciplinary Approaches to Post-Millennial Intellectual History”
Role: Convenor (Jt.)
This foundational event brought together global scholars to rethink intellectual traditions and critical methodologies through the lens of posthumanities.