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The Shapeshifters Symposium is a transdisciplinary two-day event that explores the concept of plasticity across academic domains and beyond. Their group of interdisciplinary scholars, invite researchers, societal stakeholders and artists to come together and question what it means to be a shape within a shapeshifting society, a form within a form – adapting, evolving and mutating, along with its environment.
Event details of The Shapeshifters Symposium
Start date
30 May 2024
End date
31 May 2024
Time
10:00

Moldable bodies across time & space

Plasticity, the ability to be molded in various forms while maintaining a core identity, is a term that is increasingly used within various fields of science, e.g. neuroscience, plant- and cell biology, and within the humanities. However, the meaning and use of plasticity varies between these fields. How are these different usages – from shapeshifting to adaptability, related between disciplines, and how can plasticity be developed into a threshold concept within fields where it is currently not in use?

Day 1 (PC Hoofthuis, room 1.05, Spuistraat 134, Amsterdam)

Day One of The Shapeshifters Symposium consists of four transdisciplinary panels, each centering spe cific questions related to plasticity. 

10:00 Panel 1: Plasticity, Complexity, and Circular Causality
11:45 Panel 2: Plasticity from Within and from Without
13:15 Lunch Break
14:00 Panel 3: Time & Mind
15:45 Panel 4: Meaning Making across Epistemic Cultures
17:30 Closing Circle
18:00 Drinks + Dinner

Day 2 (UvA - Institute for Advanced Study, Oude Turfmarkt 145-147)

Day Two of The Shapeshifters Symposium consists of a working group aimed to further advance discussions relating to plasticity across discplines. Our aim here is to advance a white paper and a book under the working title ‘Plasticity - Here, There, and Everywhere'.