Our first conference addresses a crisis created by the continuing fractures of sociality expressed either as internal estrangement or as hostility to those perceived as the resident stranger. This first annual Congress of the newly instituted AHRB Centre for Cultural Analysis, Theory and History aims to incite new debates around the interrelated aspects of both the political and philosophical theories of class and hospitality and their current translations to cultural practices, analyses and performance.

Keynote Speaker: Gayatri Spivak (Columbia University)

Plenary Speakers: Paul Gilroy (Yale University), Tahar Ben Jelloun, Cora Kaplan (university of Southampton), Abdelkébir Khatibi (University Mohammed v-souissi), Martha Rosler (Mason Gross School of the Arts, Rutgers University).

Special Panel Speakers: Rachel Bowlby (University of York), Assia Djebar ( Louisiana State University), Aritha van Herk (University of Calgary), Saskia Sassen (London School of Economics/University of Chicago), Carolyn Steedman (University of Warwick).