Overt political aggression and excessive use of force by state actors dominate global media discourse and public debate. The TraCe annual conference “Beyond the Spectacle: Interdisciplinary Approaches to Slow Violence and Political Harm” from November 19 to 21, 2025, in Marburg aims to deepen research into more subtle forms of violence that often remain unacknowledged.
At a time when acts of overt political aggression and excessive use of force by state actors dominate global media discourse and public debate, the more insidious forms of violence that unfold gradually and subtly often remain unacknowledged. How can we understand, observe and theorize these forms of violence? And how are they related to the more spectacular forms of direct violence that dominate public discourse? The concept of ‘slow violence’ provides one possible interdisciplinary framework for observing and examining these more subtle dynamics of harm. It disrupts traditional notions of violence and draws attention to how structural inequalities produce profound yet unrecognized suffering over extended periods.
Building on this conceptual opening, the TraCe annual conference ‘Beyond the Spectacle: Interdisciplinary Approaches to Slow Violence and Political Harm’ from November 19 until 21, 2025 in Marburg, aims to expand research on violence and its transformations. The TraCe Annual Conference will be opened by a German-language dialogue panel. The academic conference will be held in English.
Registration is possible until October 10 via https://eveeno.com/slow-violence. The conference is organized by Felix Anderl, Kristine Andra Avram, Thorsten Bonacker, Anika Oettler, and Mariel Reiss (all Center for Conflict Studies, Philipps University Marburg). Questions concerning the conference can be directed to trace@staff.uni-marburg.de.
