The International Plato Society’s Symposium XIII at the University of Georgia (USA) July 18-22, 2022 is devoted exclusively to the Sophist.  We will consider abstracts on any aspect of the dialogue and its reception. They should be received by November 29, 2021. At this point, we expect to have an in-person Symposium. However, because some or even many people may not be able to travel, we also plan to have simultaneous Zoom sessions to make remote participation possible.

Plato’s Sophist was, arguably, the most important Platonic dialogue for mid-20th century philosophy.  Anglo-American analytic philosophers looked to it to come to understand Plato’s philosophy of language.  Continental philosophers, inspired by Heidegger’s beginning Being and Time with a quotation from the Sophist, looked to the dialogue to wrestle with Plato’s notion of being.  Not surprisingly, each group found a rich field from which to pursue their mostly non-overlapping interests.  Both sides did agree on the importance of language in the dialogue. However, as if they were re-enacting a portion of the dialogue, they waged a kind of battle of gods and giants against each other.  Now that the barriers between these approaches have begun to break down and interests, on all sides, have broadened, it is time for a new, 21st century look at this puzzling and interesting dialogue.  The dialogue raises many issues that can be fruitfully  explored.  Besides questions about the nature and possibility of language, there are issues about definitions, truth, diaresis, interweaving, the five megista gene?, separate form, the nature of images, non-being, being, dunamis, the motions of forms, and many, many more.

Our Society does not reflect a single perspective: we welcome representatives of all perspectives—and of none.  Just as the sophist proves wily enough to escape most of the dialogue’s efforts to define him, so has an understanding of the dialogue and many of its details remained frustratingly elusive.  Join us at the Symposium to explore and engage this dialogue.

Confirmed plenary speakers:

  • Mauro Bonazzi (Utrecht)
  • Lesley Brown (Oxford)
  • Ronna Burger (Tulane)
  • Paolo Crivelli (Geneva)
  • Monique Dixsaut (Sorbonne)
  • Verity Harte (Yale)
  • Marko Malink (New York University)
  • Maurizio Migliori (Macerata, Italy)
  • Noburu Notomi (Tokyo)
  • Christopher Rowe (Durham)

Please consider submitting an abstract.

The week before our Symposium, our sister society, the International Society for the Study of Socrates, will have its own weeklong conference in Houston. For more details, see socratessociety.rice.edu. Consider attending both conferences. Make 2022 the year of Plato!