El Consejo Nacional de la Cultura y las Artes, Chile, and IFACCA are pleased to announce that Sonia Montecino will be one of the keynote speakers at the 6th World Summit on Arts and Culture, an event that will see over 400 delegates and 70 speakers, focusing on the theme Creative Times: new models for cultural development.
Sonia is currently the Vice Principal of Communication and Outreach at the Universidad de Chile. Her work focuses on the diversity of identities and the visibility of economic and symbolic inequalities between different groups faced with complex processes of cultural homogenization
During the last century, the world has experienced significant economic changes, a series of conflicts and crises, a loss of trust in political institutions, a a shift in ideologies, and the growing threat of a global environmental crisis.
We are all witness to these so-called ‘critical times’: an era of permanent change, causing sociocultural disruption and constant reevaluation of the assumptions and certainties that defined prior understandings of development. In the midst of these changes, a key issue in the development debate is an agreed definition of practices which constitute wellbeing and quality of life for different communities.
Even within a single country, the local identities of different communities vary greatly, meaning that indicators of social development, which are defined in a rigid and centralized manner, are also destined to suffer from a representation crisis. This calls for the creation of new, flexible and multidimensional categories and indicators which are representative of the diversity of communities, and help to generate a collaborative and inclusive relationship between them.
In response to this, we are pleased to announce the Summit’s first keynote speaker: Chilean anthropologist and author, Sonia Montecino, who comes from an ethnography background and works in a field that is constantly facing the challenge of questioning universal precepts, and cultural diversity.
Sonia Montecino, who holds a PhD in Anthropology from the University of Leiden and received the Chilean National Award in Humanities and Social Sciences 2013, also works as a professor of anthropology and as the director of the Gender and Culture Studies Masters program at the Social Sciences Department of the Universidad de Chile. She has dedicated her life to studies in anthropology –particularly to ethnic studies in anthropology- from a gender perspective.
With a career of over thirty years, more than twenty publications, and a wide range of awards, her participation will be a key element in discussions around the fundamental task of protecting and stimulating cultural development as an important part of healthy and inclusive social development.
As will be evident, our Critical Times –the central concept which guides the first session of the Summit- shall be treated as an open stage for reflection, discussion, and as an invitation for innovative and creative ways of thinking the role of culture in the development of our countries.