Unisinos established a new link this year: it will be the academic partner of Fronteiras do Pensamento 2023. With 16 years of history, Fronteiras do Pensamento has held more than 300 conferences and impacted an audience of over 300,000 people. This year, the conferences will be held at Teatro Unisinos (Av. Nilo Peçanha, 1600).
“Frontiers is the great event for the popularization of academic knowledge in the country today, which promotes a broad debate between academia and society. One of Unisinos’ missions is to build these bridges, so we are embracing and reinforcing our mission. We hope it will be an opportunity to effectively promote debate, the collective view, listening to the other, and provoke reflection and the discomfort that arises when we discover something new”, highlights Gustavo Borba, professor and dean of the Unisinos Creative Industry School.
One of the novelties, a consequence of Unisinos’ involvement, is the receipt of a certification from the university, which will be used as extension course credits for participants.
This year, some of the most daring and renewing voices of today will be among the speakers, such as Iraqi Nobel Peace Prize winner Nadia Murad, Spanish writer Rosa Montero and British neuroscientist David Eagleman. With the proposal to discuss the uncertainties that mark contemporaneity and point out ways to overcome them, the event will feature six face-to-face conferences and online transmissions of meetings that include names like Luc Ferry, Eduardo Giannetti and Christian Dunker. Thinkers should address this year the theme “Between Chaos and Order”.
The sale of ticket packages to the general public will open on April 17, with limited spaces, on the website loja.fronteiras.com. Before that date, subscribers to previous editions and partner audiences can already purchase tickets with promotional value in exclusive and closed sale. This includes Unisinos students, teachers and employees, who will receive a 60% discount.
In addition to attending the face-to-face and online meetings, participants will also have access to recordings of the meetings on the project’s platform. The access package also includes unpublished interviews and exclusive historical conferences.
Fronteiras do Pensamento is organized by Delos Bureau, a company of the DC Set Group specialized in cultural entertainment.
Check the list of speakers:
BORDERS OF THOUGHT 2023
SEASON 17 – Between Chaos and Order
face-to-face conferences
- May 31 – Rosa Montero
- June 21 – Nadia Murad
- July 5 – David Eagleman
- August 9 – Michael Sandel
- September 13 – Douglas Rushkoff
- October 4 – David Wengrow
online conferences
- August 30 – Luc Ferry
- August 31st – Eduardo Giannetti and Christian Dunker
About the speakers
Rosa Montero (May 31)
A Spanish writer and journalist, she occupies a position of international reference both in the media and in the literary world. In journalism, as editor-in-chief of El País, she was responsible for developing an innovative interview technique, after listening to more than two thousand personalities. Recognized as one of the main names in contemporary European literature, in 2017 she received the National Prize for Spanish Letters, for her body of work, with more than 30 bestsellers, translated into 20 languages, including A crazy house, We, women, The ridiculous idea of never seeing you again and Good luck.
Nadia Murad (June 21)
An Iraqi activist in defense of Human Rights who, alongside physician Denis Mukwege, received the Nobel Peace Prize in 2018, focuses her efforts on raising the awareness of major international leaders to put an end to the use of sexual violence in wars and armed conflicts. At the age of 21, she was kidnapped and spent three months under the control of the Islamic State terrorist group. The horrors she experienced, described in the book May I be the last (2017), fueled her fight as a UN Goodwill Ambassador.
David Eagleman (July 5)
One of the most important voices in the Neuroscience field today, scientific educator, writer and presenter, he has published dozens of books and hundreds of articles on topics such as sensory substitution, time perception, brain plasticity, synesthesia and neurolaw. He hosts the PBS series The Brain with David Eagleman and the documentary The Creative Brain on Netflix. Author of bestsellers such as Incógnito – The secret lives of the brain (2012) – about the neuroscience “under the hood” of the conscious mind – and Brain: a biography (2017) – which describes how the narratives we know for everyday life are mediated by the brain. He is an advisor to the Mind Science Foundation, American Brain Foundation and The Long Now Foundation. He serves as academic editor for the Journal of Science and Law and was named Science Educator of the Year by the Society for Neuroscience.
Michael Sandel (August 9)
An American political philosopher, he is part of Prospect magazine’s list of leading global thinkers. Recognized by the American Association of Political Sciences for the excellence of his teaching career, it was as a professor of the Justice course at Harvard that he became known worldwide. Appointed by The Guardian as “the master of life’s great questions”, his classes already add up to tens of thousands of students from all over the world and discuss moral and ethical dilemmas to analyze people’s justification for their everyday positions and attitudes. Author of bestsellers such as Justice: what is it to do the right thing, What money can’t buy: the moral limits of the market and his most recent work, The tyranny of merit: what happened to the common good?, defends a new model of coexistence, capable of rescuing solidarity between people from different backgrounds.
Douglas Rushkoff (September 13)
Media theorist, author and documentary filmmaker, he dedicates his studies to the issue of human autonomy in the digital age. Named one of the 10 most influential intellectuals in the world by MIT, he coined terms such as “viral media” and “social currency”, and believes in the power of the digital counterculture for the social and economic transformation of the planet. Winner of the first Neil Postman Award from the Media Ecology Association, he is Professor of Media Theory and Digital Economics at CUNY/Queens, where he founded the Laboratory for Digital Humanism.
David Wengrow (October 4)
Archaeologist, anthropologist and professor of comparative archeology at the Institute of Archeology at University College London, co-author of The Awakening of Everything, written in partnership with David Graeber and which has achieved international bestseller status. In the work, the authors question everything that exists about the origins of agriculture, property, cities, democracy, slavery and civilization itself. In his studies, Wengrow proposes other forms of freedom and social organization in an invitation to a new future based on this historical reconstruction. The author has contributed essays on topics such as social inequality and climate change to The Guardian and The New York Times. As of 2021, it was ranked #10 on ArtReview’s Power 100 list.
online conferences
Luc Ferry (August 30)
Defender of secular humanism – a view that opposes critical reason to religion and faith –, he is one of the most widely read philosophers today. Doctor in political science from the University of Reims, where he served as a professor. He has also taught at ENS-PSL in Paris, at IEP-Lyon and at Caen Normandy and Paris VII universities. He was Minister of Education between 2002 and 2004. Author of over 70 books, translated into over 45 languages. Among his works, Learning to Live stands out, a best-seller that received the Aujourd’hui Prize, one of the most prestigious in France, as well as 7 ways to be happy, The most beautiful history of philosophy, The god man, The destructive innovation , The New Ecological Order, Loving Dictionary of Philosophy and The Transhumanist Revolution, among others. His most recent book is Les setp écologies, not yet published in Brazil.
Eduardo Giannetti (August 31)
One of the most respected economists in Brazil, he holds a degree in Economics and Social Sciences from USP and a Ph.D. in Economics from the University of Cambridge, England. Immortal of the Brazilian Academy of Letters, he departed from economic philosophy to one of the most influential careers of contemporary Brazilian intellectuals. Winner of two Jabuti Awards – with private vices, public benefits? (1993) and The parts & the whole (1995) –, the author consecrated himself beyond economics with O auto-engano, a work that deals with the untruths that convince us in everyday life. He has taught at the University of Cambridge, at FEA/USP and at INSPER in São Paulo. His newest book is The Ring of Gyges, released in 2020.
Christian Dunker (August 31)
Most read, watched and heard psychoanalyst in Brazil, internationally recognized for studies that renew Lacanian thought. PhD in Psychology from USP with post-doctorate at MMU, United States, coordinates the Laboratory of Social Theory, Philosophy and Psychoanalysis (Latesfip-USP). He received the Jabuti Award for Structure and Constitution of the Psychoanalytic Clinic, his Habilitation thesis and reference work in the area. He reached the general public with the essay Malaise, suffering and symptom, also awarded with the Jabuti award. His most recent works are The Clown and the Psychoanalyst – A Biography of Depression and Lacan and Democracy.
