This volume explores the implications for biblical studies of changes in the direction of travel, whether from centre to margin, backwards in time, along byways rather than the main stream, or inside gaps, and using post colonialism, feminism, Marxism, gay theory, semiotics, political theory and post structuralism. What if biblical scholars travelled to the antipodes for an international conference instead of to Europe or North America? The essays in this volume, originally written for such a conference, explore the implications for biblical studies of such a change in direction. In fact, they travel in a host of different directions, exploring the alternative journeys and places of biblical studies, developing connections in the rhizomatic fashion (as delineated famously by Deleuze and Guattari). Such "journeys" may be understood in terms of the consideration of other texts, whether those of biblical exegetes from Africa, or of the Reformation, or recasting our notions of the canon itself in light of new technologies. Or they may indicate other ways of reading the biblical texts - backwards, through superscriptions or the repression of maternal bodies, as forms of literature not previously considered. Or the question of alternative places may become the focus - reading for spaces in the text or places where the text has been appropriated outside the metropolitan zones.

Author Biography

Roland Boer is Associate Professor in Comparative Literature and Cultural Studies at Monash University, Australia. Edgar W. Conrad is Director of Postgraduate Studies in the School of History, Philosophy, Religion and Classics at the University of Queensland.