Archive of William Franke’s videorecorded lectures and videoconferences

• Rome, Italy, February 8, 2026
• “Apophatic Catholicity: Its Speculative Roots and Inspiration” International Seminar on “Theologies of Catholicity: Exploring Secular Analogues”, Institute of Religion and Critical Inquiry of the Australian Catholic University. Rome, ACU Campus in Monteverde

• Santiago de Chile, August 29, 2025
  Conferencia de clausura: “La eternidad en los límites del tiempo y la historia: la tradición épica cristiana y el Apocalipsis ahora” [Closing Lecture: “Eternity at the Limits of Time and History: Christian Epic Tradition and Apocalypse Now”] 12th International Conference on Theory and Philosophy of History, LAS FRONTERAS DE LA HISTORIA, XII Jornadas Internacionales de Teoría y Filosofía de la Historia, Viña del Mar-Chile, 27 – August 29, 2025

• Enkirch (Germany), June 21, 2025
• “Negative theologische Hoffnung im Nichtwissen, erzeugt durch kontroverse Meinungen und Glaubenssätze in Bezug auf Pandemien,” Aphin V (Arbeitskreise philosophierender Ingenieure und Naturwissenschaftler): “Meinen, Glauben, Wissen, Hoffen,” Enkirch an der Mosel, June 20-22, 2025

• Florence, Italy May 19 and 24, 2025
• Lectures for “Dante’s Divine Comedy and the Birth of Modern Religion,” symposium sponsored by Gladdening Light (NPO), Orto de’ Medici Hotel, Florence, May 19, 2025
• Introduction to Dante’s Inferno: A Journey of Interpretation (part 1)
  Introduction to Dante’s Inferno: A Journey of Interpretation (part 2)
  
  Introduction to Paradiso: Vision Impossible (part 1)
  Introduction to Paradiso: Vision Impossible (part 2)

• Fribourg, Switzerland (Webinaire) April 17, 2025
• “Singularity and Ineffability in Apophatic Perspective” for the Online Seminar Series: “Singularity in Historical and Theoretical Perspective,” April 17, 2025 
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  Vienna, Austria, May 22, 2025
  Living Together: An Apophatic Ethics (Videorecording of Lecture)
• Keynote Lecture, Plenary Session, for 8th World Conference on Arts, Humanities, Social Sciences, and Education, May 22, 2025, Vienna, Austria
• Regensburg, May 20, 2025
• Videorecording of Lecture: Dante und die Selbst-Reflexion: An der Schwelle vom Mittelalter zur Neuzeit – Verhältnis zwischen Wissenschaft und Theologie”
•  Akademisches Forum Albertus Magnus, University of Regensburg, May 20, 2025

• Krakaw, Poland, March 7, 2025
• Keynote Lecture: “Medieval Origins of the Question Concerning Technology and its Contemporary Apocalypses”
• INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE:
  APOCALYPSE NOW? TECHNOLOGY AND EXISTENTIAL THREATS, IGNATIANUM UNIVERSITY IN CRACOW, March 7, 2025

• Université Fribourg, Switzerland
• Singularity Webinair: “Singularity and Ineffability in Apophatic Perspective” for the Online Seminar Series: “Singularity in Historical and Theoretical Perspective,” April 17, 2025 

• Bras (Le Var), France, January-March 2025
• William Franke, L’Enfer de Dante, Conférence à Bras (France)
• William Franke, Le Purgatoire de Dante, Conférence à Bras (France)
• William Franke, Le Paradis de Dante, Conférence à Bras (France)

• Navarra, Spain, January 2025
• 3 seminars on Identity Politics and Justice, Instituto Cultura y Sociedad, University of Navarra:
• 1) From Revolution to Religion: The Woke Revolution’s Founding of Social and Political Power on a Religion of Victimhood, January 21, 2025
• William Franke, Revolution to Religion, University of Navarra (pt. 1)
• William Franke, Revolution to Religion, University of Navarra (pt. 2)
• William Franke, Revolution to Religion, University of Navarra (pt. 3) + Q&A
• 2) Identity versus Universality: The Universality of What is Not, January 23, 2025
• William Franke, Identity versus Universality, Navarra (pt 1) – YouTube
• William Franke, Identity versus Universality: The Universality of What is Not (pt 2 Q&A)
• 3) Transcending Power Politics Negatively: Kenosis as the Apophatic Solution to Societal Conflict, January 24, 2025
• Transcending Power Politics Negatively: Kenosis as the Apophatic Solution to Societal Conflict pt. 1 – YouTube
• Transcending Power Politics Negatively Kenosis as Apophatic Solution to Societal Conflict (pt 2 Q&A)

• Pavia, Italy, May 2, 2024
• Videorecording of Lecture: “Come rifondare l’etica e la politica dopo la rivoluzione woke”?
• Santa Cruz, California (Webinair) March 2024
• Videorecorded Lecture on Paradiso 33, Intro Ronald Herzman + Q&A with Dante Scholars, March 2024, Paradiso Project: “Gates of Heaven,” Santa Cruz, CA
• Paris, December 15, 2023
• William Franke, Conférence sur le Wokisme à Paris (youtube.com)

• Boston, USA, October 8, 2023
• William Franke, “Dante’s New Life, or How Phenomenological Reduction Enables Theological Revelation”
• This lecture at Boston College lecture presents Dante’s youthful work the Vita Nuova (The New Life) as the inaugural work of modern phenomenology and as fully revealing of the latter’…

• Krakow, Poland, August 1, 2023
• Plato’s Apophatic Legacy: Taking Letters Literally and Figuring the Unsayable.
• GUEST LECTURE for 7th Platonic Summer Seminar: ἄγραφα δόγματα, Lanckorona (Krakow), Poland, June 25-July 2, 2023

• Warwick, UK, April 13, 2023
• Franke Lecture, “Pandemics and Apocalypse in World Literature,” University of Warwick, April, 2023
• KEYNOTE SPEECH for Symposium on “Processing the Pandemic III: Hope,”Interdisciplinary Approaches to Emotions in the Wake of COVID19,” Center for Renaissance Studies

• Berlin, Germany, May 16, 2022
• “Self-Reflection and Reduction in the Language of Lyric,” Reduction Lecture Series, ICI (Institute for Cultural Inquiry) Berlin, May 16, 2022
• Introduction by Manuele Gragnolati
• Discussion

• Nashville, USA, November 15, 2022
• “Dante’s New Life for Poetic Language as Theological Revelation in a Modern Secular Key,” Inaugural Lecture for Annual Dante Lecture Series, Vanderbilt University, November 29, 2022, Nashville, Tennessee 

• Frankfurt, Germany (Webinair), June 25, 2021
• “Conversazione con Francesco Giusti sul linguaggio lirical nel Paradiso”
• Public Debate on William Franke’s Dante’s Paradiso and the Theological Origins of Modern Thought: Towards a Philosophy of Self-Reflection, With critique by Francesco Giusti, Moderator Christine Ott, Comparative Literature, University of Frankfurt, Germany, June 25, 2021
• Berlin, Germany, April 4, 2019
• International Conference on “Negation und Wissen. Zur Kategorie der Negativität in Theologie, Anthropologie und Ästhetik der Vormoderne” [Negativity and Knowledge: On the category of negativity in theology, anthropology and aesthetics in the pre-modern period] Interdisciplinary Conference under auspices of SFB: Sonderforschungsbereich: Episteme in Bewegung, Freie Universität, Berlin, April, 4-5, 2019

• Regensburg, Germany  May 2019
  “The Fate of Philology in a Logo-decentered Culture: The Challenge of Media Studies,” Guest Lecture, Lehrstuhl fuer Medienwissenschaften (Institute for Media Studies) in Fakultät für Sprach-, Literatur-, und Kulturwissenschaften [Faculty of Language, Literature and Cultural Studies], University of Regensburg, May 9, 2019
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  Poitiers, France  April 2019
  **“De Dante à Mallarmé à travers l’Hamlet de Shakespeare: Négativité de la révélation prophétique-poétique dans la modernité” (“From Dante to Mallarmé via Shakespeare’s Hamlet: Negativities of Prophetic Revelation in Modernity”), International Conference: « Dante and Shakespeare: Cosmology, Politics and Poetics », University of Poitiers / Centre d’Études Supérieures de Civilisation Médiévale, FRANCE, 4-6 April 2019
  
  
  
   

• Taiwan (Greater China), October 19, 2018
• TACMRS 2018 conference – Keynote Lecture – William Franke
  會議手冊 Taiwan TACMRS print program
  Call for papers
  TACMRS conference info
  https://www.stfran.qld.edu.au/keynote-presenters/
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  Brisbane, Australia  June 2018             
  “Negative Theology and Negative Poetics: A Strained Relationship or an Elective Affinity?” KEYNOTE SPEECH for “Tell it Slant: A Symposium on Theology and the Arts,” St. Francis Theological College of Charles Sturt University, Brisbane, Australia, Public and Contextual Theology Research Centre (PACT), June 15-17, 2018
  
  
  York, UK  June 2018
  “Apophatic Mysticism as Paradigm of Learned Ignorance,” KEYNOTE SPEECH for Conference “Paths Beyond Words: The Ways of Unsaying in Early Modernity” Centre for Research on Early Modern Studies (CREMS) and Humanities Research Centre (HRC), University of York, June 1, 2018
  VIDEO-TAPED LECTURE:  “Nicholas of Cusa as Focal Point for Advocating Apophatic Vision and Thought Today”
  Lecture, with introduction by Kevin Killeen and questions from audience:
  
  
  
  Oxford, UK  September 2017
  “Poetry as Prophecy: From Anthropological Origins to Postmodern Apocalypses” KEYNOTE SPEECH for The Prophetic Word: Poetry, Philosophy and Theology in Conversation, The Power of the Word International Conference V, Heythrop Institute for Religion and Society (Heythrop College, University of London) and the Oxford Centre for Christianity and Culture, Regent’s Park College, University of Oxford
  Audio Recording of Oxford Poetic Prophecy Lecture, whole lecture with introduction
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  Glasgow, UK  December 2016
  “Apophatic Paths from Europe to China: Method and Mysticism in Intercultural Philosophy” KEYNOTE SPEECH for Comparative Mysticism: Renewing a Neglected Project, Annual Conference of the Mystical Theology Network, University of Glasgow, Scotland, December 15, 2016
  
  
  
  Beijing, China  May 2016
  “Universality of Knowledge and Specialization at the University: A Path from France to China,” KEYNOTE SPEECH for International Academic Conference to Inaugurate the School of Foreign Studies, Beijing Capitol University of Business and Economics (CUEB), Beijing, May 26, 2016
  
  
  
  Beijing, China  November 2015
  “The Tradition of the Chinese Classics and the Idea of World Literature Today” KEYNOTE SPEECH (with simultaneous translation into Chinese) at International Symposium on “The Orient vs. The Occident: Cultural Exchanges and Influences,” sponsored by Foreign Language Department of Capital University of Economics and Business, jointly organized by the Chinese People’s Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries, Capital International Culture Research Center of Beijing Language and Culture University, and the Comparative Literature Studies Center of Soochow University. Beijing, November 27-29, 2015
• 
  Macao (Greater China)  January 2015  (conjoint with Institute for Advance Study of Religion, Toronto)
  “Natural Cognition, Universals, and the Nothing of Religion” Keynote Address for “Cognition, Religion, and Science”: A Conference of the International Association for the History of Religions (IAHR), co-sponsored by the Toronto Institute for the Advanced Study of Religion Philosophy and Religious Studies Program, University of Macao, January 13-14, 2015
• Colombo, Sri Lanka April 2014
• Rethinking Cultural Universality Today
• International Conference on Arts and Humanities
• The International Institute of Knowledge Management
• Colombo, Sri Lanka (2014), April 3, 2014
   
  Pretoria, South Africa  January 2012
  “The Art of Memory or the Forgetting of Art? The Visionary Moment in Dante and Blanchot” KEYNOTE SPEECH for International Conference: “Memory: Impressions, Expressions, Reflections: An Interdisciplinary Conference,” The Department of English Studies at the University of South Africa (UNISA), Pretoria, March 28, 2012
   
  Bamberg, Germany  March 2011
  “Letargo and the Argo: Total Forgetting as the Moment of Truth at the Climax of Dante’s Divine Comedy and the Christian Epic Tradition”            Internationale Nachwuchstagung des DFG-Graduiertenkollegs: Generationenbewußtsein und Generationenkonflikte in Antike und Mittelalter: “Erfahren, Erzählen, Errinern: Narrative Konstruktionen von Gedächtnis und Generation in Antike und Mittelalter”
  [4th International Postgraduate Colloquium,  DFG (German Research Foundation): “Record, Relate, Remember: Narrative Constructions of Memory and Generation in Antiquity and the Middle Ages”]
  Otto-Friedrich University of Bamberg, March 2- 4, 2011
   
  Ankara, Turkey  August 2010
   “The Scientific Paradigm and the Poetic Epistemology of the Humanities” PLENARY ADDRESS: 12^th International Conference of ISSEI (International Society for the Study of European Ideas): “Thought in Science and Fiction” Cankaya University, Ankara, Turkey, August 4, 2010
   
  Tampere, Finland  August 2009
  “’Il Trapassar del Segno’: Language and Transcendence in Dante’s Paradiso”” KEYNOTE SPEECH:The Fourth Interdisciplinary Conference of the Nordic Dante Network: “Dante and Transgression,” University of Tampere, Finland, August 20, 2009
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  SYMPOSIA – On William Franke’s Work
  
  Syndicate Theology Symposium, April 2016
  
  Syndicate Theology, vol. 3, issue 2, March/April (2016) “William Franke, A Philosophy of the Unsayable,”
   
  Macao (Greater China) March 2015
  “What is Apophatic Thinking and Why is it Relevant Today? Discussions around William Franke’s ‘A Philosophy of the Unsayable’” International Philosophy Colloquium, Program of Philosophy and Religious Studies, University of Macao, March 7th, 2015
   
  Tokyo, Japan  October 2013
  INTERNATIONAL SYMPOSIUM ON ‘DANTE AND THE SENSE OF TRANSGRESSION’: “Transgression and Transcendence: What Makes Religion Radical?  A two-day symposium to discuss Prof. William Franke’s book “Dante and the Sense of Transgression: ‘The Trespass of the Sign,’” Institute for Christianity and Culture,International Christian University (ICU), Tokyo, Japan, October 11-12, 2013
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• BOOK PRESENTATIONS

Sign of Swan

• PODCASTS AND INTERVIEWS
• PODCASTS
• Podcast for Dante Society of America, Canto per Canto, “Scripture as Theophany and Virtual Reality: Paradiso 18”: William Franke and Jacob Abell
• Podcast with Kevin Hart:  On the Way – Talking about God.  Brisbane, Australia

• Interviews
  
   
  
  
  Julien Sureau article front page
  Julien Sureau article front page Julien Sureau article p.2

Interviews

https://youtube.com/watch?v=yGtj1wNWXx8%3Ffeature%3Doembed

https://youtube.com/watch?v=WhHsKlsoLrM%3Ffeature%3Doembed