60 academics, in the field of Greek studies along with members of the wider academic community, will come together this week to discuss Hellenism in a globalised world.

Speakers from America, England, Greece, Cyprus, Austria, Australia and New Zealand, will present talks at the tenth biennial conference of the Modern Greek Studies Association, Australia and New Zealand (MGSAANZ), which begins Thursday and concludes Sunday.

The conference will focus on Greek culture, examining its past and more importantly its future.

Lecturer and Head of Modern Greek Studies at Macquarie University, Dr Elizabeth Kefallinos, will deliver a lecture on Greek-Australian identities in the Globalised World, and said the conference has an important focus.

“Usually when we do conferences about Hellenism we look at the past, but I think it’s time to speak of the present,” Dr Kefallinos told Neos Kosmos.

Dr Kefallinos said her lecture would examine identity and the new Greek identity that has formed. “We are trying to reevaluate our existence in Australia by asking what are we? What is our Greek identity?” she said. “People like me left Greece when quite young but were old enough to have completed our identity as Greeks, however we grew up and studied here in Australia so it is inevitable our identity would be linked to Australia as well. Sometimes people feel we go back to Greece and we don’t feel Greek; a lot of people feel in between and it’s not very nice to feel this way,” she said.

This feeling of “between-ness” is vastly affected by globalisation, Dr Kefallinos said.

Other academics speaking at the conference include Dr John Yiannakis discussing language, history and diaspora in the age of globalisation, Ms Sophia Sakellis discussing Greek language in the age of globalistion and Dr Despina Michael lecturing about negotiating ethnic identity: The Musician as ‘insider-outsider’ in Modern Greek culture.

The conference will be held on the Macquarie University Campus in Sydney.

The program is available online at: http://www.eurolang.mq.edu.au/conferences/Greek/index.html