- Leipzig University
Kolleg-Forschungsgruppe "Multiple Secularities - Beyond the West, Beyond Modernities"
Nikolaistraße 8-10
04109 Leipzig
GERMANY
- The Humanities Centre for Advanced Studies "Multiple Secularities - Beyond the West, Beyond Modernities" investigates... moreThe Humanities Centre for Advanced Studies "Multiple Secularities - Beyond the West, Beyond Modernities" investigates forms and arrangements of differentiation between religious and other social spheres, practices, interpretive frameworks, institutions and discourses in different eras and regions. We refer to such arrangements, which are often contentious, with the heuristic term “secularities”.edit
Much has been written in the past few decades about populism that most scholars approaching the subject feel obliged to begin by justifying their writing of yet another text. In this paper, the situation is somewhat different: whilst our... more
Much has been written in the past few decades about populism that most scholars approaching the subject feel obliged to begin by justifying their writing of yet another text. In this paper, the situation is somewhat different: whilst our analytical gaze is cast upon populism (and fascism, as a precursor or closely related social phenomenon), this is only indirectly the case. Our primary focus is, instead, on the relationship that populism has with religion and secularity. Or, more precisely, the relationships of diverse populisms with different religiosities and various secularities. While the religious and the secular are mentioned in numerous studies about populism, these topics have rarely been adequately elaborated. Even when they are discussed, they are treated only in a marginal way. The purpose of this work is, therefore, to highlight the complex and multi-faceted way that populisms in Europe and Latin America have related to religion and religiosity. A second, parallel objective of this work is to reflect on the particular relationships populism establishes with different understandings of the secular, specifically within the political sphere, i.e. ‘political secularity.’ Following the differentiation paradigm, another term one might see used for this is ‘laicity’ (laïcité in French, laicidad in Spanish). I understand this to refer specifically to the secularisation of the state and the areas of society which come under its control.
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In the context of my involvement with the CASHSS Multiple Secularities – Beyond the West, Beyond Modernities’ research programme, I chose Ghazali’s autobiography, and in particular his “crisis of indecision,” as an example of a pre-modern... more
In the context of my involvement with the CASHSS Multiple Secularities – Beyond the West, Beyond Modernities’ research programme, I chose Ghazali’s autobiography, and in particular his “crisis of indecision,” as an example of a pre-modern negotiation of the boundaries of religion at the micro level. The research programme suggests employing the analytical concept of secularity to investigate both non-Western and pre-modern forms of secularity, in terms of conceptual distinctions and institutional differentiations between religious and non-religious social spheres. In this essay, I would like to propose a method of pursuing these goals from my own theoretical perspective. More specifically, I will argue that in Ghazali’s reflections on spiritual religiosity, theology, philosophy and science, we can discern the individual engagement of a prominent Muslim thinker with emerging communicative realms. In the Modern Systems Theory of Niklas Luhmann, these realms are taken to represent functionally differentiated subsystems of modern society.
Research Interests: Religion, Religion and Politics, Study of Religions, Secularization, Abbasid History, and 10 moreAbu Hamid Muhammad al-Ghazali (d. 1111), Secularisms and Secularities, Niklas Luhmann, Secularism, Islam and Secularism, Al Ghazali, Secularisation, Differentiation, Religion and Social Theory, and multiple secularities
This paper explores the political thought during the 1920s of Lala Lajpat Rai (1865–1928), a prominent anti-colonial nationalist. It outlines the historical context under which a secular politics became vital for Rai, and elaborates the... more
This paper explores the political thought during the 1920s of Lala Lajpat Rai (1865–1928), a prominent anti-colonial nationalist. It outlines the historical context under which a secular politics became vital for Rai, and elaborates the intricate internal texture of his complex, often fluid vision of secularism. The second half of the paper explores the theoretical implications of Rai’s dynamic position. It illustrates how Lajpat Rai simultaneously articulated both a Hindu communal politics and a vision of secularism. By so doing, this paper challenges the long-drawn strict dichotomy between Hindu politics or Hindu ‘communalism’ and Indian secularism. Yet, the paper also pushes back against revisionist scholarship which, in challenging assumptions of strict mutual exclusivity between Indian secularism and Hindu communalism, has tended to overlook and undermine meaningful distinctions that still exist between these categories. This paper insists on the need to retain and respect the analytical distinctions between the two categories, even while recognising that they do not always exist in relation to each other as a strict dichotomy. Unearthing a hitherto-hidden Indian secularism articulated by this ‘Hindu communal’ politician, the paper will briefly explore the ways in which Rai’s complex position overlaps with, and is distinct from, Western variants of secularism, India’s constitutional secularism, and the Gandhian-Nehruvian vision, the latter of which became hegemonic till the 1970s. The paper ends by, very briefly, comparing Lajpat Rai’s position with Hindutva nationalism – a major influence on the contemporary Hindu right – and by reflecting on the relationship between the Hindu right and secularism.
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The study of secularity in Iceland has so far largely been restricted to institutional differentiation, alongside legal aspects of the relationship between the state and the country’s national church. This paper approaches the formation... more
The study of secularity in Iceland has so far largely been restricted to institutional differentiation, alongside legal aspects of the relationship between the state and the country’s national church. This paper approaches the formation of secularity in the country from a different angle. Adopting a research perspective shaped by both cultural history and sociology of culture, it investigates the role of the Icelandic sagas, and the medieval culture which spawned them, in the development of secularity in Iceland. Instead of looking at the processes through which Christian religion came to be separated from other spheres of society, it probes the discourses legitimising such a separation. It pays special attention to the reception and understanding of the sagas and the medieval culture which produced them, and further asks how they provided a background against which a secular culture could be imagined, both in the past and for the present.
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Why jump into a sea, where everything is seemingly fleeting, floating, and fluid? There is not a single concept that offers solid ground to stand on: ‘religion’ is problematic, ‘culture’ elusive, ‘secularity’ contested, and ‘Islam’ one... more
Why jump into a sea, where everything is seemingly fleeting, floating, and fluid? There is not a single concept that offers solid ground to stand on: ‘religion’ is problematic, ‘culture’ elusive, ‘secularity’ contested, and ‘Islam’ one big question mark. ‘Identity’, to name that which looms so large in modern contexts, fares no better. Yet jump we must if we are to do more than critique conceptualisations that we consider flawed, and instead provide what is expected of academics: critical reflection that does justice to the subject at hand, while at the same time speaking to wider intellectual, moral, and political concerns. This paper contributes to the debate on multiple secularities by discussing conceptualisations of religion and culture and their relevance to articulations of secularity ‘in Islam’. Written from the perspective of historically grounded Islamic studies, with a focus on the period up to 1500, this paper nonetheless addresses current concerns, for while the secular and hints at secularity can be identified in pre-modern Muslim majority contexts, they only emerged as themes of theoretically informed debate in the modern period.
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In its initial research project description, the Centre for Advanced Studies in Humanities and Social Sciences (CASHSS) took a position on the longstanding academic and public debates on secularism, secularisation, and secularity. In... more
In its initial research project description, the Centre for Advanced Studies in Humanities and Social Sciences (CASHSS) took a position on the longstanding academic and public debates on secularism, secularisation, and secularity. In doing so, The CASHSS took up the concept of Multiple Secularities and developed it further. Based on the hypothesis that distinguishing and differentiating practices are not an exclusive sign of Western modernity, we decided to systematically explore regions beyond the ‘Western world’, and in doing so expand our research remit beyond that on which Taylor had focused. We focused on regions that have been culturally shaped by Islam (the MENA region, Indonesia, India), as well as on Asia, which necessarily involved some overlap. These regional contexts differed historically and still do so today in terms of their propensity for conflict over boundary demarcation and the way in which relationships are established between the religious and the non-religious. What they have in common is that the application of the term ‘religion’ to the respective socio-cultural traditions is highly controversial. Exploring these regions brought different religious traditions as well as experiences of the confrontation with the Western world into focus, suggesting the prospect of instructive comparisons.
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For many bureaucrats, temples are nuisances, traffic obstructions, acts of landgrabbing, or means of political assertion that contribute to inter-religious tensions. By contrast, builders, trustees or worshippers defend temples as spaces... more
For many bureaucrats, temples are nuisances, traffic obstructions, acts of landgrabbing, or means of political assertion that contribute to inter-religious tensions. By contrast, builders, trustees or worshippers defend temples as spaces of divine manifestation, as responding to religious needs and providing space for religious festivals and community activity. In this article, I use the case study of the establishment of a controversial goddess temple in Bhopal to shed light on a fundamental rift between two ideal-type approaches to the city – as a secular place and as religious territory.
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This working paper is part of a larger research project on emerging visualities and imaginaries of living together in plurality and on equal terms. Against the background of growing majoritarianism in India and the normalization of... more
This working paper is part of a larger research project on emerging visualities and imaginaries of living together in plurality and on equal terms. Against the background of growing majoritarianism in India and the normalization of violence against religious minorities and marginalized communities, the search for new visual forms and aesthetic means to counter increasing divisiveness and conflict has acquired exceptional urgency. It is a search pursued by many and in multiple directions, occasionally even in the realm of marketing and advertising which is the focus of this article. The larger project considers documentaries, fictional films and transmedia interventions in order to understand how different actors seek to create new visualities that are markedly different from earlier form(at)s used to visually mediate the normative project of political secularism for many decades, but nevertheless draw on the idea that secularity is a mode of living
together and socially interacting in plural societies.
together and socially interacting in plural societies.
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This paper is part of broader research on social welfare, understood in its broadest sense as social security, education, and health care, which the state has taken over gradually from religions as it has established its authority and... more
This paper is part of broader research on social welfare, understood in its broadest sense as social security, education, and health care, which the state has taken over gradually from religions as it has established its authority and thereby the ontological and the teleological legitimacy of secularity as a pillar of modernity. The paper explores the Chinese Communist Party’s evolving attitude towards religious affairs and philanthropy.
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This paper will examine the transformation dynamics of social change in Kurdish Alevi communities, while mostly focusing on the increasing sociopolitical and religious role of talips. Until the end of the 20th century, the socio-religious... more
This paper will examine the transformation dynamics of social change in Kurdish Alevi communities, while mostly focusing on the increasing sociopolitical and religious role of talips. Until the end of the 20th century, the socio-religious structure of Kurdish Alevis was dominated by two hereditary social positions, much like a caste system: on the one hand, the members of the sacred lineages (ocaks), who embody the religious authority, and on the other hand, the talips who are subordinated to the sacred lineages. This socio-religious structure provided a framework for Kurdish Alevi socioreligious organisations.
The Humanities Centre for Advanced Studies “Multiple Secularities – Beyond the West, Beyond Modernities” deals with topics, at least some of which I have myself dealt with throughout my sinological and philosophical life. I came to... more
The Humanities Centre for Advanced Studies “Multiple Secularities –
Beyond the West, Beyond Modernities” deals with topics, at least some
of which I have myself dealt with throughout my sinological and philosophical life. I came to Frankfurt in autumn 1968: fascinated by Frankfurt School, I started studying sociology, but to my surprise this did not mean studying Critical Theory. Instead, it meant going through quite a conventional education in the social sciences, and moreover, it meant studying economics and statistics. This was not quite what I expected and after a few semesters I changed my major to philosophy. In need of a second subject, I chose sinology because of some vague interest in foreign cultures, and also because of the news coming from China at that time. It was the time of the Cultural Revolution that exerted a certain fascination on the German student movement especially since its revolutionary rhetoric differed so remarkably from the ossified language of Eastern European Marxist orthodoxy. So, like many members of my generation, I began to develop an interest in revolutionary China that was definitely not shared by my philosophy teachers – they were skeptical, at least to some extent.
Beyond the West, Beyond Modernities” deals with topics, at least some
of which I have myself dealt with throughout my sinological and philosophical life. I came to Frankfurt in autumn 1968: fascinated by Frankfurt School, I started studying sociology, but to my surprise this did not mean studying Critical Theory. Instead, it meant going through quite a conventional education in the social sciences, and moreover, it meant studying economics and statistics. This was not quite what I expected and after a few semesters I changed my major to philosophy. In need of a second subject, I chose sinology because of some vague interest in foreign cultures, and also because of the news coming from China at that time. It was the time of the Cultural Revolution that exerted a certain fascination on the German student movement especially since its revolutionary rhetoric differed so remarkably from the ossified language of Eastern European Marxist orthodoxy. So, like many members of my generation, I began to develop an interest in revolutionary China that was definitely not shared by my philosophy teachers – they were skeptical, at least to some extent.
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In this paper, we show how this plural legal landscape is negotiated by litigants, especially women, and thereby illustrate the procedural interplay between civil and religious courts through this adjudication process. The ethnography of... more
In this paper, we show how this plural legal landscape is negotiated by litigants, especially women, and thereby illustrate the procedural interplay between civil and religious courts through this adjudication process. The ethnography of adjudication at the Darul-Qaza situated in a large Muslim neighbourhood in Kanpur and the institution’s intersections with the societal (We mean the tribunals that function at the neighbourhood or community level) secular courts show how Muslim personal law functions. In this paper, we identify both the links between the Darul-Qaza and civil courts, and the processes of evidence making and legal reasoning that are integral to this interlegality. We argue that the issue of personal law should be understood within the post-colonial legal structure of India and with a good understanding of the processes through which disputes in the delicate area of family, affect and kinship are addressed and resolved. The above case shows how resolution occurs in a family dispute when plural institutional mechanisms are at work. This paper explores the adjudication process at a Darul-Qaza to understand how religion-based family laws get constituted as litigants seek both religious counsel and civil authority.
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This Working Paper is intended to suggest a fairly simple contention concerning a number of interconnected propositions made in connection with the debates on modernity and secularism. None of these propositions is particularly novel, nor... more
This Working Paper is intended to suggest a fairly simple contention concerning a number of interconnected propositions made in connection with the debates on modernity and secularism. None of these propositions is particularly novel, nor is this the first time that they have been put forward. The simple contention I wish to start with concerns Islamism, often brought out emblematically when secularism and modernity are discussed. Like other self-consciously retrogressive identitarian motifs, ideas, sensibilities, moods and inflections of politics that sustain differentialist culturalism and are sustained by it conceptually, Islamism has come to gain very considerable political and social traction over the past quarter of a century. This had until recently reached the extent that it, as a perceptual grid of social and cultural purchase relating to societies and countries that many associate with Islam, has become hegemonic in public discussions about society and politics and, until recently, hegemonic without serious challenge. It has also been crucial for triggering the latest round of antisecular discussions and polemics.
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Iran’s constitutional revolution of 1906 is arguably the most significant turn toward the secular in its modern history. I start this investigation by making a conceptual distinction between secularism and secularity. Here, secularism is... more
Iran’s constitutional revolution of 1906 is arguably the most significant turn toward the secular in its modern history. I start this investigation by making a conceptual distinction between secularism and secularity. Here, secularism is defined as the ideologically-driven separation of religion and state according to an agenda, a blueprint, a model, that could be indigenously, or externally informed and is achieved with the assistance of the modern state and explicit political motivations. Secularity, on the other hand, is expressed in terms of a non-ideological separation that comes about unintentionally. In some accounts, this separation may take on evolutionary connotations in terms of the natural separation of functions as a result of the growing complexity of a natural organism or social system. What I have in mind here is a separation of functions that is agent-driven but the secularity that emerges is both unintentional and unideological. In other words, separation is attained not because actors consciously distinguish between the religious and the political at the conceptual level, or experience a wholesale shift in belief systems, but because some new contexts open novel avenues for pursuing goals or interests that are experienced by actors as more effective than previously undifferentiated ones, without necessarily effecting conscious change, or any change, in belief systems.
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This working paper aims to analyse the relationship between state and religion (in this case, Islam) in political and legal developments in Indonesia from colonial times to the present, and to determine the model of Indonesian secularity... more
This working paper aims to analyse the relationship between state and religion (in this case, Islam) in political and legal developments in Indonesia from colonial times to the present, and to determine the model of Indonesian secularity within the multiple secularities approach. The legal and political developments relating to the relationship between the state and Islam in Indonesia are understood to be the products of societal debate as well as instruments for solving particular societal problems, guided by certain guiding ideas that shape Indonesian secularity.
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In the first half of the seventeenth century, three major Buddhist governments that combined a twofold religious and political structure under a Buddhist ruler were established in the Tibetan cultural area (Joint Twofold System of... more
In the first half of the seventeenth century, three major Buddhist governments that combined a twofold religious and political structure under a Buddhist ruler were established in the Tibetan cultural area (Joint Twofold System of Governance). In 1625/26, Bhutan was united under the rule of a charismatic Tibetan Buddhist master, Tibet and Sikkim followed, both in 1642 – although with significant differences in their respective institutionalisation. The Working Paper presents findings of the specific and unique case example of pre-modern Bhutan to yield benefit for further interdisciplinary discourses about secularity, religion, and modernity in contemporary Bhutan – paying thereby tribute to the complexity of this field of research. Besides for Bhutan, this analytical framework can be adapted for further research about different pre-modern formations of the Joint Twofold System of Governance in the Tibetan cultural area as a whole.
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This working paper explores what I consider to be a tenuous but persistent form of “public culture” extending between Inner Asia and Europe over the course of the eighteenth and, especially, nineteenth centuries. This “stranger... more
This working paper explores what I consider to be a tenuous but persistent form of “public culture” extending between Inner Asia and Europe over the course of the eighteenth and, especially, nineteenth centuries. This “stranger relationality,” as Michael Warner would have it, was mediated by new forms and routes of Eurasianist textual circulation. In this late imperial period, spread along the frontiers of the Qing, Tsarist, and British empires, Tibetan, Mongolian, and Buryat monks read works by European and East Asian intellectuals on all manner of technical knowledge, and began writing not to fellow scholastics or local readers, but to a global community of “the knowledgeable” (Tib. mkhas pa; Mon. baγsi, nomčin). This paper introduces the social sites of my sources, the Buddhist monastic colleges that spanned the Sino-Russian frontiers, and provides a few examples of synthetic scholastic products that emerged in this previously unstudied form of Eurasianist public culture (c. 1750–1930s). I will also share some preliminary arguments about the ways that practices of secularity amongst the actors led directly to the creation of the modern public sphere, civil society, and ironically, revolutionary institutional forms and models of history that had violently erased scholastic culture from public life.
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If any one thing marks early modern history, it is religious transformation. Confessional and pietist movements, both European firsts, are prominent examples of such catalysts for change. In large parts of the Islamic world in the... more
If any one thing marks early modern history, it is religious transformation. Confessional and pietist movements, both European firsts, are prominent examples of such catalysts for change. In large parts of the Islamic world in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, it was Sufi piety that carried the day. The historiographical record reveals strikingly new imaginaires and novel modes of connectivity to the past. The focus in this paper is on the manifold ways in which new forms of religiosity redefined the landscape of politics in the eastern Islamic world. It traces invocations of the past in Fakhr al-Dīn Kāshifī’s (d. 1532) "Rashaḥāt ‘ayn al-ḥayāt" ("Sprinklings from the Fountain of Life"), a sixteenth-century collected biography of Naqshbandī Sufi masters, to argue that the classificatory schema adopted by the author reveals a template of secularity that marks a significant departure from past manners of adherence.
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Debates about the usability of the concept of ‘secularity’ in academic research are not merely theoretical. Standpoints are also politically informed and arguments are sometimes emotionally charged. To some, merely using the term... more
Debates about the usability of the concept of ‘secularity’ in academic research are not merely theoretical. Standpoints are also politically informed and arguments are sometimes emotionally charged. To some, merely using the term ‘secularity’ seems to inflict violence upon certain objects of research or even upon themselves. Others object to applying the concept beyond a particular arrangement of secularity, lest that defense-worthy arrangement be undermined. Taking a step back, however, the actual hermeneutical problem and historical question still seems rather clearly to be this: is it possible to uncouple the link between secularism as a political regime and secularity as an analytical concept with broader historical purchase? In this paper, I argue that the basic approach of Multiple Secularities is indeed the commendable way forward, but could be refined and improved, also by learning from the valid points of its critical alternatives. Thus, this paper aspires to shed light on two basic questions, namely, how to take ‘secularity’ beyond the modern West, and, as a logical prior, why take ‘secularity’ beyond the modern West in the first place?
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Disagreement over the nature of religion in China - a civilization that has long confounded the vocabulary of religious and secular - is nothing new. With an imperial institution that eclipsed confessional structures, and bound Heaven and... more
Disagreement over the nature of religion in China - a civilization that has long confounded the vocabulary of religious and secular - is nothing new. With an imperial institution that eclipsed confessional structures, and bound Heaven and Earth in ritual cosmology, China was what John Lagerwey called a “religious state.” When native notions of religion were forced into European-derived categories, the result was either a clash of interests, particularly with Christian missionaries, or dreadful mistranslations, such as the still pervasive idea of “emperor worship.” Religion in the twentieth century was been punctuated by periods of intense persecution, but the more longstanding policy of the People’s Republic has been to allow organized religion to exist, and even thrive, albeit at the cost of being coopted or transformed into a museum piece, its teaching is reduced to moral platitudes. The ideological wave under Xi Jinping is something new. Combining nationalism, personal advancement, economic welfare, and an unprecedented level of surveillance of public and virtual spaces, this wave has made the state more ideologically pervasive than it has been in half a century. It has tamed the independent charitable organizations that grew up over the previous decade, but even this is just a symptom of the larger reorientation of ideology to public spaces to become what I call the “Chinese secular.”
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Working Paper #8 from the University of Leipzig Centre for Advanced Studies on "Multiple Secularities - Beyond the West, Beyond Modernities" . I am sincerely grateful to Judith Zimmermann for bringing coherence and precision to my... more
Working Paper #8 from the University of Leipzig Centre for Advanced Studies on "Multiple Secularities - Beyond the West, Beyond Modernities" .
I am sincerely grateful to Judith Zimmermann for bringing coherence and precision to my poorly-structured thoughts.
I am sincerely grateful to Judith Zimmermann for bringing coherence and precision to my poorly-structured thoughts.
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This article discusses four concepts: religionization, religio-secularization, religio-secularism, and religion-making. These concepts are proposed as heuristic devices for the analysis of the processes through which social networks,... more
This article discusses four concepts: religionization, religio-secularization, religio-secularism, and religion-making. These concepts are proposed as heuristic devices for the analysis of the processes through which social networks, practices, and discourses come to be understood as ‘religious’ or ‘religion.’ I use the term ‘religionization’ to describe situations where assemblages of knowledge (structures, practices, discourses) are being made sense of through the modern concept of religion. I use ‘religio-secularization’ to illustrate the connection between religionization and secularization in the modern context. I use ‘religio-secularism’ to denote the knowledge regime that legitimizes processes of religionization and secularization. Finally, the term ‘religion-making’ is proposed as a means of focusing on agency in processes of religionization.
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In this article, I undertake several lines of enquiry in the history of ideological and political movements centered on the “modernity” polemic at the transnational level. By analyzing these movements in juxtaposition, I explore the... more
In this article, I undertake several lines of enquiry in the history of ideological and political movements centered on the “modernity” polemic at the transnational level. By analyzing these movements in juxtaposition, I explore the possibility of more diverse narratives of modernity and antimodernity than are assumed by conventional dichotomies in contemporary academic writings. The results of my enquiry challenge several pervasive “dogmas” of post-colonial theory: that orientalism is a purely modernist intellectual project, while anti-orientalism is by necessity its more “local” discursive counterpart in a dualism of East and West.
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As can be easily recognised, the title of this paper alludes to a famous statement by Robert N. Bellah. In his article “Values and Social Change in Modern Japan,” originally published in 1970, Bellah identified “worldly affirmativeness,... more
As can be easily recognised, the title of this paper alludes to a famous statement by Robert N. Bellah. In his article “Values and Social Change in Modern Japan,” originally published in 1970, Bellah identified “worldly affirmativeness, the opposite of denial” as “the ground bass […] of the Japanese tradition.” This may, at first sight, seem to be consistent with my rather provocative notion of the ‘secular ground bass of pre-modern Japan.’ Is “worldly affirmativeness” not actually a key feature of ‘secularity,’ and of ‘modernity’ for that matter? However, Bellah’s argument runs in the very opposite direction. Contrary to what one might expect, worldly affirmativeness, in Bellah’s view, did not pave the way for secularity but, rather, prevented it. The reason is, says Bellah, that the alleged ground bass of worldly affirmativeness was responsible for the ‘failure’ of the early modern Japanese to actualise the moment of transcendence that had been recognised and strongly emphasised by medieval Buddhist thinkers already. I adopt a completely different approach. I aim to demonstrate that the medieval Japanese had already developed a set of epistemes with a longue durée, which turned out to be favourable for appropriating modern Western concepts of secularity in the 19th century, because they clearly distinguished between two social domains, which we – from a modern perspective – would label roughly as ‘religion’ on the one hand and ‘politics’ on the other. In other words, we find social structures and related systems of classification that come quite close to the ideal type of secularity as originally defined by Monika Wohlrab-Sahr and Marian Burchardt, namely: “institutionally as well as symbolically embedded forms and arrangements for distinguishing between religion and other societal areas, practices and interpretations.”
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A wide variety of Buddhist writings originating on the Indian subcontinent and elsewhere in South and Southeast Asia were translated into Chinese between the mid-second and the early eleventh centuries C.E. As this material was read,... more
A wide variety of Buddhist writings originating on the Indian subcontinent and elsewhere in South and Southeast Asia were translated into Chinese between the mid-second and the early eleventh centuries C.E. As this material was read, digested, commented upon, and integrated into daily life, Chinese audiences came to be familiar with Buddhism’s basic teaching that overcoming all forms of suffering (Ch. ku 苦; Skt. duḥkha) is its core function. As one of the most obvious forms of suffering encountered in everyday human life, illness was a frequent topic of concern in these discourses. Of particular concern was the question of the relationship between the alleviation of the suffering of illness and the total, final salvation from suffering of all kinds (commonly referred to as Ch. niepan 涅槃; Skt. nirvāṇa; among other terms). This question appears and reappears across the genres of the Buddhist canon. From sūtras (loosely meaning “scriptures”), to disciplinary texts, ritual manuals, narratives, parables, philosophical treatises, and poetry, illness and healing are everywhere in Buddhist literature.
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The goal of this paper is to provide a bird’s eye view on what might qualify as ‘the mother of all distinctions’ within Islamicate history affecting the regulation of human conduct. It is a rather ‘soft’ distinction, whereby the ethical... more
The goal of this paper is to provide a bird’s eye view on what might qualify as ‘the mother of all distinctions’ within Islamicate history affecting the regulation of human conduct. It is a rather ‘soft’ distinction, whereby the ethical and literary tradition of adab works as an harmonious counterpoint, more than as a sheer alternative, to the normative discourse subsumed under the notion of shari‘a, the law originating from Divine will (shar‘). Adab does so, however, while clearly affirming a distinctive, non-divine (and in this sense ‘secular’) source of norms of human interaction. The paper is divided into two parts: the first delineates the traits of adab in pre-colonial times, while the second focuses on key transformations it underwent during the colonial era.
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For the last few decades, sociological debates about religion and secularisation have been characterised by confrontation between (often American) critics and (mostly European) defenders of secularisation theories. There has also been a... more
For the last few decades, sociological debates about religion and secularisation have been characterised by confrontation between (often American) critics and (mostly European) defenders of secularisation theories. There has also been a remarkable rise in academic and public debates about the role of secularism in political regimes and in national as well as civilisational frameworks. These debates are shaped by the context of the changing position of the West in world politics, Islamist terror and the war on terror, struggles of religious minorities for recognition and influence, and the concomitant negotiations over the place of religion in the public sphere, as well as the emergence of post-national citizenship. Contributions from political theory, social anthropology and religious studies that emerged from this context have enriched the debate, but also contributed to fragmenting existing theories on the relationship between religion and modernity. Whereas scholars previously aimed to develop ‘general theories’ of secularisation that included deviations from the general model, newer approaches tend to highlight the specificity of Western European developments as opposed to those in the rest of the world, and sometimes even highlight their incomparability.
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The project seeks to explore the boundaries that distinguish between the religious and non-religious, in modern as well as pre-modern societies. In doing so, we are aligning ourselves with current debates but we are approaching the... more
The project seeks to explore the boundaries that distinguish between the religious and non-religious, in modern as well as pre-modern societies. In doing so, we are aligning ourselves with current debates but we are approaching the debated issues from a basic theoretical perspective. At present, a general distinction can be drawn between three narratives: The first claims the dwindling presence and relevance of religion (“secularisation”); the second regards religion to be returning globally, consequently irritating the self-perception of modern societies (“return of religions”, “post-secular society”). According to the third, religion has always been present and has simply changed shape, meaning secularisation assumptions are misleading (“invisible religion”). There is also a theoretical-methodological conflict to be taken into consideration. Where the secularisation hypothesis considers its theories and methods to be universally applicable, the critics of this theory not only increasingly challenge the transferability of Western development paths, but also the transferability of the concepts used. This applies right down to the challenge of the religious/secular dual, which is understood to be an expression of Western experience and power of interpretation that forces other cultures into Western schematisations. In contrast, we are formulating an alternative position, in which we are trying to explore the boundaries between the religious and non-religious beyond normative concepts. We are particularly seeking such boundaries in regions that differ greatly from the so-called “West” in the “Modern World” in terms of culture and history: In various Asian regions and – partly overlapping with these – in the so-called “Islamic World”, but also in different epochs. This is linked to a plea for comparability across multifaceted regions and cultural contexts, and for investigating their entangled history.
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Despite extensive academic discussion about de-centring the concept of secularity, very few academics have looked at contemporary China. This should not be surprising as the concept of ‘secularity’, and its cognates ‘secular’,... more
Despite extensive academic discussion about de-centring the concept of secularity, very few academics have looked at contemporary China. This should not be surprising as the concept of ‘secularity’, and its cognates ‘secular’, ‘secularisation’, and ‘secularism’ rarely translate well into Chinese. This article explores whether and how Wohlrab-Sahr and Burchardt’s conceptual framework for understanding secularity beyond the West and beyond modernity can be applied to China. This article looks into the lessons we can derive from China’s own recent history of relations between religious and non-religious social spheres to enrich our understanding of secularity beyond the West, and, at the same time, contribute to the de-othering of China and the critique of positive orientalism. A major argument made in this essay is that the particular features of secularity in China are not the inevitable result of a cultural configuration determining institutional arrangements between religion and the spheres of the secular. Although the language and terminology of these arrangements may be culturally specific and intelligible only within the sinosphere, i.e. to people who can understand written Chinese, this does not pre-ordain the creation of a specific form of secular state such as the current mode of regulation of religion enforced by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). The case of Taiwan, another important centre within the sinosphere where secularity differs from that seen in China, illustrates the vast repertoire of institutional arrangements possible in Chinese societies, and highlights the importance of agency in shaping institutions.
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With the assertion of Buddhism as the dominant religion at the end of the 16th century, a new reflection on the relationship between the secular and the religious commenced among the Mongols. They adopted the Joint Twofold System of... more
With the assertion of Buddhism as the dominant religion at the end of the 16th century, a new reflection on the relationship between the secular and the religious commenced among the Mongols. They adopted the Joint Twofold System of Governance formulated in Buddhist Tibet, and adapted it to the Mongolian cultural context. This system of governance is described in the work “The White History”, written in the late 16th century, with the epistemic distinctions between the religious and the secular discursively negotiated in the work. Although the impact of these distinctions on the social differentiations of Mongolian society during the Qing period (1644–1911) remains to be investigated, the “White History” nonetheless provides a valuable insight into pre-modern Mongolian notions of the distinction between the religious and the secular.
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Any history of secularity in the Arab world needs to dedicate a special chapter to the Syro-Lebanese press in Beirut in the second half of the 19th century. Not only that the first explicit expressions of secularism in the region were... more
Any history of secularity in the Arab world needs to dedicate a special chapter to the Syro-Lebanese press in Beirut in the second half of the 19th century. Not only that the first explicit expressions of secularism in the region were articulated on its pages; it was the forum in which the earliest debates in Arabic about the relationship between religion and other social spheres were conducted in universal, abstract terms between members of different religious communities (as opposed to debating this relationship from within a particular religious tradition).
Research Interests:
This is a contribution to The Companion to the Study of Secularity of the Kolleg-Forschergruppe "Multiple Secularities: Beyond the West, Beyond Modernities" at the University of Leipzig about the Tibetan Cultural Area: "The Companion... more
This is a contribution to The Companion to the Study of Secularity of the Kolleg-Forschergruppe "Multiple Secularities: Beyond the West, Beyond Modernities" at the University of Leipzig about the Tibetan Cultural Area:
"The Companion to the Study of Secularity is a publication that is projected to grow over time. It consists of short articles in encyclopaedic form and style, which detail the specific concepts and peculiarities of secularity in the regions and eras our members are specialised in. In contrast to journal articles or articles in our Working Paper Series, the Companion’s entries are not intended to initiate detailed intradisciplinary discussion or to present new findings from research. Instead, they should provide the wider academic community with an insight into the concept of multiple secularities and thus foster transdisciplinary exchange.
The intent is that scholars interested in the concept of multiple secularities, who are not themselves specialists in particular (historical) regions, should be able to gain an insight into both the different regions where formations of secularity can be observed, and the main notions and concepts that the KFG’s members refer to. Over time, the Companion should grow to encompass all epochs and areas that have been worked on within the scope of the KFG. For as long as the KFG continues to exist, the Companion will be published and further expanded on the KFG’s website. Towards the end of the Multiple Secularities project, all entries will be systematised and edited in order to transform the Companion into a completed open access publication."
(https://www.multiple-secularities.de/publications/companion/).
"The Companion to the Study of Secularity is a publication that is projected to grow over time. It consists of short articles in encyclopaedic form and style, which detail the specific concepts and peculiarities of secularity in the regions and eras our members are specialised in. In contrast to journal articles or articles in our Working Paper Series, the Companion’s entries are not intended to initiate detailed intradisciplinary discussion or to present new findings from research. Instead, they should provide the wider academic community with an insight into the concept of multiple secularities and thus foster transdisciplinary exchange.
The intent is that scholars interested in the concept of multiple secularities, who are not themselves specialists in particular (historical) regions, should be able to gain an insight into both the different regions where formations of secularity can be observed, and the main notions and concepts that the KFG’s members refer to. Over time, the Companion should grow to encompass all epochs and areas that have been worked on within the scope of the KFG. For as long as the KFG continues to exist, the Companion will be published and further expanded on the KFG’s website. Towards the end of the Multiple Secularities project, all entries will be systematised and edited in order to transform the Companion into a completed open access publication."
(https://www.multiple-secularities.de/publications/companion/).
Research Interests:
This article gives an overview of the various narratives of "secularity" in modern India, with a particular focus on the 20th century. It traces how 'secularity' in India developed in response to the country's religious pluralism, from... more
This article gives an overview of the various narratives of "secularity" in modern India, with a particular focus on the 20th century. It traces how 'secularity' in India developed in response to the country's religious pluralism, from British colonial rule to independence movement and the recent present.
Research Interests:
Which major forms of Buddhist governance have developed over time in the Tibetan cultural area since the introduction of Buddhism in the seventh century in Tibet? How have distinctions and differentiations between the societal spheres of... more
Which major forms of Buddhist governance have developed over time in the Tibetan cultural area since the introduction of Buddhism in the seventh century in Tibet? How have distinctions and differentiations between the societal spheres of religion and politics manifested themselves? Finally, which general Buddhist conceptions may be considered essential in the different forms of governance? This article provides a chronological overview of the major forms of Buddhist governments in the Tibetan cultural area while also touching on various underlying conceptions of Buddhist governance relevant to the process of conceptual distinction and social differentiation.
Research Interests:
Any history of secularity in the Arab world needs to dedicate a special chapter to the Syro-Lebanese press in Beirut in the second half of the 19th century. Not only that the first explicit expressions of secularism in the region were... more
Any history of secularity in the Arab world needs to dedicate a special chapter to the Syro-Lebanese press in Beirut in the second half of the 19th century. Not only that the first explicit expressions of secularism in the region were articulated on its pages; it was the forum in which the earliest debates in Arabic about the relationship between religion and other social spheres were conducted in universal, abstract terms between members of different religious communities (as opposed to debating this relationship from within a particular religious tradition).
Research Interests:
If Johannes Itten, the early Bauhaus teacher, had not been a staunch adherent of Mazdaznan, a very small religious group, perhaps only emic historiographies of it would exist in Germany today. Within research on the cultural history of... more
If Johannes Itten, the early Bauhaus teacher, had not been a staunch adherent of Mazdaznan, a very small religious group, perhaps only emic historiographies of it would exist in Germany today. Within research on the cultural history of the so-called life reform movements (Lebensreform) and the growing body-culture movement around 1900, it became a fringe topic, treated both as an exotic subject and as an ideologically suspect case.
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If we consider Islamic Reformism, it becomes very clear why it is important to distinguish between secularism and secularity as the Multiple Secularities approach does. ‘Secularity’ denotes a situation in which religious and secular... more
If we consider Islamic Reformism, it becomes very clear why it is important to distinguish between secularism and secularity as the Multiple Secularities approach does. ‘Secularity’ denotes a situation in which religious and secular aspects are distinguished, both in terms of structural differentiations and in terms of conceptual distinctions. ‘Secularism’, by contrast, refers to the political demand for greater separation between religion and the secular. Islamic reformists have rejected secularism almost unanimously as an external political regime that evolved in Christian Europe and is alien to Islam. However, they have been operating with the conceptual distinction between religion and the secular. They have elaborated this distinction firmly within an Islamic framework to the extent that, in a sense, Islam itself has taken the place of ‘secularity’, as will be shown.
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Sometime between April and September 1300, in a small town in Īlkhānid, Iran, the aristocrat turned Sufi master ‘Alā al-Dawla alSimnānī wrote the Arabic treatise al-Wārid al-shārid al-ṭārid shubhat al-mārid (The inspiration refuting the... more
Sometime between April and September 1300, in a small town in Īlkhānid, Iran, the aristocrat turned Sufi master ‘Alā al-Dawla alSimnānī wrote the Arabic treatise al-Wārid al-shārid al-ṭārid shubhat al-mārid (The inspiration refuting the rebel’s sophistry), ostensibly to refute the philosophical method.
Research Interests:
The relationship between Islam and the state has altered with regime changes in Indonesia. During the Old Order period, especially during the period of guided democracy, there was a separation between state and religion and state... more
The relationship between Islam and the state has altered with regime changes in Indonesia. During the Old Order period, especially during the period of guided democracy, there was a separation between state and religion and state authorities even opposed Islamists. During the New Order period, religion was confined to the private realm and efforts were made to eliminate political religious movements and remove religious values and symbols from political life. During the Reformation Era, all groups have had the same space to grow and develop. But religious parties, including Islamic ones, have not gained a significant number of votes. This shows that there has been a major shift in the sociopolitical configuration of Indonesian society.
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Starting from the 9th century, this entry illuminates the specific role that the New Persian played in establishing a specific Persianate culture and in the spread of Sufism as well as the idea of Persianate kingship. On the one hand,... more
Starting from the 9th century, this entry illuminates the specific role that the New Persian played in establishing a specific Persianate culture and in the spread of Sufism as well as the idea of Persianate kingship. On the one hand, this conception of kingship clearly distinguished between religious/spiritual and political/worldly domains, but on the other hand saw kingship itself and prophecy as ordained by God.
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This article sheds light on the historical roots of debates on the relationship between science and religion by looking at two underlying perspectives: the conflict thesis and the differentiation thesis. Different as they are, both... more
This article sheds light on the historical roots of debates on the relationship between science and religion by looking at two underlying perspectives: the conflict thesis and the differentiation thesis. Different as they are, both perspectives assume that science and religion are two separate and clearly distinguishable fields. The sociology of science and the science and technology studies call into question this exclusiveness of science and scientific work. Therefore, these concepts are discussed here with regard to their underlying ideas of the relationship between science and religion. Finally, the conclusion provides a suggestion for conceptualising the relationship between science and religion without dichotomising the two fields.
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What could be called “scientific media of space” played an important role in transformations of the cosmo-geographical imagination in 19th-century Theravada-Buddhist Modernism. Christian missionaries used these instruments and devices –... more
What could be called “scientific media of space” played an important role in transformations of the cosmo-geographical imagination in 19th-century Theravada-Buddhist Modernism. Christian missionaries used these instruments and devices – maps, globes, compasses, and astronomical models – in their debates with Buddhists all over the Theravada world and deemed them essential to their challenge to traditional notions of space. This mobilisation of science in attempts at conversion to Christianity, though often unsuccessful, hints at the ways in which ‘religious’ actors contributed to conceptual distinctions in regard to “Western science” and paved the way for later differentiations and the emergence of a religio-secular episteme.
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The 19th century can be considered central to processes of ‘religion-making’ in Siam (today’s Thailand): over the course of the century, a religio-secular episteme emerged that included the establishment of the traditional Buddhist term... more
The 19th century can be considered central to processes of ‘religion-making’ in Siam (today’s Thailand): over the course of the century, a religio-secular episteme emerged that included the establishment of the traditional Buddhist term sasana as the standard translation of ‘religion’ on the basis of modern “distinctions of religion”, and relegated certain elements of the Buddhist tradition to other societal spheres now seen as distinct from sasana/religion. This process enabled the politicisation and regulation of ‘religion(s)’ in the context of the newly emerging Thai state towards the end of the ‘long 19th century.’
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As the theory of multiple modernities began to question the uniform transformation and conversion of all modern societies, several culturally specific definitions of secularism/laïcité by modernising elites were already prevalent in... more
As the theory of multiple modernities began to question the uniform transformation and conversion of all modern societies, several culturally specific definitions of secularism/laïcité by modernising elites were already prevalent in different nation states in the non-Western world. Although the Turkish constitution of 1928 was the first to set up a secular state and to explicitly define laïcité, as Talal Asad and others have noted, de facto secularisation in the form of control and definition of religion by the state had already been ongoing for the better part of a century.
Research Interests:
Religionization is intertwined with seculariza-tion and secularism Secularity as a product of religio-secularization and religion-making Religionization and Secularity 1 is entry discusses four concepts: religionization,... more
Religionization is intertwined with seculariza-tion and secularism Secularity as a product of religio-secularization and religion-making Religionization and Secularity 1 is entry discusses four concepts: religionization, religio-seculariza-tion, religio-secularism, and religion-making. ey are proposed as heuristic devices for the analysis of the processes through which social structures, practices, and discourses come to be understood as 'reli-gious' or 'religion. ' Since all of these concepts relate to the demarcation of boundaries between religious and non-religious domains, they are devices for analyzing the formation and maintenance of secularities. is entry is based on the premise that processes of religioniza-tion and practices of religion-making have been intertwined with processes of secularization and politics of secularism. If we take a constructivist approach to religion, we must consider how to position secularity, conceived in terms of conceptual distinctions and structural dii erentiations, 2 within this dynamic. It is suggested that, at least for the modern context, secularity can be regarded as a product of processes of religio-secularization and practices of religion-making. As with the Multiple Secularities approach, the con-structivist approach to religion advanced here is interested in the historical conditions under which certain assemblages of knowledge and structures were and continue to be related to religion and secularity.
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This article provides an historical overview of the development of the relationship between religion and medicine in Japan from the Asuka period (538-710), when Buddhism was officially introduced, to the 20th century. It sheds light,... more
This article provides an historical overview of the development of the relationship between religion and medicine in Japan from the Asuka period (538-710), when Buddhism was officially introduced, to the 20th century. It sheds light, among other things, on the impact of Chinese medicine as well as European influences on the medical system in Japan and traces the change in the relationship between two distinct but not necessarily separate spheres.
Research Interests:
As in most premodern societies, prior to the accelerated modernisation of Japan under Western influence in the 19th century, concepts of societal differentiation were primarily focused on the relationship between religious and political... more
As in most premodern societies, prior to the accelerated modernisation of Japan under Western influence in the 19th century, concepts of societal differentiation were primarily focused on the relationship between religious and political institutions. It is important to note, however, that the conceptual distinctions found in discursive statements do not necessarily reflect or represent the actual state of societal differentiation. In many cases, these concepts were, in all likelihood, normative ideals that were only partly realised. Having said this, a very brief and generalising narrative of the relationship between ‘religion’ and ‘the secular’ would run as follows.
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Workshop at the Centre for Advanced Studies “Multiple Secularities – Beyond the West, Beyond Modernities”, Leipzig University, in conjunction with the working group “Africa” of the German Association for the Study of Religion (DVRW)... more
Workshop at the Centre for Advanced Studies “Multiple Secularities – Beyond the West, Beyond Modernities”, Leipzig University, in conjunction with the working group “Africa” of the German Association for the Study of Religion (DVRW)
02-04 February 2022
Convenors: Marian Burchardt, Magnus Echtler, and Katharina Wilkens (all Leipzig University)
In the field of secularity studies, Africa has remained the 'heart of darkness', marked by a peculiar absence. One line of argumentation suggests that this absence is justified as Africans allegedly never entered what Charles Taylor has described as the 'immanent frame'. In this reading, African ways of being in, or knowing the world are outside the religious-secular divide. This interpretation also suggests that the idea of modernisation as secularisation is an instance of epistemic violence that has underwritten much of Africa's colonial history. However, arguably this position underestimates the impact of the colonial encounter, essentialising and othering African societies as shaped by holistic indigenous cultures rather than differentiated religions. This second interpretation explains secularity's apparent irrelevance by Africa's revenant otherness which formed part of its secularisation while hiding the process. This workshop seeks to tackle epistemological distortions and blind spots through empirical studies of African social realities. In particular, we are interested in the heuristic values of divergent conceptualisations (religious/secular, spiritual/material, sacred/profane, transcendent/immanent, or singularly mundane). Regarding Africa and its diaspora, the power/knowledge topography of religion and secularity surely requires deeper investigation.
02-04 February 2022
Convenors: Marian Burchardt, Magnus Echtler, and Katharina Wilkens (all Leipzig University)
In the field of secularity studies, Africa has remained the 'heart of darkness', marked by a peculiar absence. One line of argumentation suggests that this absence is justified as Africans allegedly never entered what Charles Taylor has described as the 'immanent frame'. In this reading, African ways of being in, or knowing the world are outside the religious-secular divide. This interpretation also suggests that the idea of modernisation as secularisation is an instance of epistemic violence that has underwritten much of Africa's colonial history. However, arguably this position underestimates the impact of the colonial encounter, essentialising and othering African societies as shaped by holistic indigenous cultures rather than differentiated religions. This second interpretation explains secularity's apparent irrelevance by Africa's revenant otherness which formed part of its secularisation while hiding the process. This workshop seeks to tackle epistemological distortions and blind spots through empirical studies of African social realities. In particular, we are interested in the heuristic values of divergent conceptualisations (religious/secular, spiritual/material, sacred/profane, transcendent/immanent, or singularly mundane). Regarding Africa and its diaspora, the power/knowledge topography of religion and secularity surely requires deeper investigation.
Research Interests:
USA 2017, doc, 81 min, director: Erika Cohn Languages: Arabic with English subs As a young lawyer, Kholoud Al-Faqih entered the office of the Chief Justice of Palestine and announced that she wanted to join the bench. He laughed at her.... more
USA 2017, doc, 81 min, director: Erika Cohn
Languages: Arabic with English subs
As a young lawyer, Kholoud Al-Faqih entered the office of the Chief Justice of Palestine and announced that she wanted to join the bench. He laughed at her. But just a few years later, Kholoud became the first woman to be appointed as a judge in the Shari'a courts of the Middle East. The documentary "The Judge" portrays Judge Kholoud and accompanies her on her way, in her tireless fight for women's rights and her visits to clients, friends and family. In so doing, "The Judge" sheds light on some of the universal conflicts in Palestinian domestic life - child custody, divorce, abuse - while offering an unvarnished look at women's lives and Shari'a.
The film will be followed by a discussion with scholar of Islam Markus Dreßler.
Languages: Arabic with English subs
As a young lawyer, Kholoud Al-Faqih entered the office of the Chief Justice of Palestine and announced that she wanted to join the bench. He laughed at her. But just a few years later, Kholoud became the first woman to be appointed as a judge in the Shari'a courts of the Middle East. The documentary "The Judge" portrays Judge Kholoud and accompanies her on her way, in her tireless fight for women's rights and her visits to clients, friends and family. In so doing, "The Judge" sheds light on some of the universal conflicts in Palestinian domestic life - child custody, divorce, abuse - while offering an unvarnished look at women's lives and Shari'a.
The film will be followed by a discussion with scholar of Islam Markus Dreßler.
Research Interests:
NL 2020, doc, 74 min, director: Paul Sin Nam Rigter Languages: Dutch, English, Sranantongo, Twi with English subs The many cultures in Bijlmer, a suburb of Amsterdam, all have their own rituals for saying goodbye to the dead. Funeral... more
NL 2020, doc, 74 min, director: Paul Sin Nam Rigter
Languages: Dutch, English, Sranantongo, Twi with English subs
The many cultures in Bijlmer, a suburb of Amsterdam, all have their own rituals for saying goodbye to the dead. Funeral director Anita, a white Dutch woman, is sent to find out what the community wishes for a new multicultural funeral home that the Yarden organisation wants to set up there.
But the more the initially confident Anita sees and gets to know, the more she begins to doubt. Does this diverse community really need a facility for all cultures like Yarden is planning? Navigating between two worlds, Anita also has to deal with death in her own environment, which leads her to ask herself new questions. Meanwhile, in the Yarden offices, the ideal of diversity must be reconciled with the business plan.
This largely observational, often light-hearted, documentary follows Anita's uncertain mission over a period of more than five years.
After the film there will be a discussion.
Languages: Dutch, English, Sranantongo, Twi with English subs
The many cultures in Bijlmer, a suburb of Amsterdam, all have their own rituals for saying goodbye to the dead. Funeral director Anita, a white Dutch woman, is sent to find out what the community wishes for a new multicultural funeral home that the Yarden organisation wants to set up there.
But the more the initially confident Anita sees and gets to know, the more she begins to doubt. Does this diverse community really need a facility for all cultures like Yarden is planning? Navigating between two worlds, Anita also has to deal with death in her own environment, which leads her to ask herself new questions. Meanwhile, in the Yarden offices, the ideal of diversity must be reconciled with the business plan.
This largely observational, often light-hearted, documentary follows Anita's uncertain mission over a period of more than five years.
After the film there will be a discussion.
Research Interests:
GER, 2011, doc, 82 min, directors: Stephanie Bürger, Jule Ott and Manal Abdallah Languages: English, Hebrew and Arabic with English subs The documentary is an Israeli woman's direct response to "The Heart of Jenin". On 31 March 2002,... more
GER, 2011, doc, 82 min, directors: Stephanie Bürger, Jule Ott and Manal Abdallah
Languages: English, Hebrew and Arabic with English subs
The documentary is an Israeli woman's direct response to "The Heart of Jenin".
On 31 March 2002, Doy Chernobroda and 14 other people died in Haifa when a Palestinian suicide bomber blew himself up in an Arab restaurant. Doy Chernobroda was a peace activist and worked all his life for reconciliation between Jews and Arabs. Eight years later, his widow Yaël decides to visit the family of the assassin in the West Bank.
Why does a young man leave the house in the morning like any other day, say he won't be back from work that late and detonate the explosive belt under his shirt a few hours later? The two directors Stephanie Bürger and Jule Ott accompany Yaël on her journey and try to understand what seems unimaginable. How do people live in this conflict? What does one know about the tragedies of the other
We will show the film together with "The Heart of Jenin" as part of the "GLOBE21" science festival. After the film there will be a discussion.
Languages: English, Hebrew and Arabic with English subs
The documentary is an Israeli woman's direct response to "The Heart of Jenin".
On 31 March 2002, Doy Chernobroda and 14 other people died in Haifa when a Palestinian suicide bomber blew himself up in an Arab restaurant. Doy Chernobroda was a peace activist and worked all his life for reconciliation between Jews and Arabs. Eight years later, his widow Yaël decides to visit the family of the assassin in the West Bank.
Why does a young man leave the house in the morning like any other day, say he won't be back from work that late and detonate the explosive belt under his shirt a few hours later? The two directors Stephanie Bürger and Jule Ott accompany Yaël on her journey and try to understand what seems unimaginable. How do people live in this conflict? What does one know about the tragedies of the other
We will show the film together with "The Heart of Jenin" as part of the "GLOBE21" science festival. After the film there will be a discussion.
Research Interests:
GER, ISR 2008, doc, 89 min, directors: Markus Vetter and Leon Geller Languages: English, Hebrew and Arabic with English subs The documentary "The Heart of Jenin" tells the story of the Palestinian Ismael Khatib. He lives with his family... more
GER, ISR 2008, doc, 89 min, directors: Markus Vetter and Leon Geller
Languages: English, Hebrew and Arabic with English subs
The documentary "The Heart of Jenin" tells the story of the Palestinian Ismael Khatib. He lives with his family in the Jenin refugee camp in the West Bank. 15,000 people live here in a small area under difficult living conditions. Jenin is a political powder keg that threatens to explode at any time; most of the suicide bombers who carry out attacks in Israel come from here.
In 2005, Ismael's 12-year-old son Ahmed is fatally shot in the head by bullets from Israeli soldiers while playing with friends. After the doctors at the hospital can only diagnose Ahmed's brain death, Ismael decides to donate his son's organs to Israeli children and thus to save their lives.
Two years later, he embarks on a journey across Israel to visit these children. A painful and at the same time liberating journey, because through the children Ismael also gets very close to his son again.
We will show the film together with "After the Silence" as part of the science festival "GLOBE21".
Languages: English, Hebrew and Arabic with English subs
The documentary "The Heart of Jenin" tells the story of the Palestinian Ismael Khatib. He lives with his family in the Jenin refugee camp in the West Bank. 15,000 people live here in a small area under difficult living conditions. Jenin is a political powder keg that threatens to explode at any time; most of the suicide bombers who carry out attacks in Israel come from here.
In 2005, Ismael's 12-year-old son Ahmed is fatally shot in the head by bullets from Israeli soldiers while playing with friends. After the doctors at the hospital can only diagnose Ahmed's brain death, Ismael decides to donate his son's organs to Israeli children and thus to save their lives.
Two years later, he embarks on a journey across Israel to visit these children. A painful and at the same time liberating journey, because through the children Ismael also gets very close to his son again.
We will show the film together with "After the Silence" as part of the science festival "GLOBE21".
Research Interests:
GER 2014, Doc., 90 min, Directors: Chris Wright and Stefan Kolbe Language: German with English subs What happens when two atheist filmmakers gain access to a preacher's seminary? And this in Wittenberg, the city of Luther, once the... more
GER 2014, Doc., 90 min, Directors: Chris Wright and Stefan Kolbe
Language: German with English subs
What happens when two atheist filmmakers gain access to a preacher's seminary? And this in Wittenberg, the city of Luther, once the stronghold of the German Reformation, today located in one of the most secularised regions of Europe?
For one year, Wright & Kolbe accompany a group of young men and women in the final phase of their parish training.
While at the beginning the main focus is on learning the religious and liturgical "craft", in the course of time both protagonists and filmmakers are confronted with very fundamental human questions. Boundaries become blurred - between belief and unbelief, comfort and despair, truth and madness. An open, intimate dialogue emerges about fundamental needs for love, security and meaning.
After the film there will be a discussion.
Language: German with English subs
What happens when two atheist filmmakers gain access to a preacher's seminary? And this in Wittenberg, the city of Luther, once the stronghold of the German Reformation, today located in one of the most secularised regions of Europe?
For one year, Wright & Kolbe accompany a group of young men and women in the final phase of their parish training.
While at the beginning the main focus is on learning the religious and liturgical "craft", in the course of time both protagonists and filmmakers are confronted with very fundamental human questions. Boundaries become blurred - between belief and unbelief, comfort and despair, truth and madness. An open, intimate dialogue emerges about fundamental needs for love, security and meaning.
After the film there will be a discussion.
Research Interests:
AUT 2009, Drama, 96 min, director: Jessica Hausner Language: French with English subs Christine, who suffers from multiple sclerosis, is paralysed and sits in a wheelchair. Since the doctors cannot give her any hope of healing, she... more
AUT 2009, Drama, 96 min, director: Jessica Hausner
Language: French with English subs
Christine, who suffers from multiple sclerosis, is paralysed and sits in a wheelchair. Since the doctors cannot give her any hope of healing, she decides to travel to the Catholic pilgrimage site of Lourdes in France. Even though she does not believe in miracles, she hopes that her afflictions will be alleviated by God's help and that she will be able to break out of her involuntary isolation.
On her journey, she is accompanied to the spas and to the processions by the young and fun-loving Maltese nun Maria. Maria, however, also seeks distraction from nursing and tries to have fun, which intensifies Christine's longing for her old life. In Lourdes, Christine also makes the acquaintance of the pilgrim Mrs Hartl, who prays for Christine's healing and whose prayer is answered: Christine's condition improves visibly, and finally she can even walk again.
The miracle is now being examined by the medical committee in Lourdes - the results of this examination are questionable, as both sudden deteriorations and improvements are possible with Christine's illness. The possibility of a relapse hangs over her from now on.
The film will be followed by a discussion with scholar of religion Bernadett Bigalke.
Language: French with English subs
Christine, who suffers from multiple sclerosis, is paralysed and sits in a wheelchair. Since the doctors cannot give her any hope of healing, she decides to travel to the Catholic pilgrimage site of Lourdes in France. Even though she does not believe in miracles, she hopes that her afflictions will be alleviated by God's help and that she will be able to break out of her involuntary isolation.
On her journey, she is accompanied to the spas and to the processions by the young and fun-loving Maltese nun Maria. Maria, however, also seeks distraction from nursing and tries to have fun, which intensifies Christine's longing for her old life. In Lourdes, Christine also makes the acquaintance of the pilgrim Mrs Hartl, who prays for Christine's healing and whose prayer is answered: Christine's condition improves visibly, and finally she can even walk again.
The miracle is now being examined by the medical committee in Lourdes - the results of this examination are questionable, as both sudden deteriorations and improvements are possible with Christine's illness. The possibility of a relapse hangs over her from now on.
The film will be followed by a discussion with scholar of religion Bernadett Bigalke.
Research Interests:
As the intensity of the politics around cultural identity is growing across the world, the notion of heritage-making, or “heritagisation”, has acquired new political urgency. At the same time, these politics have animated far-flung... more
As the intensity of the politics around cultural identity is growing across the world, the notion of heritage-making, or “heritagisation”, has acquired new political urgency. At the same time, these politics have animated far-flung controversies over the religious and secular sources of belonging along with the values of ethnic, religious and racial majorities, minorities and the states that are supposed to represent them. This raises an intriguing set of questions: Under what conditions and with what consequences are certain religious artefacts, rituals and worldviews framed as heritage? Whose religious heritage is considered worthy to be selected, canonised and ennobled as elementary for nations’ collective memory? Who is systematically excluded and left to oblivion in the politics of religious and secular heritage? Which social groups are central to these processes?
Research Interests:
Houda al-Habash is a conservative Muslim preacher. Already at the age of 17 she founded a Qur' an school in Damascus exclusively for young girls. Every summer, her female students immerse themselves in a rigorous study of Islam, in... more
Houda al-Habash is a conservative Muslim preacher. Already at the age of 17 she founded a Qur' an school in Damascus exclusively for young girls. Every summer, her female students immerse themselves in a rigorous study of Islam, in addition to their secular schooling. This puts Houda and her students in conflict with traditional attitudes, which see religious education and prayer in the mosque as a male privilege. Using Qur’ anic teachings, Houda encourages her students to pursue higher education, jobs and public lives, while remaining committed to an interpretation of Islam prioritising women’s role as wives and mothers. The film was shot right before the uprising in Syria erupted in 2011.
The film will be shown in Arabic (with English subtitles), followed by a Q&A with scholar of religion Mohammad Magout from Leipzig University.
Online Screening via Cinémathèque Leipzig
https://cinematheque-leipzig.de/programm/filme/the-light-in-her-eyes/
The film will be shown in Arabic (with English subtitles), followed by a Q&A with scholar of religion Mohammad Magout from Leipzig University.
Online Screening via Cinémathèque Leipzig
https://cinematheque-leipzig.de/programm/filme/the-light-in-her-eyes/
Research Interests:
Public Lecture with Donovan Schaefer (University of Pennsylvania) Comment: Monique Scheer (Tübingen University), Host: Nur Yasemin Ural (Leipzig University) 24 February, 6:15 pm via zoom Abstract: It’s easier than ever to talk... more
Public Lecture with Donovan Schaefer (University of Pennsylvania)
Comment: Monique Scheer (Tübingen University), Host: Nur Yasemin Ural (Leipzig University)
24 February, 6:15 pm via zoom
Abstract:
It’s easier than ever to talk about the ways that religion is more than
just what’s in our heads. Scholars working on embodiment, ritual,
and emotion have diagrammed the paths by which religion is felt,
experienced, and lived—rather than merely believed. But could we
say the same of the secular? The standard definition of the secular
associates it with an absence of feeling, sometimes under the heading
of “disenchantment.” This talk explores the ways that the category of the
secular can be understood from the perspective of affect. Examining the
history of the Sheldonian Theatre at the University of Oxford, this talk
suggests not only that what Talal Asad calls “formations of the secular”
are felt, but that starting with affect allows us to reframe and revisit the
secular/religious binary in productive ways.
Comment: Monique Scheer (Tübingen University), Host: Nur Yasemin Ural (Leipzig University)
24 February, 6:15 pm via zoom
Abstract:
It’s easier than ever to talk about the ways that religion is more than
just what’s in our heads. Scholars working on embodiment, ritual,
and emotion have diagrammed the paths by which religion is felt,
experienced, and lived—rather than merely believed. But could we
say the same of the secular? The standard definition of the secular
associates it with an absence of feeling, sometimes under the heading
of “disenchantment.” This talk explores the ways that the category of the
secular can be understood from the perspective of affect. Examining the
history of the Sheldonian Theatre at the University of Oxford, this talk
suggests not only that what Talal Asad calls “formations of the secular”
are felt, but that starting with affect allows us to reframe and revisit the
secular/religious binary in productive ways.
Research Interests:
This workshop will bring together case studies and theoretical reflections on the study of religion as an object of historical and social scientific inquiry in different academic contexts in the Americas, Asia, Europe, and the Middle... more
This workshop will bring together case studies and theoretical reflections on the study of religion as an object of historical and social scientific inquiry in different academic contexts in the Americas, Asia, Europe, and the Middle East. We are especially interested in the global presence and characteristics of religion as an object of study in the most pertinent academic disciplines: History of Religion; Comparative Religious Studies; Sociology; Anthropology and Political Science (excluding Theology and Philosophy). Central questions concern the place, status and history of research on religion in these disciplines: What are the main authors, theories and topics
Research Interests:
The second workshop on the usability of differentiation theory for research on secularity turns to the meso and micro level of social differentiations and conceptual distinctions in relation to 'religion'. It explores concrete empirical... more
The second workshop on the usability of differentiation theory for research on secularity turns to the meso and micro level of social differentiations and conceptual distinctions in relation to 'religion'. It explores concrete empirical and historical cases that are instructive for the demarcation and negotiation of boundaries between 'religion' and other social spheres and practices. What are the activities and spheres between which the drawing of boundaries becomes visible? Which actors are involved? Which conflicts does the process evoke? And what are the underlying social problems and dynamics to which differentiation processes are related?
Research Interests:
The film directed by Mina Salehpour and Michal Honnens mirrors the partially fierce debates and protests in the run-up to the construction of the mosque for the Ahmadiyya community in Berlin-Heinersfeld in 2008. Based on interview... more
The film directed by Mina Salehpour and Michal Honnens mirrors the partially fierce debates and protests in the run-up to the construction of the mosque for the Ahmadiyya community in Berlin-Heinersfeld in 2008.
Based on interview protocols with opponents and supporters of the mosque, neighbours and community members, the two directors let enter fictitious characters enter into an equally fictitious dialogue: The convert, the politically correct newcomer, the local pastor, the imam and the chairman of a citizens' initiative that wants to prevent the construction. Soon it is no longer just about building the mosque, but about the fundamental question of how we want to live together.
15 October 2019 | 7 p.m.
Cinémathèque Leipzig (Karl-Liebknecht-Straße 46)
The screening will be followed by a Q & A. Moderation and introduction: Florian Zemmin, guest: Rainer Frank (actor playing the chairman of the citizens' initiative).
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Once a month, we screen international documentaries and movies rarely seen in German cinemas in our series "Screening Religion". Religion features in every film, be it as a catalyst for negotiation processes or a source of conflict, a marker of identity or a constitutive element of social background. Thus, we seek to screen films on religion whilst simultaneously screening for “religion” as a cinematic object.
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Based on interview protocols with opponents and supporters of the mosque, neighbours and community members, the two directors let enter fictitious characters enter into an equally fictitious dialogue: The convert, the politically correct newcomer, the local pastor, the imam and the chairman of a citizens' initiative that wants to prevent the construction. Soon it is no longer just about building the mosque, but about the fundamental question of how we want to live together.
15 October 2019 | 7 p.m.
Cinémathèque Leipzig (Karl-Liebknecht-Straße 46)
The screening will be followed by a Q & A. Moderation and introduction: Florian Zemmin, guest: Rainer Frank (actor playing the chairman of the citizens' initiative).
+++
Once a month, we screen international documentaries and movies rarely seen in German cinemas in our series "Screening Religion". Religion features in every film, be it as a catalyst for negotiation processes or a source of conflict, a marker of identity or a constitutive element of social background. Thus, we seek to screen films on religion whilst simultaneously screening for “religion” as a cinematic object.
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