Colloquium 24 April 2024

Our Junior Researcher Elisabeth Marx will give a presentation titled Looking for the Secular in Intercultural Intellectual Exchange: A Perspective from Japan.

Her talk will focus on intercultural intellectual exchanges regarding secularisation theory in the 1970s and 1980s in Japan. Particular attention will be paid to the links between modernisation and secularisation theory in relation to the question of becoming or being secular in the modern age.

If you'd like to read beforehand, Elisabeth would like to recommend the following translation of Session A "Religion and Secularisation" of the Kokugakuin University Centennial Symposium "Cultural Identity and Modernisation in Asian Countries" (09-13.01.1983). https://www2.kokugakuin.ac.jp/ijcc/wp/cimac/index.html

These symposia gathered important figures in religious studies, sociology of religion and comparative religious studies in Japan in 1980s. The symposium on "The Problem of Secularisation in Asia" in November 1982, mentioned in the introduction to the Centenary Symposium, will also be referred to in the talk.

If scholars from outside the KFG "Multiple Secularities" wish to attend the colloquium, please send a short inquiry to multiple-secularities@uni-leipzig.de.

Workshop: 'Traditionism’ and Multifaceted Responses to Secularization amongst Mizrahim in Israel

Yemima Hadad, Junior Professor for Jewish Studies at Leipzig University, will host a workshop on 'Traditionism’ and Multifaceted Responses to Secularization amongst Mizrahim in Israel on 20 June 2024.

The Sephardi encounter with modernity shows a counterexample to the Ashkenazi and European experience of secularization. The Mizrahi encounter with modernity offers a case study for thinking of secularization in Israel and beyond. This workshop explores the religious and secular aspects of what we view as Mizrahi renaissance in the context of intra-Jewish power struggles and political debates in Israel.

To participate please contact tarndt@uni-leipzig.de.

CfP: Intersections of Youth, Gender, and Religion under Digital Media in the MENA Region

Our Associate Member Ülker Sözen calls for papers for her workshop on the Intersections of Youth, Gender, and Religion under Digital Media in the MENA Region.

Some possible themes and topics for contributions to be analyzed within the framework of youth and/ or gender, religion, and digital media in the MENA region are:

- Expressions and performances of religious identities
- Governance strategies and policies targeting the youth, gender, and sexuality
- New age religions and spiritualities
- Social media influencer economies
- Trans-regional and global flows and networks enabled by the digital condition
- Youth cultures
- Feminist and LGBTQ politics and collective movements
- Anti-gender politics and ideologies
- Negotiation of the religious-secular divide
- Anti-religious and secularist politics and post-secularity on digital media

Deadline: 3 May 2024
Contact: uelker.soezen@uni-leipzig.de