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Dear friends and colleagues,

In today's Wednesday Weekly, we have a publication for you and a recommendation for a conference with KFG participation. We also want to draw your attention to a Call for Papers, an online talk as well as a launch of a new open access journal.

For the upcoming two weeks there will be no colloquium. The next one is scheduled for 4 May.

Take care and have a good week!

Anja & Lucy

New Publication (in Arabic): Housamedden Darwish on “KFG Workshop Report: The Relationship between State and Religion in the Arab and Islamicate Contexts, 9–10 December 2021”

We would like to share with you the latest publication (in Arabic) of our Associate Senior Researcher Housamedden Darwish. Last December, he and our Associate Member Markus Dreßler organised the KFG-Workshop on “The Relationship between State and Religion in the Arab and Islamicate Contexts. Civil State, Secular State, Religious/Islamic State”. This workshop brought together case studies and theoretical reflections and discussions on the three concepts in different disciplines and academic and political contexts in Arab and Islamicate states.

In March 2022, Housamedden presented his workshop report (in Arabic) at the Nohoudh Endowment for Development Studies, Kuwait. The English version of the report will be published later in The Journal of Law and Islam/Zeitschrift für Recht und Islam.

Fifth Annual Conference of the European Academy of Religion in Bologna, 20–23 June

The 5^th Annual Conference of the European Academy of Religion will take place in Bologna from 20–23 June, organised by FSCIRE (Fondazione per le scienze religiose). The overarching topic of the Conference will be Religion and Diversity. Our Senior Researcher Nur Yasemin Ural will be one of the speakers in the panel on Islamic practices in the professional field in Non Muslim secular context.

Here you find detailed information on the registration.

Conference Date: 20–23 June | Bologna, Italy

Call for Papers: Conference on „Urbane Sozialformen des Religiösen zwischen Pluralisierung und Regulierung“ (“Urban social forms of religion between pluralisation and regulation”, 21–23 September

This conference will address urban social forms of the religious in recent decades from the perspectives of pluralisation, glocalisation and regulation, and will serve to relate research strands that have developed in part in isolation. It will comprise three sections: (1) Urban social forms of the religious: Individualised Practices, Interactions, (2) Urban Forms of Regulation and (3) Dialogue, Materiality and Space. The event is being held in cooperation with the Research Centre for Contemporary History in Hamburg (FZH), the Institute for the History of the German Jews (IGdJ) () and the Academy of World Religions at the University of Hamburg.

Submission of abstract (300–500 words): 30 April

Conference Date: 21–23 September | Hamburg

Online Talk: “The Secular as a Religious Power House: A Conversation between Kocku von Stuckrad and Courtney Bender”, 21 April

In his book “A Cultural History of the Soul: Europe and North America from 1870 to the Present”, Kocku von Stuckrad, Professor of Religious Studies at the University of Groningen, argues that contemporary forms of popular spirituality have a genealogy that can be traced back into the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, and that secular sciences have been instrumental in shaping these new spiritualities, metaphysical worldviews, and religious practices. Today, these trends also manifest in environmental politics and social movements around the world.

This talk will address questions such as: What is the role of secular institutions in the transformation of religions and spiritualities? Has secularism been “religiously productive” itself? What does this mean for our understanding of secularity and religion in contemporary Europe and North America? Speakers will be Kocku von Stuckrad and Courtney Bender, Ada Byron Bampton Tremaine Professor of Religion at the Columbia University in New York City.  

21 April | 5–7 p.m. (CET)

Online

Pre-launch of new open access journal AЯGOS

We would like to draw your attention to the pre-launch of AЯGOS, a new open access journal in the study of religion. AЯGOS is a multilingual, peer-reviewed online journal that aims to build a bridge between the different academic cultures of Europe. The journal publishes original articles and translations in English, German, French and Italian. The intention is to present, comment upon and further develop established and innovative perspectives in the study of religion. In addition to the classic essay format, photo essays, interviews and book reviews are welcome.

It is possible to submit articles and proposals for publications as well as book reviews. The first articles will be released in September 2022 with the publication of the special issue on religion and ecology. 

If you have any content that you think suits the purpose of the weekly, please feel free to send it to us at multiple-secularities@uni-leipzig.de.