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Wednesday Weekly 20 October 2021

Dear friends and colleagues,

This week, we would like to draw your attention to two forthcoming KFG workshops that we are very much looking forward to: “Enshrining the Past: Religion and Heritage-Making in a Secular Age” from 27–29 October and “Religion as an Object of Historical and Social Scientific Study: Global Perspectives” from 3–5 November. Our colloquium series is taking a break and will be back on 24 November.

We would also like to present three new publications by our KFG members and draw your attention to a book launch. This Wednesday Weekly will conclude with our recommendation for the great DOK Film Festival Leipzig.

Enjoy and have a great week!

Anja

KFG-Workshop I “Enshrining the Past: Religion and Heritage-Making in a Secular Age”, 27–29 October

Our Associate Member Marian Burchardt and Senior Researcher Nur Yasemin Ural will be hosting the workshop on “Enshrining the Past: Religion and Heritage-Making in a Secular Age” from 27–29 October. This workshop seeks to explore the contours of the politics around cultural heritage and the ways it is enmeshed with the religious-secular dynamics in societies past and present suggesting that these concerns manifest in three substantive ways, each provoking suggestive research questions: legal frames, immaterial values, and material patrimony.

Registration for participation in the workshop is still possible. Please send us an e-mail. The workshop will take place as a hybrid event. The corresponding connection data will be made available to all registered participants shortly beforehand. Participation in presence may be possible, but please note that the number of places is limited to ensure the required COVID-19 security measures. If you would like to participate on-site, please also send an e-mail.

If you would like to attend only individual presentations and/or panels, please indicate this when registering.

Workshop Dates: 27–29 October

27 October | 2.00 p.m.–7.00 p.m. (CET)
28 October | 10.00 a.m.–7.00 p.m. (CET)
29 October | 10.00 a.m.–1.30 p.m. (CET)

Leipzig University, Seminar Building, Universitätsstraße 1, 04107 Leipzig AND Online via zoom

Workshop Programme

KFG-Workshop II “Religion as an Object of Historical and Social Scientific Study: Global Perspectives”, 3–5 November

One week later, our Associate Member Florian Zemmin invites to his workshop on “Religion as an Object of Historical and Social Scientific Study: Global Perspectives”. 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. Special interest lies on 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).

Again, this workshop takes place as a hybrid event and registration for virtual participation is possible via e-mail. The corresponding connection data will be made available to all registered participants shortly beforehand. Participation in presence is limited to a certain number of people due to the COVID-19 security measures. If you are interested in participating on-site, please contact us.

Workshop Dates: 3–5 November

3 November | 11.30 a.m.–7.00 p.m. (CET)
4 November | 12.00 a.m.–7.00 p.m. (CET)
5 November | 10.00 a.m.–7.00 p.m. (CET)

Leipzig University, Strohsack, Nikolaistraße 8–10, 04109 Leipzig AND Online via zoom

Workshop Programme

New Publication I: Jens Köhrsen on “A field perspective on sustainability transitions: The case of religious organizations”

The latest publication by our Senior Research Fellow Jens Köhrsen and his co-author Fabian Huber provides us with “A field perspective on sustainability transitions: The case of religious organizations”.

This article proposes the field perspective as an approach to explain organizational activities in sustainability transitions. It applies this framework to analyze environmental activities of religious organizations in Germany and Switzerland. Religious organizations can become important actors in transitions by drawing on their extensive membership, material resources, and public visibility. However, to date, research is dearth about the conditions that facilitate transition activities of religious organizations. The empirical insights of this study show differences in the activities (a) between religious incumbents and challengers and (b) between the supra-local and local scale.

Koehrsen, Jens, and Fabian Huber. “A Field Perspective on Sustainability Transitions: The Case of Religious Organizations.” Environmental Innovation and Societal Transitions 40, no. 3 (2021): 408–20.

Read Full Article

New Publication II: Julia Heilen on „Entwicklung strafrechtlicher Normen im Sultanat und Königreich Marokko am Beispiel von Sexual- und Sittlichkeitsdelikten” (“Development of criminal law norms in the Sultanate and Kingdom of Morocco using the example of sexual and moral offences”)

Congratulations to our Senior Research Fellow Julia Heilen on the publication of her dissertation! The German monograph, entitled „Entwicklung strafrechtlicher Normen im Sultanat und Königreich Marokko am Beispiel von Sexual- und Sittlichkeitsdelikten” (“Development of criminal law norms in the Sultanate and Kingdom of Morocco using the example of sexual and moral offences”) examines the development of criminal law norms on sexual and moral offenses in the sultanate or later kingdom of Morocco. Structural as well as terminological continuities and breaks are worked out by the author for the period before 1912, during the dependence on the French protectorate rule (1912-1956) and since independence was regained in 1956 up to the present day.

Heilen, Julia. Entwicklung strafrechtlicher Normen im Sultanat und Königreich Marokko am Beispiel von Sexual- und Sittlichkeitsdelikten. Leipzig Middle East Studies 4. Berlin: Frank & Timme, 2021.

New Publication III: Peter Kneitz on “A Magic Momentum: Negotiating Authority in the Bongolava Region, Madagascar”

Our Senior Research Fellow Peter Kneitz has just published an article on “A Magic Momentum: Negotiating Authority in the Bongolava Region, Madagascar”. His ethnographic case study focuses on the recent establishment of two vigilante groups in the Bongolava region of middle-western Madagascar, the so-called Zazamainty and Lambamena, whose work is based, among others, on a magic worldview and a locally well-known cultural code related to the precolonial past. The inactivity of the state sets the precondition for such magic momentum, as villagers are taking recourse on ideas and practices based on what is presented as ‘traditional authority,’ the only and last refuge they have. Villagers, by consequence, appear to navigate between two parallel, partly concurrently and overlapping registers of authority and legitimacy: State authority, and the connected global normativity of the legal state, of democracy, of peacemaking, or civil society on the one side, and local expressions of authority on the other.

Kneitz, Peter. “A Magic Momentum. Negotiating Authority in the Bongolava Region, Madagascar.” In Challenging Authorities: Ethnographies of Legitimacy and Power in Eastern and Southern Africa. Edited by Arne S. Steinforth and Sabine Klocke-Daffa, 319–45. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2021.

More KFG Publications

Book Launch “The Secret Police and the Religious Underground in Communist and Post-Communist Eastern Europe” by James Kapaló and Kinga Povedák, 21 October

We would like to mention the launch of the book “The Secret Police and the Religious Underground in Communist and Post-Communist Eastern Europe” by James Kapaló and Kinga Povedák, organised by the School of Society, Politics and Ethics at University College Cork. This book is one of the key outputs of the Hidden Galleries ERC project that was hosted in the Study of Religions Department at UCC from 2016-2021 and addresses the complex intersection of secret police operations and the formation of the religious underground in communist-era Eastern Europe. It discusses how religious groups were perceived as dangerous to the totalitarian state whilst also being extremely vulnerable and yet at the same time very resourceful. It explores how this particular dynamic created the concept of the "religious underground" and produced an extremely rich secret police archival record. You are welcome to join the launch. If you want to share or post the link or if you have any questions, please send an e-mail.

21 October | 5–6 p.m. (CET)

Online via Microsoft Teams

Join the Meeting

DOK Leipzig 2021: International Leipzig Festival for Documentary and Animated Film, 25–31 October

DOK Leipzig looks forward to welcoming you back! Whether you will visit the cinema in Leipzig or join the event online, you will take part in an intense and inspiring festival week and celebrate the film community. This year, the films at DOK Leipzig once again represent a wide variety of cinematic approaches, in terms of both their themes and their formal criteria. The film-makers’ works document current political crises, seek out historical vestiges and sketch introspective portraits.

DOK Leipzig is the largest German and second largest European festival for artistic documentary film. It is also the oldest documentary film festival in the world. In its tradition, DOK Leipzig stands for films that stand up for peace and human dignity. The festival celebrates the free spirit, the free word and the consciously placed image.

During the festival week, there will be shown 170 films in cinemas throughout Leipzig. In addition, from 1–14 November, the festival will present more than 70 documentary and animated films as Video on Demand.

Festival Website

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.

Kolleg-Forschungsgruppe "Multiple Secularities - Beyond the West, Beyond Modernities"
Nikolaistraße 8-10, 04109 Leipzig
Mail: multiple-secularities@uni-leipzig.de

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