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Dear friends and colleagues,

We are happy to announce that our research fellow Farhat Hasan will present his research project next week in the Colloquium. We would also like to draw your attention to new KFG publications and a new bulletin entry, as well as a workshop where our fellow Gökçen Beyinli will be contributing.

Enjoy and have a good week!

Your KFG Team

Next week’s Colloquium: Farhat Hasan on “Dialogic Spaces, Reforms and Secularities in Early Modern South Asia”, 12 July

Next Wednesday, our Senior Research Fellow Farhat Hasan will give a presentation on his research project “Dialogic Spaces, Reforms and Secularities in Early Modern South Asia” at our colloquium.

The colloquium will take place in a hybrid format (on-site and online). In the Member Area you will find more information including preparatory readings and the zoom connection data.

12 July | 9.15–11.45 am (CEST)

Strohsack, Room 3.25 and online via zoom

Please note that our colloquium will be held on the third floor and not as usual in room 4.55!

New Bulletin Entry: “Essay Series: The Premodern World and the Secular”

Rushain Abbasi from Stanford University has hosted an online Symposium on "The Premodern World and the Secular" for the Political Theology Network this spring. The series features contributions from our director Christoph Kleine and Senior Research Fellows Sita Steckel and Neguin Yavari.

New KFG Publications

Besides the three essays in the context of Rushain Abbasis online Symposium on the Political Theology Network that we have already mentioned, our recent Senior Research Fellow Klaus Buchenau has published findings of his fellowship project.

Klaus Buchenau: “Eine russisch-islamische Synthese? Interaktionsmuster zwischen Christen, Muslimen und Staat im Wolgaraum vom Mittelalter bis in die Gegenwart“ (A Russian-Islamic Synthesis? Patterns of Interaction between Christians, Muslims and the State in the Volga Region from the Middle Ages to the Present Day)

Russia's war against Ukraine is indeed "underpinned" by spiritual motivations from the leadership of the Russian Orthodox Church; however, other faith communities in the country are also behind the war, significantly including the Islamic one. This study by our Senior Research Fellow Klaus Buchenau argues that while the current Orthodox-Islamic alliance has deep roots in Russian history, it by no means necessarily arises from historical experience.

Buchenau, Klaus. “Eine russisch-islamische Synthese? Interaktionsmuster zwischen Christen, Muslimen und Staat im Wolgaraum vom Mittelalter bis in die Gegenwart.” IOS Mitteilungen 70. Leibniz Institut für Ost- und Südosteuropaforschung, 2023.

Workshop: “The Supernatural, Healing and Mental Health in Contemporary Middle East”, 7-8 July, Otto-Friedrich-Universität Bamberg

From 7–8 July, a workshop on "The Supernatural, Healing and Mental Health in Contemporary Middle East" will take place at the Otto-Friedrich-University Bamberg. The aim of the workshop will be to examine the ways by which notions of communication  between the human and the Supernatural spheres and related healing/divinatory practices form an integral part of lived religion and religio-ritual life in today’s Middle East.

On Friday, our Senior Research Fellow Gökçen Beyinli will contribute to the program with her presentation "Interviews with the Saint Eyüp Sultan: A Female Psychic Medium Challenges Disenchantment, Superstition and the State in Turkish Modernity".

If you are interested in attending, please contact the organizer Eszter Spät (spateszter@yahoo.com) to obtain Zoom access, if applicable.

Date: 7–8 July
Venue: University of Bamberg, Schillerplatz 17, Room 00.13 | Online via ZOOM

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.