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Dear friends and colleagues,

This week, we open our Wednesday Weekly with three KFG events: At first we want to give you all the information about next week's colloquium. Also, next week we will be showing the next film in our series Screening Religion. And last but not least our second workshop on “Differentiation Theory and the Sociology of Religion and Secularity” will take place in June and today we are happy to present our workshop programme.

In addition, we have some important information about the elections currently taking place at the University of Leipzig. And finally, we have a recommendation for an online conference for you.

Enjoy and have a good week!

Anja & Lucy

Next week’s Colloquium: Markus Dreßler, Aydın Özipek and Tuğçe Özdemir on “Piety and Secularity Contested: Family and Youth Politics in post-Kemalist ‘New Turkey’”

In next week's colloquium, our associated project “Piety and Secularity Contested: Family and Youth Politics in post-Kemalist ‘New Turkey’” will introduce itself to the KFG community. The project team Markus Dreßler, Aydın Özipek and Tuğçe Özdemir will present the project's aims, its intersections with the research questions of the Multiple Secularities Project, methodological issues, and the working plan of the subprojects on youth and family, respectively.

In the member area, you find an outline of the research project as well as some additional reading. The colloquium will take place as online event. Please note that attendance in person is not possible right now.

12 May | 9:15–11:45 a.m. (CET)

Online via zoom

KFG Workshop Part II on “Differentiation Theory and the Sociology of Religion and Secularity”, 3–4 June

We are very much looking forward to our second workshop on “Differentiation Theory and the Sociology of Religion and Secularity” focusing on “Boundaries of Religion: Demarcations and Negotiations” on 3–4 June.

Again, our directors Christoph Kleine and Monika Wohlrab-Sahr together with Daniel Witte from the University of Bonn, have invited scholars to discuss the usability of differentiation theory for research on secularity. This time the workshop 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.

The workshop will take place online via zoom. The corresponding connection data will be made available to all registered participants shortly beforehand. If you are interested in attending, please register via e-mail by 31 May.

Date: 3 June, 9:00 a.m.–6:00 p.m. | 4 June, 9:00 a.m.–4:00 p.m. (CET)

Online via zoom

Screening Religion: “Lourdes”

We are happy to present the next film in our Screening Religion series as online livestream in cooperation with Cinémathèque Leipzig: On 12 May we invite you to watch the film “Lourdes”, directed by Jessica Hausner. The film portrays Christine, who suffers from multiple sclerosis and for whom the doctors see no chance of a cure. Hoping for relief, she travels to the Catholic place of pilgrimage Lourdes.

The film will be followed by a discussion with scholar of religion Bernadett Bigalke, and will be shown in German and French (with German subtitles only). Registration will not be necessary.

12 May | 7:00 p.m. (CET)

Online via Livestream

Leipzig University Elections 2021

From 4 May until 11 May, University elections take place at Leipzig University for the Senate, the Extended Senate, faculty councils, Commissioners for Equal Opportunities and their deputies. All students and employees of the university are entitled to vote. The approved nominations for these elections can be found on the University’s intranet. Voting will take place using the POLYAS online voting system which lets you fill out and submit your ballots online.

All eligible voters received their voter ID and password for the online election via e-mail. We would like to encourage you to vote in the elections and thereby help to shape the democratic decision-making processes at the university.

Online Conference on “Religion, Materialism and Ecology”

We would like to draw your attention to the online conference on “Religion, Materialism and Ecology”, organised by the European Forum for the Study of Religion and the Environment, in conjunction with the Lincoln Theological Institute at the University of Manchester. The conference will explore new developments in materialism, including how materialist issues impinge upon religious traditions and the extent to which religions are already materialist and so have a creative contribution to make to debates about ecological materialisms.

Registration deadline: 12 May

Date: 14–15 May

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.