This paper is the attempt of an approach towards my empirical material consisting of interviews with meditation practitioners. One case is used to exemplarily show how to carve out the self and world relations and their connection to the meditation practice. At the end the results will be connected with the resonance theory. Therefore this paper could be read as a naive and preliminary attempt to reconstruct the case in regards to the resonance theory.
Showing posts with label World relations. Show all posts
Showing posts with label World relations. Show all posts
Monday, 2 July 2018
Wednesday, 8 March 2017
New International Graduate School of the Max-Weber-Center jointly with the University of Graz, Austria
The Max-Weber-Kolleg working together with the University of Graz have set up a joint international graduate school on resonant world relations in socio-religious practices of antiquity and the present.
What do ancient rituals such as the placing of marble noses in front of god images or common banquets with the deceased have in common with today's practices such as the setting up of teddy bears for young victims of an amok run or weddings of atheistic couples in cosy chapels of Saint Mary? - They represent socio-religious practices that define, express the important relationships of people to their worlds - that is, to other people, to things, to nature, to their own selves, to heaven or to gods or god. The nature of world relations tells a lot about the culture that characterizes them. It can, on the one hand, provide information about our cultural heritage, as well as on the other hand, about our own practices in order to create resonant - ie, responding - relationships with the world.
The question of world relations in antiquity and the present is raised in the context of a joint international graduate school, which the Karl-Franzens-University in Graz with the Max-Weber-Center for Advanced Cultural and Social Sciences at the University of Erfurt has taken. The school is planned to train young scholars in a joint research and study program in interdisciplinary projects that bring together scholarship of antiquity and late antiquity on the one hand and cultural and social sciences with a focus on the present on the other. From this interdisciplinary collaboration, particularly innovative results are expected for both fields of research. A special focus is placed on concrete socio-religious practices as objects of investigation, ie the sometimes peculiar rituals yesterday and today. Through this approach, the all too easy-going view of foreignness as the outflow of a polytheistic world image can be avoided and the foreign culture can be taken seriously in its peculiarity.
One of the specifics of this two-country-school will be that PhD students will enjoy a temporary stay in the partner country and, from the start, will be supervised by two supervisors, one from Austria and one from Germany - moreover, the students from both countries will form a community where exchange of knowledge and social cross-country relations are fostered.
After the German Research Foundation (DFG) endorsed the promotion of the joint international graduate school at the end of autumn of 2016, the Science Fund of Austria (FWF) has now also agreed to the funding of the new graduate school. 'We are looking forward to working together and would like to see many international applicants to the soon-to-be-advertised doctoral bursaries', says Jörg Rüpke, spokesman for the Graduate School at Erfurt.
What do ancient rituals such as the placing of marble noses in front of god images or common banquets with the deceased have in common with today's practices such as the setting up of teddy bears for young victims of an amok run or weddings of atheistic couples in cosy chapels of Saint Mary? - They represent socio-religious practices that define, express the important relationships of people to their worlds - that is, to other people, to things, to nature, to their own selves, to heaven or to gods or god. The nature of world relations tells a lot about the culture that characterizes them. It can, on the one hand, provide information about our cultural heritage, as well as on the other hand, about our own practices in order to create resonant - ie, responding - relationships with the world.
The question of world relations in antiquity and the present is raised in the context of a joint international graduate school, which the Karl-Franzens-University in Graz with the Max-Weber-Center for Advanced Cultural and Social Sciences at the University of Erfurt has taken. The school is planned to train young scholars in a joint research and study program in interdisciplinary projects that bring together scholarship of antiquity and late antiquity on the one hand and cultural and social sciences with a focus on the present on the other. From this interdisciplinary collaboration, particularly innovative results are expected for both fields of research. A special focus is placed on concrete socio-religious practices as objects of investigation, ie the sometimes peculiar rituals yesterday and today. Through this approach, the all too easy-going view of foreignness as the outflow of a polytheistic world image can be avoided and the foreign culture can be taken seriously in its peculiarity.
One of the specifics of this two-country-school will be that PhD students will enjoy a temporary stay in the partner country and, from the start, will be supervised by two supervisors, one from Austria and one from Germany - moreover, the students from both countries will form a community where exchange of knowledge and social cross-country relations are fostered.
After the German Research Foundation (DFG) endorsed the promotion of the joint international graduate school at the end of autumn of 2016, the Science Fund of Austria (FWF) has now also agreed to the funding of the new graduate school. 'We are looking forward to working together and would like to see many international applicants to the soon-to-be-advertised doctoral bursaries', says Jörg Rüpke, spokesman for the Graduate School at Erfurt.
Friday, 2 December 2016
Central German Universities are launching a joint research Forum
The Universities of Leipzig, Halle-Wittenberg, Jena and Erfurt set up a
joint research forum in the humanities and social sciences on 1 December 2016.
The forum, entitled "Forum for the Study of
the Global Condition", brings together scholars from numerous
disciplines, studying the global entanglement of contemporary societies and
their historical roots. In addition to the four universities, involved are the
Leibniz Institute for Leipzig, the Max Planck Institute for Ethnology, the
Simon Dubnow Institute for Jewish History and Culture Leipzig, and the Center
for the History and
Culture of Eastern Central Europe at the University of Leipzig (which
will become part of the Leibniz Gesellschaft on 1 January 2017).
The initiative is based on the idea that the Central German
Universities, together with the institutes of the Max Planck Society and the
Leibniz Gesellschaft, have an excellent expertise in the analysis of global
processes, with their professionalism and experience in collaborative research.
Existing
collaborative and individual projects are to be linked with each other
and supplemented by appropriate forms of doctoral qualification and
research-oriented teaching.
In terms of content, it is about the paradox that more and more people
are involved in and affected by global interdependencies, but that they are
skeptical about a globalized future for various reasons. The Forum does not
study "globalization", but explores how different actors deal with
transnational migration, exchange of goods, financial flows and the transfer of
ideas, and thus create "the global" at all.
"Through an interdisciplinary combination of our competencies in
the new Forum, we will be able to form a competitive center, whose research is
attracting international attention and is thus highly attractive to excellent
young scholars and master students," says Prof. Dr. Beate Schücking,
Rector of the University of Leipzig. "In Central Germany, we are
constantly showing how good inter-institutional cooperation can be achieved.
The institutionalised cooperation between Halle, Jena and Leipzig has now been
in existence for more than 20 years, special research areas such as those of
the
nomadic societies have made the best use of this foundation and the
relatively young German Center for Integrative Biodiversity Research is
developing into an internationally visible lighthouse. The study of global
processes is now building on this."
More important collaborative projects have been approved in the recent
past, such as the Leibniz Science Campaign "Eastern Europe - Global
Area" between Leipzig, Halle and Jena, and the special research area
"Spatialization Processes under Globalization Conditions" (University
of Leipzig, Leibniz Institute for Ethnology, History and Culture of East
Central Europe). The new research Forum also links thematically to topics and
projects of the "International Year of Global Understanding", which
has its origin at the University of Jena and focuses on questions of
sustainability and the understanding of global contexts.
"The research Forum will be an expression of cooperation between
university and non-university research centers in Central Germany,"
emphasized Prof. Dr. Walter Rosenthal, President of the Friedrich Schiller
University of Jena (FSU). Bringing together excellent human and social sciences
expertise is an important step "to promote interdisciplinary research in
these fields", so Rosenthal.
In terms of content, the University of Jena inter alia focuses on
literature, history, and sociology. The existing research and graduate colleges
as well as the collegiate research groups represent an excellent starting point
for the successful cooperation. The President of the FSU also emphasizes that
the promotion of young scholars is a particular concern of the new Forum. Thus,
by means of a joint program of excellence, the proportion of international
graduate students in Central Germany would be significantly increased.
"Halle contributes its expertise primarily to questions of law and
the possible implementation of national legal systems in the context of
international norms," says Prof. Dr. Udo Sträter, Rector
of the Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg. The University of
Halle and Jena, among others, are part of the University's interdisciplinary
research center "Society and Culture in Motion" as well as the
Aleksander Brückner Center for Polish Studies. Another important partner is the
Max Planck
Institute for Anthropological Research in Halle.
At the University of Erfurt, the sociological and historical research at
the Max Weber Center for Advanced Cultural and Social Studies concentrates on
the changing world-relations of individuals and entire societies, which are
increasingly challenging in the face of growing uncertainty about the result of
the many overlapping global interdependencies. Professor Walter Bauer-Wabnegg,
President of the University of Erfurt, said: "The comparative analysis of
world relations in the field of culture, in particular, also includes
historical aspects well before the 19th century and our time."
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