Sabine Gabriel presents a workshop paper on "The meaning of the body in an individual and societal perspective. An ethnographic and biographical study of professional dancers"

This PhD project aims to make a subject-founded contribution of a theoretical model, as on one hand body can become methodologically and methodically coherent to the object of the research to convey, on the other hand, empirically based knowledge of the body by biographical and temporal processes respectively gradients with respect to the subjective experience of physicality and the attitude to the body to be examined. The additional implementation of a participatory observation is to support the empirical data corpus.
The formulated interest affects fundamentally questions of becoming a person. The person of the sample already work very early intensively and highly focused with their bodies and the included material references. The survey and evaluation methods are selected and modified in a way which physical and material-related processes of confrontation and incorporation can emerge on the basis of the collected data material and then can be reconstructed with the methodological means of evaluation methods. In consideration of the epistemological interest biographical-narrative interviews (see Schütze 1983, 1987) were conducted with ballet dancers (so that implicit references are to be expected). These were analyzed in a technically and methodologically procedural suggestions based on the Soziolinguistischen Prozessanalyse (socio-linguistic process analysis) by Fritz Schütze. This modification has effects on the concrete methodical procedure during the evaluation. In doing so, the biographical data material shows traces of social fields. The participant observation is limited by time, and access to the social field is made to capture person, and therefore bodies, supportively within social practices. This data collection method plays in terms of a flexible and contextual research strategy (see Lüders 2012) an exploratory, complementary role, which is recorded in writing through structured protocols of observation and description in connection (see Przyborski/Wohlrab-Sahr 2014). The data, which is generated from opposite perspectives, is against the backdrop of contrasting case comparison of Glaser and Strauss (1967: 51-83; cf. Schütze 1983: 286f) examined and triangulated.
The following leading research questions are currently assumed: What are the forms of interaction between dancer and body? Which patterns of acting and attitudes in handling and in terms of orientation on the body can be noted? What are the basic process variants of handling the narrators with their bodies show up on the basis of data material? Which somatic and social conditions and process mechanisms, which can be analyzed in the course of their respective biographies, are found? Furthermore, the question is relevant, what processes of learning and education are constitutive for a somatic level, such as the learning of movements and the usage and transformation of attitudes towards the body. In short, which process courses and process structures arise if a person with focus on the body and the bodies of the other are put in the center of the analysis? Furthermore attention is placed on the becoming and being of sexual and gendered bodies in the ballet world and their related acting with the "spare time body" or "private body". The aim is to provide a generalizable scheme of theoretical explanation.

Riccarda Suitner presents a workshop paper on "The Powerlessness of the Devil: Scientific Knowledge and Demonology in Clemente Baroni Cavalcabò (1726-1796)"

This time I would like to submit to the participants in my Kolloquium something different from my usual papers on Antitrinitarianism. This is a text I have written for a collective volume on "profanation" in the early modern period, for which I would be very grateful to receive comments/suggestions for improvements. The Italian Enlightenment thinker Clemente Baroni Cavalcabò is an unknown figure. He is the author of a treatise, which tries to demonstrate, using scientific, philosophical, and exegetical arguments, the powerlessness of the devil, interpreting, in particular, German sources in an original way. This attempt was not anachronistic at all at the time, as in the mid- 18th century many European regions – especially southern Germany and northern Italy - were still theaters of public executions of witches.

Bernd-Christian Otto presents a workshop paper on "Magical manuscripts in the German Book Trade (c. 1700)"

On 26 April 2016 Bernd-Christian Otto is presenting his paper in the MWK, Erfurt.

This is not a finalized article, but rather a ‘Werkstattbericht’, or even a ‘Steinbruch’ of a project I am currently working on together with a colleague (Daniel Bellingradt, Jun. Prof. for book history at the university of Erlangen-Nuremburg). It is an attempt to provide a historical contextualization as well as an in-depth content analysis of a collection of 142 manuscripts of ‘learned magic’ that have been copied/translated/compiled some time between the late 17th and early 18th centuries. The collection is today hosted at the university library of Leipzig (Cod. mag. 1-142), and has so far avoided scholarly attention (only one of the 142 manuscripts has recently been edited). We believe that this is likely the largest corpus of manuscripts of ‘learned magic’ in eighteenth century German speaking Europe, and moreover the earliest collection of German translations of such texts (113 codices of the collection comprise German texts, the remaining texts are written in Latin or Italian). The article will be submitted to the Journal Book History later this year (deadline is 31 August), together with two appendices: an edition of a selling catalogue that dates to the year 1710 (Appendix A: at that time, the collection included 140 manuscripts; there is a minor discrepancy of 9 manuscripts between the 1710 and the contemporary collection), and a content analysis of the surviving manuscripts hosted in the university library of Leipzig (Appendix B). These two appendices are provided for the colloquium, but note that the edition of the selling catalogue (Appendix A) is currently in German (it remains to be translated into English), and that the content analysis (Appendix B) only covers some 25 manuscripts (of 142) so far. Apologies, also, for inconsistent or incomplete citations and footnotes – these will be re-worked before submission. For the colloquium I would be most interested in remarks concerning the general structure of the article. We struggled with assembling the different angles and narrative sections in a logical, coherent, or at least systematic order. The current analytical framework of three sections entitled ‘uniqueness’, ‘scarcity’, and ‘illegality’ is disputed. Do other possibilities of arranging the material come to your mind?

Hannah Peaceman presents a working paper on Jewish political philosophy in the German-speaking Diaspora

The project aims to tackle the universality, secularity and practice of Jewish Political Philosophy in the 19th century and until the Shoah. Reference-points are Jewish-German perspectives that were involved in political debates until the Shoah. They have not been systematically accounted for since then from a philosophical perspective. The aim is to reflect their potential as critical perspectives on society that can evoke its transformation towards a pluralistic living together with reference to Jewish concepts like Tikkun Olam which means to "improve the world". The aim is to develop systematic and normative grounds for Jewish political philosophy that can be universalized and secularized.

Petra Gümplová presents a paper on 'Sovereignty, Human Rights, and Rights to Natural Resources'

This paper is a part of a larger project which aims at providing criteria for a critical appraisal of the international system of sovereign rights to natural resources and at elaboration of a conception which emphasizes limits on states’ rights to natural resources.
'In the paper 'Sovereignty, Human Rights, and Rights to Natural Resources' I explore the historical affinity between international law of human rights and rights of states to natural resources and the aim of both systems to realize the international justice. The paper assumes a practice-based approach to human rights and argues that the chief purpose of human rights is to provide a universal standard for regulating the behavior of states, to limit their sovereignty for the sake of promoting welfare and protecting equal moral status of individuals. The key point of the paper is then to show that due to the historical co-originality and due to the transformative impact human rights have had on state sovereignty, international human rights law has direct implication for how we should interpret the scope of states' rights to natural resources – regarding the scope of resource rights and the conditions of their rightful exercise by states as well as the model of the international system of natural resource governance.'

Jana Ilnicka on 'Prosper de Regio Emilia and Eckhart's Parisian Question on Relation'

For the opening of term, Jana Ilnicka who is part of the AHRC research project team of King's College and the MWK on 'Meister Eckhart and the early 14th century Parisian University', has presented her working paper on 'Prosper de Regio Emilia and Eckhart's Parisian Question on Relation'. Here the abstract of the paper:
Prosper of Regio Emilia is the author of the manuscript that has been preserved in Vat. Lat. 1086 with which has prepared himself for his magister test at Paris University in 1315. In this test he concentrated on the topic of 'relation', but in order to prepare himself, he created a huge portfolio of over 500 Questions, given by masters and students in the years around 1311. Out of all those questions, however, only two by Meister Eckhart (and one other by an unknown magister) deal with Prosper's own main topic of 'relation' . In his conclusions, which are based on the arguments of Meister Eckhart, Prosper shows not only amazing parallels to Eckhart's Questions, but they also show that the position of Eckhart on this subject was known and adopted as a benchmark at Paris University at this time. There still remain some problems of interpretation that might be addressed in future discussions, but the importance that Eckhart has for Prosper is illuminating.
 

Initial program – Call for short papers: "Lived Religion in Metropoleis: A comparative view", 21.-23.6.2016

21 (noon)-23 June (evening) 2016, Erfurt, Germany (Augustinerkloster).

The Lived Religion approach to ancient religion, as developed at the Max Weber Center has highlighted the importance of local spatial and social contexts, of materiality and communication as much as of social imaginaries and knowledge. One of these most important contexts is the urban, and this in two senses. First, the urban can be seen as the product of a specific economic development in the aftermath of the Neolithic revolution, embedded in cultural schemes of interpretation and Lived Religion. Secondly the urban is also a specific constellation of materiality and communication that finds its expression most of all in the emergence of public spaces. This constellation is of key importance for the specific reproduction of cultural schemes interpretation and Lived Religion. So far, we have concentrated on domestic, secondary groupings’ and public space. The collaboration with the new Center for Urban Network Evolutions at Aarhus University and specialists in social geography allows to add a further field, urban space, and to explore the mutual constitution of religious and urban space in both directions. As a starting point, this raises the question of religion in the city and in particular in ancient metropoleis of more than 100,000 inhabitants, characterized by a density of exchange and speed of interaction, a plurality of religious practices and religious groups, by a violence of critique and boundary drawing, by economic opportunities and medical dangers unknown to rural spaces. The degree of reading competences and the presence of texts in public spaces were certainly elevated there as well. At the same time, the sheer size would have offered the possibility of segmentation, of hiding or simply refraining from claiming public space. Spatial distance might have lowered frequency of specific religious interactions and hence degrees of institutionalisation, the diversity of public spaces could have ensured a large number of shared practices and reduced the salience of discrepant religious identities. Of course, these metropoleis were intensively connected to the larger world, by economic, cultural and religious exchange, by traders and immigrants, by exploitation of distant areas or patronage. These metropoleis were present as imaginaries and penetrated as places of attraction even into the most distant places and they grew imaginaries of rural life and solitude at the same time. Once urbanity had gained foothold there was nowhere which was not somehow effected by having “become urban”, being somehow in touch with or affected by the “urban”. How did these facts translate into religious agency, communication and identities within the mega-cities? Certainly, many of the large urban formations were a result of the formation of empires, but within the framework of “lived religion”, the conference is not interested in empire but in scale as a factor for history of religion. From a history of religion point of view, the very few ancient mega-cities – Rome above all, but also Alexandria, Antioch and Byzantium – also appear as places of important changes, of innovation and conflict, of intensified literary production, of mutual influence, imitation, and frequent, if not aggressive distinction, boundary drawing and processes of marginalisation. The role of Hellenistic and imperial Alexandria for Judaism and Late Antiquity’s Christianities is a case in point, the role of Rome for the proliferation of diverse symbols (emperor, “Egyptian gods”, bull-sacrifice) and theological and Christ-related texts another. What would ancient religion had looked like without the specific contribution of these centres to the shaping of religion and religious traditions? Are we able to specify such factors? To narrate religious change in a way that pays sufficient attention to it and might we be able to pin it down? Given the growing percentage of urban population, already forming the majority, in today’s world, and the role of mega-cities in contemporary life, has become a thriving field of research. However, even here the role of religion in such environments is under-researched. Thus, looking onto ancient metropoleis might also contribute to a pressing field of research that so far has been dominated by a concentration on public spaces and dissolution of tradition social forms of bondage and their consequences to religion. This invites to attempt a comparative approach focusing on the interaction of scale and lived religion. This demands to employ comparison (with smaller cities or rural conditions) and larger diachronic views (assessing rates and the importance of changes). It is also inviting studies focusing on the interaction of different media, groups, and imaginaries in a metropolitan environment. We are inviting young and senior scholars to join the discussion and to contribute short papers on the mutual constitution or the interaction of urban and religious developments past and present as outlined above (15 minutes).

Please, send a substantial abstract, including two or three bibliograpical references, until 11 March 2016 to emiliano.urcioli@uni-erfurt.de

 

We offer free accommodation to accepted speakers and can offer travel subsidies on a limited scale.

 

Invited speakers:

Nicole Belayche, Paris: "Mithraism in a megalopolis' context (Rome and Ostia)? An impact? Which impact?"

Esther Eidinow, Nottingham/Erfurt: Scaling Up: Networks, Narratives and Religion

Paul Lichterman, Los Angeles: Style and inter-religious spaces

Lisa J. Lucero, Urbana-Champaign: Low density Maya urbanism

Teresa Morgan, Oxford: Rome, Alexandria and Antioch and key developments in early Christianity

Rubina Raja, Aarhus: Networks in Metropoleis in the Eastern Mediterranean

Jörg Rüpke, Erfurt: Metropoleis and religion: An uneasy companionship

Michael Stausberg, Bergen/Erfurt: What is urban religion?

Anna Sun, Gabier/Ohio: The Social Life of Prayer in Contemporary Shanghai

Miguel John Versluys, Leiden: Unpacking the cosmopolitan node: Alexandria, Alexandrianism and religious innovation

Markus Vinzent, London/Erfurt: Jewish-Christian uprootings at Rome

Annette Weissenrieder, Berkeley: Alexandria

Benno Werlen, Jena: Schemes of Interpretation and the Constitution of Urbanity: Lived Religion and Metropoleis in comparative perspective

Greg Woolf, London: Scale and structure: Religious action in metropoleis of the Roman Empire

 

 

Rubina Raja, Center for Urban Network Evolutions Aarhus University

Jörg Rüpke, Lived Ancient Religion – Ordering Dynamics Max Weber Center Erfurt

Benno Werlen, International Year of Global Understanding

Universität Jena

 

http://www.uni-erfurt.de/index.php?id=21031&L=1

https://www.uni-erfurt.de/index.php?id=33963&L=1

http://urbnet.au.dk/ http://www.global-understanding.info/

 

The conference is financed by an ERC grant from the European Communion „Lived Ancient Religion“.