Jörg Rüpke is going to present a working paper on 'Beyond Urban religion'

If ‘urban religion’ can serve as a lens onto the historical entanglement of cities or even more loosely ‘urban settlements’, it is the spatial character of religion that needs to be understood and theoretically modelled. In the history of research, ‘sacred places’ have played a prominent role as loci of epiphanic character, above all in phenomenological approaches to religion, but also in studies of roles of sacred centres or pilgrimage. In many other perspectives, the temporal aspects of religion (routine, crisis rituals and rites de passage, conversion, calendar) have been foregrounded, place has been reduced to a mere setting. This paper attempts at reconstructing religious action as a spatial practice that is sensitive to and creative of the character of settlements. On that basis it tries to develop a grid of analytical perspectives for the interaction with urban space.

A workshop takes place at the Max Weber Kolleg on 'Sounds of Protest and Resonance'

Workshop: Sounds of Protest and Resonance
November 13, 2018, Max-Weber-Kolleg, Erfurt

 Next, Tuesday, November 13, a workshop takes place at the Max-Weber-Kolleg in the framework of the International Graduate School on "Sounds of Protest and Resonance". Fouad G. Marei and Stefan Donath present their ongoing research on rituals and the emotive effect of sounds in protest and conflict contexts in two guest lectures. Participants are welcome.

 
Workshop: Sounds of Protest and Resonance
November 13, 2018, Max-Weber-Kolleg, Erfurt

 PROGRAMME
14.15–14.30 | Andreas Pettenkofer (Max-Weber-Kolleg)
Introduction
14.30–15.15 | Stefan Donath (Freie Universität Berlin,
Research Centre “Interweaving Performance Cultures”)
Choruses of Protest: Towards a New Aesthetics of Resistance
15.15–15.25 | Marcus Döller (Max-Weber-Kolleg)
Comment to the paper
15.25–16.00 | Chair: Juhi Tyagi (Max-Weber-Kolleg)
Discussion
16.30–17.15 | Fouad Marei (Max-Weber-Kolleg)
Feeling Sectarian? Shi’i Ritual Practice, Affective Relations,
and Holy War in the Middle East
17.15–17.25 | Anita Neudorfer (Karl-Franzens-Universität Graz)
Comment to the paper
17.25–18.00 | Chair: Andreas Pettenkofer
Discussion

 For more infomation:

https://www.uni-erfurt.de/fileadmin/public-docs/Max-Weber-Kolleg/6_PDFs/Tagungen/2018/Aushang_Workshop_Sounds_of_Protest_and_Resonance_2018.pdf

Gábor Gángó presents a working paper on 'The Election Campaign of the Count Palatine Philipp Wilhelm von Neuburg for the Crown of Poland and the Genesis of Leibniz’s Specimen Polonorum'

This study is a chapter from my planned book on Leibniz on the Polish royal election in 1669. On the basis of extended research in the family archives of the German candidate for the Crown of Poland, I reconstruct the wider diplomatic context of Leibniz’s early political treatise. The surviving testimonies of the writing process not only enable us to define the time of the genesis of the treatise with more precision than it was before but they also challenge our belief on Leibniz’s exclusive authorship by testifying a close collaboration between the young Leibniz and his mentor and friend, the Baron Johann Christian von Boineburg.

Bettina Hollstein gives a working paper on 'Why do we criticize corruption and under which circumstances does criticism help?'

Corruption research often inquires into the motivations of corrupt actors and into the circumstances and institutional settings that promote corruption in order to find out how we can prevent corruption.

In my contribution, I want to reverse the perspective and to analyze what motivates the critique of corruption and what the circumstances and institutional settings are that help to make critique of corruption effective. I start with the assumption that the critique of social phenomena which are embedded in a society for a long time, and normalized by habitualization, is quite improbable. Therefore, I look at the elements and actors which are relevant to raising the awareness of corrupt practices. How can we explain the development of new interpretations of certain practices as corrupt and no longer as “normal”? Which situations and dynamics are relevant for institutional changes that change also the normal/regular interpretation of socially accepted norms? Why does whistleblowing become more and more accepted in specific contexts, while it is seen as a case of lack of loyalty in others?

Hannah Peacman is going to present a working paper on 'The "dybbuk" returns. Jewish traditions in philosophy. A systematic appraoch'

Hannah Peaceman presents the first part of the third chapter of her PhD-project on "Jewish traditions in philosophy in the 19th century and their potential for questions of political philosophy today". The chapter deals with the meaning of "Jewish" in the context of philosophy. The first question is, how the term can be defined without excluding contradictionary, changing and ambigous meanings. The second question is, where Jewish traditions in philosophy are usually located. The claim of the chapter is that Jewish traditions in philosophy can be found at the boarders of philosophy, "Jewish" serves as a characteristic of distinction. Vice versa, this text shows how the exclusion of Jewish traditions in philosophy relies on unphilosophic premises. Further, it argues that their lies a potential in these Jewish perspectives for a critical review of philosophical aspirations to universalism that is determined by exclusion of differences and contradictions. In this sense the "dybbuk" returns.

Petra Gümplová gives a working paper on 'Rights of Conquest, Discovery and Occupation, and the Freedom of the Seas and the Genealogy of Natural Resource Injustice'

This paper traces the origin of three traditional international law principles – the right of conquest, the right of discovery and occupation, and the freedom of the seas. It showed that the right of conquest was created to enable territorial conquest of Indian kingdoms in Latin America and their inclusion in the territorial realm of the absolutist sovereignty of the Spanish crown for the purpose of domination and accumulation of natural resources for the exclusive benefit of the sovereign and for the maintenance of his or her imperial rule. The right of discovery and occupation was reinvented to regulate permanent settlement of colonizers in discovered territories with scarce resources and to facilitate acquisition of the property rights in land for them, either by forceful expropriation (by contract, enclosure, or agricultural settlement) or by violent elimination of native occupants from the land (by displacement or genocide). The freedom of the seas principle, also one of the founding international law principles which established non-sovereign ocean space as the avenue of commerce, then enabled colonization of distant markets by semi-private chartered companies by imposing monopolistic trading relations defined by unequal exchange and coercion.

A conference is taking place at the Max Weber Kolleg on 'Religion and Urbanity: Theorising Mutual Formations'

                              Religion and Urbanity: Theorising Mutual Formations
                                   Erfurt, Augustinerkloster, 6 to 8 November 2018

Tuesday, 6th of November 2018
 14.00: Welcome and Introduction to the Conference by Susanne Rau, Rubina Raja and Jörg Rüpke

Panel 1 14.15-16.15
Chair: Rubina Raja
 14.15-14.30:
Susanne Rau: Urbanity
 14.30-14.45:
Jörg Rüpke: Religion and Urban Space
 14.45-15.00:
Anne Murphy: Which Urbanity? Secondary Urban Centres and their Attendant Religious Formations at the Border with the Rural
 15.00-15.15:
Respondent: Ulrike Freitag
15.15-16.15:
Joint Discussion
16.15-16.30: Coffee Break

Panel 2 16.30-17.50
Chair: Asuman Lätzer-Lasar
16.30-16.45:
Christopher Smith: What is Religious about Founding a City?
16.45-17.00:
Emiliano Rubens Urciuoli: Citification of Religion: What is it?
17.00-17.10:
Respondent: David Garbin
17.10-17.50
Joint Discussion
18.15: Dinner in the Council Chamber

Wednesday, 7th of November 2018

Panel 3 09.00-11.00
Chair: Martin Fuchs
09.00-09.15:
Mar Griera/ Marian Burchardt: Religious Events and the Politics of Space in the Mediterranean City
09.15-09.30:
Ranjeeta Dutta: Religious Interactions and Urban Configurations in a Temple Town of South India: the Case of Shrirangam in Tamil Nadu
09.30-09.45:
Paroma Chatterjee: Urbanity and Religion in the Chronicle of John Malalas (6th century): Coexistence and/or Conflict?
09.45-10.00:
Respondent: Harriet Rudolph
10.00-11.00:
Joint Discussion
11.00-11.30: Coffee Break

Panel 4 11.30-12.50
Chair: Emiliano Rubens Urciuoli
11.30-11.45:
Pralay Kanungo: Conceptualizing the Urban Religioscape
11.45-12.00:
Mariachiara Giorda: From Urban Geometry to Religious Urbanity
12.00-12.10:
Respondent: Martin Christ
12.10-12.50:
Joint Discussion
13.00-14.30: Lunch

Panel 5 14.30-16.30
Chair: Susanne Rau
14.30-14.45:
Rubina Raja: Religion and the Urban: Network Evolutions as a Lens
14.45-15.00:
Benno Werlen: The Constitution of Geographical and Urban Realities. An Interpretive Approach to Geographical Urban Research
15.00-15.10:
Respondent: Markus Vinzent
15.10-16.10:
Joint Discussion
16.10-16.30: Coffee Break

Panel 6 16.30-18.30
Chair: Jörg Rüpke
16.30-16.45:
Qudsiya Contractor: Between Community and Alienation? – Muslim Women and the Urban Experience of Religiosity in Mumbai
16.45-17.00:
Martin Fuchs: Precarious Belonging: Religious Options and Engagements with the World in a Metropolitan Context. The case of Dalits in Dharavi (Mumbai)
17.00-17.15:
Nora Lafi: Conceptualizing Urbanity, Practicing Coexistence: The Relationship between Religion and the Civic Sphere in Cities of the Middle East and North-Africa between the Middle Ages and Ottoman Times
17.15-17.30:
Respondent: Sunil Kumar
17.30-18.30:
Joint Discussion
19.00: Dinner

Thursday, 8th of November 2018

Panel 7 09.00-11.00
Chair: Beatrice Renzi
09.00-09.15:
Onno van Nijf / Chr. Williamson: Festivals and Urban Placemaking in the Greek city of the Hellenistic and Roman periods
09.15-09.30:
Cristiana Facchini: Seeing Cities in Travelogues and Missionary Texts in the Early Modern Period
09.30-09.45:
Supriya Chaudhuri: Spaces of the Sacred: Religious Practice in Urban Interstices
09.45-10.00:
Respondent: Asuman Lätzer-Lasar
10.00-11.00:
Joint Discussion
11.00-11.15: Coffee Break

Panel 8 11.15-13.15
Chair: Martin Christ
11.15-11.30:
Miri Rubin: Difference and Urbanity in the Age of Religion
11.30-11.45:
Rana P. Behal: Religion, Religiosity and the Urban World: Everyday Lives of People in Amritsar City, Punjab, India
11.45-12.00:
Beatrice Renzi: Religion at the crossroads of rural-urban life-worlds: Systems of relatedness in transition
12.00-12.15:
Respondent: Zoe Opacic
12.15-13.15:
Joint Discussion
13.15-14.00: Lunch
Final discussion 14.00-15.00
Guided tour of Erfurt 15.15-17.00
Departure


https://www.uni-erfurt.de/fileadmin/public-docs/Max-Weber-Kolleg/6_PDFs/Tagungen/2018/UR_Preliminary_Programme_Nov18.pdf

If you are interested and would like to attend, please send an email to asuman.laetzer-lasar@uni-erfurt.de

More information:https://www.uni-erfurt.de/max-weber-kolleg/veranstaltungen/tagungenworkshops/