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Dear friends and colleagues,

We are pleased to announce that our Screening Religion series is back and that we will show the movie “Thrust into Heaven” next Wednesday. We would also like to draw your attention to the colloquium with our guest Menachem Klein next week, as well as the panel discussion on "Contested Secularities" at our final KFG conference in October. Moreover, there is a Call for Applications for two PostDoc positions and a Call for Papers for the inaugural workshop of the Secular Worldviews working group.

Take care and have a good week!
Foteine & Lucy

Screening Religion: Thrust into Heaven | 20 September

Navigating around stereotypes of Islam and non-Muslim belonging in Pakistan, “Thrust into Heaven” showcases instances of so-called forced conversion of Hindu girls to Islam. The incidents often follow a sequence: a young Hindu woman disappears and resurfaces again as a married and newly converted Muslim. Some of these conversions are utilized to conceal criminal acts including kidnapping, human trafficking, and rape. Others are examples of ways in which young women navigate through Pakistan’s rigid patriarchal society. The film aims to give room to the various interpretations and ambiguities that emerge around the alleged forced conversion of Hindu women to Islam in Pakistan.

The film will be followed by a discussion with the director Jürgen Schaflechner.

20 September | 7.30 pm (CET)
Cinémàtheque Leipzig at naTo
Urdhu and Sindhi with English subs
Free entry, donations welcome

Next Week’s Colloquium: Menachem Klein on “New Judaism” | 20 September

Next Wednesday, Menachem Klein from Bar-Ilan University will give a presentation on his research on "New Judaism" in our colloquium.

The colloquium will take place in a hybrid format (on-site and online). If you would like to join in person, please register for the colloquium via e-mail. In the Member Area you will find the relevant readings as well as information on the zoom connection data.

20 September | 9.15–11.45 am (CET)
Strohsack, Room 4.55 and online via zoom 

Panel Discussion on “Contested Secularities – a Global Scenario” at final KFG Conference | 14 October

We are pleased to announce that the closing session of our final conference “Eight Years CASHSS Multiple Secularities: Outcome and Prospects through the Eyes of our Interlocutors” will be a panel discussion on “Contested Secularities – a Global Scenario”. 

The interest in distinctions and differentiations between religion and the secular – which we call secularity – is not merely academic. It touches deeply on societal struggles and sometimes even goes along with culture wars. This often concerns the relationship between the state and religion. However, everyday life, the family, education, science, and a variety of cultural spheres can also become battlegrounds. This panel will bring different cases, e.g. from Turkey, India, Iran, Russia and Israel, together to discuss them in comparison and relate them to the academic debate.

14 October | 3.30 pm (CET)
Bibliotheca Albertina, Lecture Hall, Beethovenstraße 6, 04107 Leipzig

You can register for this panel and the conference in general via e-mail until 20 September. 

Call for Papers: Inaugural Workshop on "Secular Worldviews" | 8–9 December, Leipzig

For the kick-off of the working group "Secular Worldviews" (Säkulare Weltanschauungen, AKsäk), which was recently founded in the DGS section Sociology of Religion, all researchers working on this topic are cordially invited to the first workshop in Leipzig. The aim of the working group is to connect scholars working on the multiple forms of secularity and non-religion (worldviews, practices, communities, artifacts, etc.). It encompasses the German-speaking world, different disciplinary approaches, is theoretically diverse and methodologically open to qualitative as well as quantitative research. The AKsäk scholars work with different conceptualizations of secularity and non-religion, which is seen as an opportunity for productive discussion. Founders of the working group are among others our Junior Research Fellow Mascha Schulz and Associate Member Lena Dreier.

Deadline CfP: 15 October
Deadline Registration: 19 November

Call for Applications: 2 PostDoc Positions on “Culture Wars and Modern Worldviews: A Transnational Conceptual History” | University of Groningen

Our Senior Research Fellow Todd Weir recently received funding for a research project on “Culture Wars and Modern Worldviews: A Transnational Conceptual History” and is looking for two PostDocs to conduct the research with him at the University of Groningen.
The aim of this project is to develop a model of the formative power of culture wars in shaping modern thought, politics and religion by investigating the history of the concept of “worldview.” It is a transnational and multilingual project, that traces the history of worldview from its popularization in nineteenth-century Germany, to its invocation by Dutch and North American Christian thinkers, to its use by political ideologies such as National Socialism, to its contemporary usage in Latin America in the context of arguments about indigenous right.

Find more information on the two positions here:

Postdoc in history of anthropology or religious studies for 3 years

Postdoc in digital humanities for conceptual history research project for 2 years

Application Deadline: 5 October 2023
Intended Starting Date: 1 February 2024 

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.