Main Content
Materiality, Visuality and Museality of Religion
The study of the materiality, visuality and museality of religious culture is the subject of the interdisciplinary approaches of "material religion"(in English-speaking countries) and "religious aesthetics" or "religious aesthetics" (primarily in German-speaking countries). This relates to to a sift since the 1980s in particular, which led to a stronger orientation towards Cultural Studies within the Study of Religion.
Under the keyword 'materiality', a repertoire of practices (e.g. sensory perceptions and embodiment) and products (e.g. things, images, spaces, architecture) are studied as well as their mediation, transmission and institutionalisation. In particular, the role of religion in the interplay between sensual, cognitive and socio-cultural aspects in the construction of reality is analysed.
Research topics in this field include, for example, religious rituals, places, symbols and media or the activation of sensory perception in religious practice as well as its transformation, reinterpretation or appropriation.
A special feature of Marburg is the Museum of Religions (Link : research in the Museum of Religions), which facilitates intensive work and research with religious objects. In the context of museality, for example, questions arise about the meanings and functions of religious objects in museums when they are displayed and decontextualised as representatives and sources of information about religions.
Research
Agency and Ethics: Sensitive Objects in University Collections, AESOH (since July 2023),
Interdisciplinary joint application as part of the BMBF funding programme ‘Networking – Cataloguing – Research. Alliance for University Collections II’
Collaborative project ‘The Dynamics of Religious Objects in Museums’ (REDIM), running from August 2018 to March 2022.
Interdisciplinary joint application as part of the BMBF funding programme ‘The Language of Objects – Material Culture in the Context of Social Developments’
Edith Franke und Ramona Jelinek-Menke (Hg.): Handling Religious Things. The Material and the Social in Museums. Hildesheim / Zürich / New York: Olms Verlag, 233 S.
Aymen Hamdouni: Exhibiting religious objects within museums: scientific concept and reflections on a museum of religion in Tunisia (PhD project)
Dr. Ramona Jelinek-Menke: Extraordinary Bodies in African-Brazilian Religious Art: An Analysis of Contemporary Umbanda Images from the Perspective of the Study of Religion
Funding: Fritz Thyssen Stiftung, 15. July 2022 to 14. July 2023
Publication: Visualizing the Invisible. Extraordinary Bodies and the Materialization of Religion in Contemporary Orisha-Centered Artworks. Eingereicht im Mai 2023 bei Material Religion. The Journal of Objects, Art, and Belief
Alisha Meininghaus: Jewish amulets from the 18th and 19th centuries in Germany (PhD project)
Gerrit Lange:Naiṇī Mayā – Cobra Mum. Personhoods and Emotions of the Serpent-Shaped “mothers” of Pindar Valley in the Indian central Himalayas, emerging in religious dramaturgies, mythical enactments and narratives (PhD project)
Pardis Eskandaripour: The New Face of the Museum – The Museum Presentation of Islamic Religious Artefacts in the Context of Space & Place, Space & Time (PhD project)
Understanding the World – Metaphors in Thinking, Feeling and Acting (UMR Network)