Institute for Religious Studies
The Institute for Religious Studies at Freie Universität Berlin is one of a total of 16 religious studies institutes in Germany ; in Berlin it is the only one that is not connected to a theological faculty ( the seminar for religious studies, missiology and ecumenics can be found at the theological faculty of the Humboldt University in Berlin ). At the Free University of Berlin it has been assigned to the Department of History and Cultural Studies since 1999 .
History of the institute
The history of the institute goes back to the early days of Freie Universität: It was established in 1948 as part of the newly founded Freie Universität and was headed by Walther Braune until the end of the 1960s . Braune, a student of the Protestant theologian Paul Tillich , who emigrated to America before the Nazis , was one of a total of five professors who moved from the East Berlin Humboldt University to the Freie Universität, which was to be newly founded in western Berlin-Dahlem . At that time, the religious and Islamic scholar Braune was the only professor at the still young institute on Boltzmannstrasse (across from the Henry Ford Building ). After Braunes retired in 1968, he was succeeded by Klaus Heinrich , who was appointed full professor at the institute in 1971 (retired in 1995). Heinrich defines his motivation for taking over the institute by making the repressed philosophy the subject of religious studies. By transferring a so-called lecturer position, a second professorship was created, to which Jochen Möbus was appointed; However, in 1978 he switched to the sociologist. In 1984 Hartmut Zinser was appointed second professor; In 1990 he was finally called to the Free University (after a short time as professor for religious ethnology in Mainz). In 1994 the institute moved to Altensteinstrasse. Currently - the institute had to move a third time: to Goßlerstrasse - there are three professors working at the institute: Almut-Barbara Renger (since 2008), Renate Schlesier (since 2002) and the aforementioned Hartmut Zinser.
Teaching and Research
The focus of religious studies teaching and research at the Free University of Berlin is on the European tradition since ancient Greece , whereby cultural traditions and updates from non-European non- scriptural and script-centered religions are also included. According to the three professorships, the Institute for Religious Studies is divided into different work areas with different thematic orientations. In addition to the three professorships, a total of around 30 research assistants and student assistants are employed at the institute.
Research projects
Various research projects are located at the institute or assigned to it, including three special research areas , a project by the German Research Foundation , a project by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research and a project by the Volkswagen Foundation :
- SFB 447: "Cultures of the Performative" (Subproject A7: "Ritual and Risk. On the Performativity of the Game between Cultural Anthropology, Religion and Art")
- Sfb 644: "Transformations of Antiquity" (Subproject B 08: "The different God. Constructions of Dionysus in the modern age")
- Sfb 626: "Aesthetic experience under the sign of the delimitation of the arts" (Subproject C7: "Inspiration and subversivity. Artistic creation as an aesthetic-religious experience")
- DFG project: "The 'Return of Religions' and the Return of Criticism of Religion. (The 'New Atheism' in German and American Contemporary Culture")
- DFG project: "Life, work and impact of the German-Jewish historian and Judaist Marianne Awerbuch "
- BMBF project: "Theater and Festival in Europe" (sub-project "Theater and Festival in Antiquity")
- Project of the Volkswagen Foundation: "From the Imperial Museum to the Communication Center? On the new role of the museum as an interface between science and non-Western societies"
Another (but already completed) project should be pointed out due to its particular relevance for the city of Berlin: Between 2001 and 2003, Nils Grübel and Stefan Rademacher mapped the religious landscape of Berlin with the help of numerous students. The result is the handbook "Religion in Berlin", which offers an overview of religious life in Berlin. In total, over 360 different religious communities were portrayed in the form of a dictionary.
literature
- Nils Grübel & Stefan Rademacher (eds.): Religion in Berlin. A manual . Weißensee Verlag, Berlin 2003, ISBN 978-3-89998-003-5 .