Tagged: Erfurt
Reflections on the Globality of Religion and Urbanity
Since 2018, the ‘Religion and Urbanity: Reciprocal Formations’ (FOR 2779) research group within the Max-Weber-Kolleg of Universität Erfurt has hosted over 100 fellows from all over the world to investigate how these two concepts intertwined with one another in more than 80 cities across space and time in Europe, the circum-Mediterranean, and South Asia. After 8 years, the research group has entered its final phase and has invited all former fellows and members back to Erfurt to take stock…
“Lost Places” – 16th City Walk
Our group discovered lost places and urban memory culture within the city of Erfurt during our 16th City Walk on the 15th of April 2026. We visited three former religious or urban places and explored how they are still present, remembered or otherwise used within the urban space of Erfurt today…
Performance of Classical Indian Dance at the KFG Closing Conference by Yashoda Thakore
As part of the closing event of the KFG Closing Conference 2026 Dr. Yashoda Thakore will present Dancing as Memory, Memory as Resistance: The Living Repertoire of the Kalavantulu — a performance lecture that speaks directly to the conference’s central concern with the reciprocal formations of religion, urbanity, memory, and social worlds…
„Healthy Living” Stufu Podcasts (1/2)
Physical and mental health is (and was) an essential dimension of the liveable city. I explored this idea in a Studium Fundamentale (“Stufu”) which I offered in the summer term 2025 with my colleague Dr. Colleen Kron. This Stufu entitled “Healthy Living: History of Spatial Design for Health and Well-being” was opened to students in pedagogy and education, history, religious studies and other Bachelor’s programs of the Erfurt University…
Summer School Report: Performing Religion in the City – Urban Spaces, Interactions and Media
Amidst the plastered narrow alleys of Erfurt’s city centre, fittingly emblematic, it was a piece of light-coloured sandstone that inaugurated the Summer School Performing Religion in the City. Placed on the seminar tables of Erfurt’s International Meeting Centre by co-convenor Isabella Schwaderer, the stone fragments represented the material grounding of Erfurt as a city and its religious life. Retrieved from a ridge close to Gotha, the stone was used to build Erfurt’s landmark, the Erfurt Cathedral, and thereby, symbolically, foreshadowed the Summer School’s theme…
„Religion, Urbanity and Sound “– 15th City Walk
Walking around in cities can be connected to hearing multiple things: People chatting, the tram and other vehicles passing by, church bells ringing, maybe even a melody coming from street musicians or an organ playing when passing a church. On our 15th City Walk on the 23rd of October, we explored how those and other sounds and music have an impact on Religion and Urbanity…
14th City Walk: Built Nature
The 16th of April in 2025 was a warm and bright spring day, and a lovely environment for the KFG’s 14th City Walk: “Building Nature.” This program, organized by doctoral students Aileen Becker and Constanze Schaller together with spokesperson of the “Urbanity & Religion” research group Jörg Rüpke, introduced the newly-arrived cohort of fellows, as well as regular members, to some of the finer, greener points in Erfurt’s history.
Religion & Urbanity in “Epoch” Magazine
Over the past months, members of the “Religion and Urbanity” group have published articles in the online history magazine “Epoch”. The articles as well as an introduction by Susanne Rau and Klara-Maeve O’Reilly can now be accessed via a dedicated page…
13th City Walk on Urban and Religious Spaces of Knowledge
On 16th October 2024 we delved into hidden treasures and fascinating Spaces of Knowledge in a city walk excellently prepared by Aileen Becker and Constanze Schaller. As always, the event presented a joyful opportunity to learn more about Erfurt’s history and topography and get to know other members of the KFG better. During the tour, the question of accessibility to Spaces of Knowledge emerged as a common thread.
Running in the city forest: 87th Steiger (spring) run
Tom Hamilton, Associate Professor in Early Modern European History at Durham University, UK and fellow of the Max Weber Centre in summer 2024, took part in the 87th Steiger (spring) run in Erfurt. They met on 21 April 2024 in Erfurt, Am Reitplatz. The race comprises several parts and always takes place in spring…
“Garten und Religion?!” – Sonderbeitrag zum Thema Paradiesgarten
Masterstudierende der Uni Erfurt erarbeiteten gemeinsam mit Sara Keller einen Bereich in der Sonderausstellung zu “Garten und Religion?!”, die derzeit im Erfurter Gartenbaumuseum zu sehen ist. Im Seminar „Der Paradiesgarten als Idealraum“ setzten sich die Studierenden mit religiösen und philosophischen Konzepten auseinander, die von der Antike bis in die Frühe Neuzeit die Gestaltung persischer und indischer Gärten beeinflussten. Die sogenannten Charbagh (oder Chaharbagh) Gärten zeichnen sich durch eine geometrische Anordnung von Strukturen wie Einfriedungen, Wasserkanälen, Pavillons und Wegen aus, weisen aber auch eine üppige Flora auf.
Animals in/and the City (City Walk 12)
On the 17th of April, we went on our twelfth city walk, which revolved around animals in the city and the animal turn. At three stops in the city of Erfurt we discussed different aspects of how animals are recognisable in the mutual formation of religion and urbanity. Frédéric Vandenberghe, Jörg Rüpke, Aileen Becker, and Heinrich Lang gave short presentations at the Natural History Museum on the Animal Turn in general and animals adapting to urban lifestyles; the St. Crucis Church on animals in biblical stories and displaying them in religious architecture, and finally at the Krämerbrücke (merchants bridge) on animals as resources in urban life.
Woad and Indigo: A Story of Two Cities, Two Continents and Decolonisation
Our former fellow Shail Mayaram on the two colours blue: Having lived with indigo for some four decades in India, I delighted in Erfurt’s own blue colour, called woad. Woad is a very distinct blue, as in the napkin that graced my table of my IBZ (the University’s International Guest House) flat, a Christmas gift from my friend, the KFG Fellow, Raminder Kaur.
