Chair person
Prof. Gregor Ahn
Gregor Ahn has studied the History of Religion, Theology, Philosophy, and Old Iranian Philology at the universities of Bonn and Copenhagen. Since 1996 he has been Professor for Religious Studies at the University of Heidelberg. During the summer term 2000 he has been Visiting Professor at the University of Munich (Romano Guardini Chair) and in the same year he was distinguished with the Teaching Award 2000 of the Federal State of Baden-Württemberg. 1999-2001 Gregor Ahn was coordinator of the DFG Graduate School "Religion and Normativity", and since 2005 he is the founder and editor-in-chief of the Online - Heidelberg Journal for Religions on the Internet.
P 08 - Ritual Design
Chair: Prof. Gregor Ahn gregor.ahn@zegk.uni-heidelberg.de
Download preliminary daily schedule here (pdf)
(for better readability kindly print it out)
Common activities:
Reception
On Monday, 29 September, we will officially open the conference with a
reception from 19.30 to 22.30
Key Note Lecture
Tuesday, 30 September:
Key Note Speaker Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c.
"Magie und Ritual"
Plenary Discussion
Wednesday, 1 October at 18.00 introductory presentation:
Prof. Dr. Christoph Wulf, Freie Universität Berlin
"The Future of the Science of Ritual in a transcultural Context"
Exchange meeting
Thursday, 2 October from 9:00 - 12:00:
Exchange meeting between scientists from
the German Archaeological Institute
and the Collaborative Research
Center SFB 619
Speakers (synonym for referee, panelist, active participant)
Day 3 – Wednesday, 1 October 2008
9:00-9:45 Gregor Ahn and Kerstin Radde-Antweiler
Introduction
9:45-10:30 Gregor Ahn
Imaginierte Performanz. Ritualdesign in den Harry-Potter-Romanen
11:00-11:45 Simon Jenkins
Holy pixels: creating sacred space and religious community online
14:00-14:45 Erik de Maaker
Reinventing All Souls
14:45-15:30 Thomas Quartier
Funeral design in the Netherlands: ritual ‘cross-overs’
16:00-16:45 Matthias Frenz
Struggles and strategies in the contest for ritual space.
Ritual design at a Marian sanctuary in India
16:45-17:30 Anne-Christine Hornborg
Using rites to reenchant secularized society:
Is New Age becoming the contemporary public religion in Sweden?
17:30-18:15 Jan Snoek
Design and Redesign of Rituals:
Researching the Independent United Order of Mechanics
Day 4 – Thursday, 2 October 2008
9:00-9:45 Roland Hauri-Bill
The Enactment of Intergenerational Relations in Family Rituals.
A Study on Christmas Celebrations in Ordinary Families
9:45-10:30 Inken Prohl
Phantasies of the Milky Way –
Ritual Design in the Japanese Modern Religious
Organisation World Mate
11:00-11:45 Michael Houseman (Respondant)
11:45-12:30 René Gründer
„In Blót we trust!“ -
Forms of staging the 'Germanic' in rituals of
contemporary neopagan communities
14:00-14:45 Final Discussion
Abstract
Ritual design has become a key term for conceptualising rituals. Viewed concretely, the spectrum covered by ritual design ranges from "patchwork" processes within traditional rituals, to the invention of completely new rituals. Widely encountered rituals such as weddings or mourning rites are often pieced together by professional ritual designers from old and new elements, motifs and ritual sequences, which may originate from highly differing religions and cultures. In western cultures this has led to a ritual market of great importance - not least as a financial factor. The recent transfer of rituals to virtual worlds such as Second Life provides a particularly illustrative example of the immense importance of ritual design in present-day culture.
Yet obviously not every change in ritual traditions is the result of ritual design. While it is natural that small deviations and differences can be observed in a ritual during its various performances, and that even the greatest care and attention by ritual specialists is unable to prevent all mistakes, what characterises ritual design are intentional changes in the ritual (e. g. by integrating elements from other religious traditions) that are made in order to adapt it to a particular setting or situation. But what is it about the re-arrangement of a ritual by a ritual specialist that deserves the name ritual design? The ritual design panel will examine various case studies in order to delineate more precisely the structures and modes of actions, as well as the boundaries that distinguish ritual design.
