Back Writing Religious, Transcultural, Gendered Identities and Alterities in the Medieval and Early Modern Mediterranean

Writing Religious, Transcultural, Gendered Identities and Alterities in the Medieval and Early Modern Mediterranean. AEI/FEDER, UE-PGC2018-093472-B-C32 (01/01/2019-31/12/2022). JONES, LINDA (IP PROJECT)

Writing Religious, Transcultural, Gendered Identities and Alterities in the Medieval and Early Modern Mediterranean. AEI/FEDER, UE-PGC2018-093472-B-C32 (01/01/2019-31/12/2022). JONES, LINDA (IP PROJECT)

The subproject RELGEND seeks to consolidate its interdisciplinary cross-cultural study of textual representations of Muslim, Christian and Jewish religious identities and alterity based on the analysis of sermons written in Arabic, Judeo-Arabic, Hebrew, Latin, Turkish, Aljamiado and Romance languages. The project will also expand its research in new directions by 1) analysing sermons in tandem with other religious, legal and literary texts to explore in greater depth the relation between religious and gender identities and 2) by studying the relations among the religious communities of the Mediterranean and northern Europe manifested in intertextual and interpersonal contacts, transcultural and linguistic borrowings, religious conversion, polemics and other phenomena. The consideration of non-homiletic texts is justified by the multi-tasking of religious agents: Jews, Christians and Muslims who preached sermons but also composed ethical treatises and devotional literature, redacted juridical responsa and wrote or appeared in hagiographies, and by the relation between sermons and other textual genres. 3) It will construct the PREDMED database of information on Jewish, Christian and Muslim preaching. The PREDMED database, webpage and research network will offer the academic community resources to expand the research on Iberian Christian sermon studies and encourage further studies on Jewish and Muslim preaching, sermons and preachers. 

RELGEND complements the coordinated project of C. Ferrero and F. González (PGC2018-093472-B-C31) by pursuing the common goals and tasks of analysing primary sources to explore constructions of religious identities and alterities and studying intertextual and transcultural relations among Jews, Christians and Muslims. It adds an interdisciplinary comparative component by studying Muslim and Jewish primary sources in their original languages from their perspectives. It enhances the cultural studies component by treating gender as an element of religious identity, alterity and transcultural encounters. The work-plan team includes senior and junior scholars and a doctoral student who come from diverse academic disciplines: Religious Studies, Arabic and Islamic Studies, Medieval History, Jewish History, Ottoman Studies, Gender Studies, Medieval Latin and Hispanic Literature, and it will apply the theoretical and methodological tools of these disciplines to their research. The emphasis on religious, transcultural and gender identities accords with the objectives of Horizon 2020, Europe in a changing world.

Specific objectives:
1) To analyse Islamic and Jewish sermons and other complementary Muslim and Jewish texts in Arabic, Aljamiado, Turkish, Hebrew and Judeo-Arabic that articulate concepts of religious identity and alterity and reflect cultural and religious relations among Muslims, Jews and Christians.
2) To edit, when warranted, the Latin and vernacular sermons of Iberian Christian preachers who are unknown or, if famous, whose sermons have been ignored by scholars; and to study these and other relevant texts that articulate concepts of religious identity and alterity and reflect cultural and religious relations among Christians, Muslim and Jews.
3) To explore the intersections between religion and gender identity in Christianity, Judaism and Islam reflected in these sources and assess the transcultural aspects of the religion-gender dynamic.
4) To complete the PREDMED database and promote its use as a resource and research network for the academic community.

Principal researchers

JONES, LINDA

Research Team / Equipo de investigación

PI / IP:  Linda G. Jones (UPF) – 
Topics: religious studies; Arabic and Islamic studies; Islamic preaching and oratory; gender studies & Muslim masculinities
Temas: historia de las religiones, estudios árabes e islámicos; predicación & oratoria musulmana; estudios de género y masculinidades musulmanas

Work Team /Equipo de trabajo:

Oriol Catalán (Ostelea Tourism Management School / Universitat de Lleida)
Topics:  Medieval history; medieval Hispanic preaching; Christian-Jewish relations; digital humanities and medieval preaching
Temas: - historia medieval, predicación medieval hispánica; relaciones cristiano—judías; humanidades digitales y predicación medieval 

Ram Ben-Shalom – (Hebrew University of Jerusalem)
Topics: Medieval Jewish history of Spain and France; Jewish-Christian relations; Jewish literature, polemics, and homiletics
 Temas: historia medieval de los judíos de España y Francia; relaciones judíos-cristianos; literatura, polémica, homilética judía

Olivier Brisville-Fertin – (ÉNS de Lyon CIHAM)
Topics: Hispanic philology; Aljamiado studies; preaching in Aljamiado
Temas: filología hispánica ; estudios aljamiados ; predicación aljamiada;

Ozgen Felek – (Yale University) 
Topics: Ottoman studies; gender studies; masculinity and sexuality in Ottoman texts
Temas: estudios otomanos; estudios de género, masculinidad y sexualidad en textos otomanos 

Jussi Hanska - (Univ. Tampere, Finlandia)
Topics: Medieval history; medieval preaching in Italy; Christian-Jewish relations
Temas: historia medieval, predicación medieval italiana; relaciones cristianos-judíos
 
Sari Katajala-Peltomáa - (Univ. Tampere, Finlandia)
Topics:  Medieval history; history of religious experience; canonization processes, miracle tales, hagiography and sermons from the perspective of gender studies 
Temas: historia medieval, historia experiencias religiosas; estudios de género y procesos de canonización, textos de milagros, hagiografía y sermones

Moshe Lavee - (The University of Haifa)
Topics: Biblical and Talmudic studies; Judeo-Arabic homiletics and literature; gender studies; digital humanities
Temas: estudios bíblicos y talmúdicos; homilética y literatura judeo-árabe; estudios de género; humanidades digitales
 
Lidia Negoi – (Lise Meitner Fellow, Institute for Medieval Research, Austrian Academy of Sciences)
Topics: social history of medieval Europe; history of the Dominicans; medieval communication studies; medieval Dominican preaching 
Temas: historia social de Europa medieval; historia de los dominicos; estudios de comunicación y de predicación dominico  

Amanda Valdés Sánchez (PhD, Pompeu Fabra University)

Topics: Marian devotion, religious accommodation, proselytism, religious conversion, Castilian devotional culture, politics of piety, multiconfessional societies, morisco studies, Medieval and Early Modern Iberia

Temas: Devoción mariana, acomodación religiosa, proselitismo, conversión religiosa, cultura devocional castellana, implicaciones políticas de las tendencias devocionales, sociedades multiconfesionales, estudios moriscos, Edad Media y temprana Edad Moderna en la Península Ibérica.

 

Oded Zinger – (Hebrew Univ. of Jerusalem)
Topics: Jewish-Muslim relations; medieval history of the Jews in the Mediterranea; Judaism and gender studies: Jewish women’s studies, Jewish masculinity and homo-social relations 
Temas: relaciones judío-musulmanas; historia medieval de los judíos en el Mediterráneo; judaísmo desde la perspectiva de género-- estudios sobre las mujeres, masculinidad y relaciones homo-sociales

Agencia Estatal de Investigación (AEI) i Fondo Europeo de Desarrollo Regional (FEDER)