Nourishing Values, Feeding Differences – (Religious) Foodways Compared
International Workshop, 2 – 4 March 2023
Date: 2 – 4 March 2023
Venue: Institute for the Study of Religion, Strohsackpassage, room 4.55, Nikolaistraße 8-10, 04109 Leipzig
The workshop seeks to explore how religion is related to human nutrition in a transregional and cross-cultural historical perspective. Moving beyond comparing religious dietary rules or examining metaphorical usages of “diets as religion,” the workshop takes a specifically Religious Studies perspective to investigate conflicts over (food norms, in which religion becomes significant for negotiations of foodways and vice versa. The contributors look at their specific case studies along various systematic complexes, i.e., administrative or economic regulation of supposedly religious or non-religious diets, ‘relative taboos’ and modes of exceptions regarding what is permissible and what is not, and the dynamics and adaptations in food regimes.
Conveners: Jörg Albrecht, Bernadett Bigalke, Nikolas Broy (all Leipzig University), and Thomas Krutak (Leuphana University Lüneburg)
Sponsored by the German Research Foundation (DFG)
If you are interested in this workshop and would like to attend, please contact j.albrecht@uni-leipzig.de. The public evening lecture can be attended without prior registration. We are happy to welcome interested parties.
Public Keynote Lecture
Halal, Kosher and Veg(etari)anism as Globalized Moral Economies (Johan Fischer, Roskilde University)
2 March, 2023, 6:00 – 7:30 pm | Institute for the Study of Religion, Strohsackpassage, room 4.55, Nikolaistraße 8-10, 04109 Leipzig
This talk explores globalized halal, kosher, and veg(etari)an markets. In Arabic, halal literally means ‘permissible’ or ‘lawful’. Halal is no longer an expression of an esoteric form of production, trade and consumption primarily linked to meat in Muslim majority societies, but part of a huge and expanding globalized market. Over the past three decades, Malaysia has become a world leader in the global expansion of halal markets and this presentation explores why and how this is the case. In a broader perspective, I explore halal as part of globalized moral economies that also include kosher (a Hebrew term meaning ‘fit’ or ‘proper’) using the U.S. as a case country and veg(etari)anism in India and beyond. Based on multi-sited fieldwork in Malaysia, the U.S., and India, I shall pay special attention to how manufacturing companies understand and practice halal, kosher, and veg(etari)anism and also to how social groups such as consumers are affected by and respond to religious markets as moral economies.
Schedule
Thursday, 2 March 2023 |
15:00-15:30 | Welcome, Opening remarks
|
15:30-17:00
| Panel I: Theoretical Introduction: Foodways and/in Religions Jörg Albrecht (FOR 2344 Multiple Secularities, Leipzig University): Relations of Religion and Foodways: Preliminary Systematic Considerations.
Jens Schlieter (University of Bern): Religious Roots of Meat Consumption: As seen by Contemporary Vegans and Vegetarians. |
17:30-18:00
| Coffee Break |
18:00-19:30
| Keynote and Public Lecture: Johan Fischer (Roskilde University): Halal, Kosher and Veg(etari)anism as Globalized Moral Economies. |
19:30
| Joint dinner for all invited participants |
Friday, 3 March 2023 |
9:00-10:30 | Panel II: Discourses on Vegetarianism and Food Taboos in China Vincent Goossaert (EPHE, PSL, Paris): A Typology of Religious Discourses around Food and Drink – Thought from China.
Nikolas Broy (Leipzig University): “Vegetarian Bandits” and “Duck Egg Eaters.” Salvationist Sects, Foodways, and Elite Prejudices in Chinese Societies since the late Qing (1644–1911). |
10:30-10:45 | Coffee Break
|
10:45-12:15
| Panel III: National Identities, Religious Norms and Food Taboos Nico Altenhoff (Leipzig University): Kosher Dietary Rules and Jewish Identity Politics in Israel.
Thomas Krutak (Leuphana University Lüneburg): How to avoid “beef”? – Food Habits, distinctions, and piety of Christians in India. |
12:15-13:15 | Joint Lunch
|
13:15-15:00 | City tour
|
15:00-17:15 | Panel IV: Distinguishing Christian Identities through Foodways Ulrike Kollodzeiski (University of Potsdam): “All Things are Lawful for Me, but all Things are not Expedient” (1 Corinthians 10,23).
Jörg Feuchter (Berlin-Brandenburgische Akademie der Wissenschaften): “Have You Eaten with Heretics?” Foodways among Medieval Religious Dissidents.
Jana Valtrová (Masaryk University): Medieval Christian perspectives on kumis consummation among the Mongols. |
17:15-17:30 | Break
|
17:30-19:00 | Panel V: Negotiating ‘Traditional’ and ‘Non-Traditional’ Religions Through Vegetarian Foodways Mitsuda Tatsuya (Keio University/TU Berlin): After Embracing Meat: Buddhist Negotiations of Vegetarianism in Interwar Japan
Stefan Rindlisbacher (University of Fribourg): Gandhi as a Life Reformer? The Appropriation of Religious Foodways in the Life Reform Movement. |
19:00 | Joint dinner for all participants |
Saturday, 4 March 2023 |
9:00-10:30
| Panel VI: Women’s Religious Food Practices in Critical Tension to Medical Norms Katja Triplett (Leipzig University / University of Marburg): Deviation from perinatal food taboos in nineteenth-century Japan
Bernadett Bigalke (Leipzig University): The “Bread of Heaven” is Enough for Me: Catholic Food Discourses in Modern Western Europe |
10:30-10:45
| Coffee Break |
10:45-11:45
| Concluding Discussion |
Erstellt von: Dr. Nikolas Broy