Project description
The research group ‘Islam and Digitality’ explores how normative reasoning of religious content, hermeneutic procedures, aesthetic practices, and reconstructions of Islamic history are changing within the context of the digital transformation. The individual subprojects will examine the constitution, organisation, and dynamics of these areas of Islamic theology and Muslim religious practice. The group will focus on the following topics in the individual research projects: two subprojects situated at the Institute for Studies in the Culture and Religion of Islam (Goethe University Frankfurt) will explore whether and how digitally constructed and mediated images of Islamic history relate to current religious discourses of identity and remembrance as well as to forms of theological differentiation. The question whether new intra-Islamic group constellations may be generated here will also be pursued. A subproject located at the Berlin Institute for Islamic Theology (Humboldt University of Berlin) is investigating how the digitisation of hadith collections and text types referring to the hadith affects the use of hadith and the perception of the entire corpus as an objective collection of material, thus impacting the hermeneutic procedures within Islamic theology. A further subproject at the Department of Religious Studies (University of Erfurt) looks at how Muslim theologians use digital content such as podcasts, images, and videos on social media platforms to articulate specific interpretations of how Islam should be practised, interpreted, and proclaimed as well as how students of Islamic theology engage with these media.
The team will also collaboratively reflect on the use of digital or computer-aided research tools, processes, methods, and digital resources in Islamic theological studies as an academic discipline and to what extent digital resources can be harnessed within the discipline.
Outcomes
- Video documentation of the project workshops and podcast episodes on topics derived from the project and related research.
- Participation in an exhibition at the Schirn Kunsthalle Frankfurt/M.
- Interactive platform ‘Narrating History’, with the aim of empowering young people to engage with digital history.
- International conference organised by the research group.
The findings of the research will be published in an edited volume as well as in renowned academic journals. Furthermore, the group will produce a video essay.
Project leaders
Prof Dr Armina Omerika, Institute for Studies in the Culture and Religion of Islam at the Goethe University Frankfurt, Professor for Intellectual History of Islam (Project spokesperson)
Prof Dr Mohammad Gharaibeh, Berlin Institute for Islamic Theology at the Humboldt University of Berlin, Professor for Islamic Intellectual History
Dr Christoph Günther, Department of Religious Studies at the University of Erfurt, Chair of Muslim Cultural & Religious History
Staff members
Dr Akif Tahiiev, Institute for the Study of Culture and Religion of Islam, Goethe-University Frankfurt
Lale Diklitaş, Institute for the Study of Culture and Religion of Islam, Goethe-University Frankfurt
Dr Ali Aghaei, Berlin Institute for Islamic Theology, Humboldt University Berlin
Jasmin Eder, Religious Studies, University of Erfurt
Nadeem Khan, Academy for Islam in Research an Society