Introduction to the Program
News
Ethnographical studies increasingly show the conversion of megalithic sites into places used for a myriad of spiritual purposes, mostly associated to contemporary rituals that celebrate nature as a sentient being. Analyzing data recently gathered at Pagan practices held in Wéris, a Belgian megalithic site dating from the Neolithic period, and in Crawick Multiverse, a megalithic landscape erected in 2013 in southern Scotland, this comparative ethnography examines material evidence (offerings) and ritual interactions (ceremonies) in both settings.
At the turn of the twentieth century, a small corpus of Sámi legends detailed the conflicts between traditional Sámi religious practices and the emergent Christian faith. This talk surveys these stories, looking at the creative and incisive ways Sámi people linked this religious shift directly to the collapse of the environment.
The talk discusses the work of Marianne Raschig, the most famous palmists of Germany’s Weimar Era. It will focus on her film magazine column titled “You’ll Recognized them by their Hands” (1928-30) in which she introduced palmistry as major mode facilitating intimacy between readers and the stars whose life-size hand prints are featured in the pages.
Come see Dr. Sarah Iles Johnston (College of Arts and Sciences Distinguished Professor of Religion at Ohio State University) give a talk about gods, mortals, and monsters in Greek mythology. This event is hosted by the Department of Ancient Mediterranean & Near Eastern Studies, and Program in the Study of Religion.
For several centuries now, scholars and practitioners alike have been looking to medieval Celtic literature and Celtic folklore for evidence of the pre-Christian past. Using a new approach based on metaphorical mapping of the supernatural in ritual and narrative, this paper suggests that, while not pagan strictu sensu, there is a distinctive cultural read on the metaphysical world that complements local religious practice, whatever the religion.
Come hear our first graduating Honours students, Kristina Shishkova and Ellie Sherman, present on their research at our last Religion for Lunch of the term!