Religion and the Senses in Early Modern Europe

Sensation is the subject of a burgeoning field in the humanities. This volume examines its role in the religious changes and transformations of early modern Europe. Sensation was not only central to the doctrinal disputes of the Reformation, but also critical in shaping new or reformed devotional practices. From this vantage point the book explores the intersections between the world of religion and the spheres of art, music, and literature; food and smell; sacred things and spaces; ritual and community; science and medicine. Deployed in varying, often contested ways, the senses were essential pathways to the sacred. They permitted knowledge of the divine and the universe, triggered affective responses, shaped holy environments, and served to heal, guide, or discipline body and soul.

Religion and Ethnicity in Mongolian Societies. Historical and Contemporary Perspectives

This volume about religion and ethnicity in Mongolian societies is the outcome of an international seminar organized in Switzerland in 2009. Ten contributions explore the interplay of religion and ethnicity in the Mongolian and Buryat-Mongolian regions, covering four hundred years of Mongolian and Buryat history. Drawing on methods of diverse scholarly disciplines, including religious studies, Tibetan and Mongolian studies, social anthropology and history, the issues addressed include Mongolian identity formations in the light of the Tibeto-Mongolian interface in the 17th century, Buryat religious survival in the colonial setting of 18th and 19th century Russia, the interplay of religion and politics in Buryatia, a case study of the famous “Imperishable Body” of Khambo Lama Itigelov, an analysis of the religious politics of the Buryat Traditional Sangha in today’s Republic of Buryatia, the role of Shamanism in the identity practices of Modern Buryatia, as well as the revival of “traditional” religions like Buddhism and Shamanism in Mongolia and the emergence of new religions, especially Christianity. Furthermore, two contributions provide in-depth analyses of the dominant theoretical approaches that inform Russian and Anglophone scholarship dealing with these questions.

Self-control strength in the relation between trait test anxiety and state anxiety

The present research examined whether in a test situation, the relation between trait test anxiety and state anxiety depends on the momentary availability of self-control strength. Since self-control strength is crucial for emotion regulation, we assume that trait test anxiety is more closely related to state anxiety if self-control strength is depleted than if it is not depleted. We conducted an experiment with 119 undergraduates in which we measured trait test anxiety, manipulated availability of self-control strength, and assessed state anxiety after a test announcement. Consistent with the assumption, multiple regression analyses revealed that trait test anxiety and state anxiety were positively related if self-control strength was depleted, but were not related if self-control strength was intact.

"The State Starts from the Family": Peace and Harmony in Tajikistan's Eastern Pamirs

Based on anthropological fieldwork between 2008 and 2011, this article focuses on how people in Tajikistan's eastern Pamirs conceptualize well-being through the establishment of peace and harmony. An exploration of the interactional use of the terms ‘peace’ and ‘harmony’ in Kyrgyz and Tajik (tynchtyk, yntymak, tinji, and vahdat) makes manifest that the meanings of these terms are connected to the fields of ‘family’, ‘leadership’, and ‘state’. Basing their reasoning on the officially promoted analogy between family and state, people in the eastern Pamirs distinguish between social spaces that are related to well-being and those that are not. As a factor of distinction, and crucial to the establishment of peace and harmony, the moral quality of leadership plays an important role. Positive experiences of such leadership as balanced and morally pure are mainly identified and witnessed within families and neighbourhoods and only occasionally in state institutions. This discrepancy raises the question of where to locate boundaries between good and bad, moral and immoral, harmonious and conflictual. Thus, this article contributes not only to the study of local concepts of well-being in Central Asia but also to the study of local concepts of ‘ill-being’ which challenge them.