Sacred and Holy Scripture. On the Materiality and Function of Competing Systems of Writing in the Formation of the Religious Sphere in Bali (C07)

• Subject Area: Social and Cultural Anthropology and Ethnology
• Term: from 2011 to 2023
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 178035969

Drawing upon the example of the Javanese-Balinese writing system, this ethnological project examines the relationship between non-typographic and typographic writing cultures as media of competing paradigms of religion, knowledge, world interpretation, and power. In the foreground is text-anthropological basic research on the esoteric writing practices of Bali. In the third funding period, this research will be deepened by comparing esoteric written pictograms (modré), Balinese scriptural amulets (rerajahan) and scriptural concepts of soteriology, body and healing with earlier forms in ancient Javanese literature and South Asian medical texts. The aim of the project is to make visible the fundamental differences between Bali's esoteric scriptural practice on the one hand, and the politically imposed modern concept of religion as a canonical written doctrine on the other. In addition, the esoteric palm-leaf manuscripts (tutur) discussing the power of Balinese characters will be translated into English and digitized. We will link texts with images of the corresponding practices.

• DFG Programme: Collaborative Research Centres
• Subproject of: SFB 933: Material Text Cultures. Materiality and Presence of Writing in Non-Typographic Societies
• Applicant Institution: Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg
• Project Head: Professorin Dr. Annette Hornbacher