New Religious Cultures in Late and Post-Soviet Russia: Social Networks, Ideologies, Discourses

• Applicant: Professorin Dr. Birgit Menzel
• Subject Area: Social and Cultural Anthropology and Ethnology ; General and Comparative Literature and Cultural Studies
• Term: from 2018 to 2023
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 389197348

The term New Age refers to a number of significant beliefs, practices, and social movements since the 1970s which are characteristic for contemporary “post-secular” societies. In a narrower sense New Age refers to the eschatological-chiliastic idea of a spiritual revolution, which became widespread in American and Western European post-war counterculture. In spite of its extreme diversity, the ideas and practices of New Age Spirituality exhibit an inner logic and are also interconnected with global processes so that they can be seen and analysed as one esoteric culture.Based on this premise, the Germersheim research project shifts the present perspective of the study of Western esotericism to the East and focuses on the history and social dimensions of New Age culture in the USSR of the 1960s–1980s, as well as in post-Soviet Russia. Even though New Age culture in the late and post-Soviet countries should be analysed in the context of global social and cultural trends, it seems important to respond to the question, which factors did exactly determine the genesis and evolution of ideas and practices in the New Age of Soviet culture. At the same time, it seems important to analyse the role of culture in the context of New Age social and ideological continuity between the late and post-Soviet eras, as well as the social functions and ideas of New Age practices in modern Russia. Questions which will be answered in this project are: To what extent had the genesis and evolution of the New Age in the USSR been defined through contacts between the Western countries and states of the Eastern bloc? How does the New Age ideology connect to economic, demographic, and ecological processes of the late and post-Soviet period? To what extent did the evolution of New Age ideas and practices of late and post-Soviet culture relate to the features of scientific knowledge and technologies, as well as to the social image of science in general? The project remains interdisciplinary in its content and design. Theoretical and methodological approaches will be applied from Cultural Studies, Religious Studies, Translation Studies, and Anthropology, as well as Gender Studies, Sociology, and recent New Age research by scholars from Russia and Eastern Europe.In its fourth year, the project will provide new insights on late and post-Soviet religious culture, on transnational travels of ideas and concepts, on the relationship between Western and Russian New Age. By establishing an international network of experts, the project also contributes to the interdisciplinary cooperation in various academic fields (Slavic Cultural Studies, Religious Studies, Religious Anthropology, Contemporary History).

• DFG Programme: Research Grants