09/03/2026
Dear all, here is a call for papers for a panel at the conference of the European Association for study of religions on religious experience. The panel's organisers are at the bottom of the notification. Please contact them if you have any questions. thanks.
Call for submissions for the open panel 'Spiritual, Nonordinary, Transformative – New Interpretations of Religious Experiences' at the Religions 360o | 22nd EASR | IAHR Regional Conference, 20-25. September 2026, Bucharest.
New methodologies bring new interpretations to the field of religious experience. By lifting the experience out of the ‘religious’ wrapping, psycho(patho)logical, social, cultural, and even neurological interpretations of experiences similar to religious ones have been conceptualized, revised, and reimagined over the past century. The terminology and methods used to examine these experiences are constantly changing and under debate. These methodologies open up religious experience to a much broader interpretive frame, ranging from theological to neurological perspectives and from qualitative to quantitative methods. This broader framework is essential because contemporary societies are continuously shaped by the processes of globalisation, marketisation, and pluralism; thus, religious beliefs and affiliations are also in flux. Therefore, research into such experiences — religious, spiritual, transcendent, supernatural, nonordinary, transformative, anomalous, religionesque and so on — is particularly topical and urgent. This panel welcomes papers addressing the current state of religious experience research, with a particular emphasis on the theoretical, terminological, and methodological challenges of the present and future.
Convenors:
Sára E. Heidl – University of Vienna
Zsuzsanna Szugyiczki – University of Szeged
Apply via email: [email protected] until the 31st of March, 2026. ca. 250 words.
