GRK 252:  Ecclesiastical Song and Hymn Interdisciplinary

• Subject Area: Theology ; History
• Term: from 1996 to 2005
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 271277

This college investigates a genre of mass communication with a history of approximately a thousand years. Hymns have their established place in liturgy and public church service. Beside this traditional chants, a wide range of spiritual songs exists which are practiced outside church (for instance christmas carols). Hymns and spiritual songs are central indicators of mental history. Despite some erosions, this is valid even until today. The topics of this college are interdisciplinary insofar as science of literature and linguistics, musicology and science of books, science of liturgy and practising theology have a common interest in their examination. In this context, interdisciplinary is no supplement but the only appropriate method. While earlier hymnological studies are very much influenced by protestant theology, this college insists on a cultural approach that knows no such limitations.The new generation of scholarship holders puts the main emphasis on an international focus. Their projects are mainly concerned with countries of Eastern Central Europe, i.e. regions of the Czech Republic (Bohemia), Silesia, Slovenia, and Transylvania. Since the Middle Ages these regions are characterised by a far-reaching diversity of cultures. This variety occurs mainly in different denominations, confessions, ethnic groups, and political developments. Those new projects aim to analyse the cultural exchange and transfer concerning hymns and spiritual songs as indicators of mental history.

• DFG Programme: Research Training Groups
• Applicant Institution: Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz
• Spokesperson: Professor Dr. Hermann Kurzke
• Participating Researchers: Professor Dr. Hansjakob Becker (†); Professor Dr. Axel Beer; Professorin Dr. Irene Dingel; Professor Dr. Stephan Füssel; Professor Dr. Christoph-Hellmut Mahling (†); Professorin Dr. Christa Reich; Professor Dr. Uwe Ruberg; Professor Dr. Stephan Weyer-Menkhoff; Professor Dr. Reinhard Wiesend