Narrating secularization. Studies on the beginning and the end of the narrative scheme of secularization in Scandinavian literature 1900/2000

• Applicant: Professor Dr. Joachim Schiedermair
• Subject Area: General and Comparative Literature and Cultural Studies
• Term: from 2018 to 2023
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 406072830

'Secularization' commonly means the transition from a society based on religion to one based on secular legitimation. Between 1900 and 2000 the plausibility of the concept was significant for a self-interpretation of European societies. The project is based on the observation that this obviousness has dwindled over the last 15 years for both the scientific and the public discussions, not least due to the increasingly strong fundamentalist Islam and, most recently, the waves of refugees.In this crisis concerning the concept of secularization, literary studies open up new perspectives: current attempts to re-evaluate the relationship between religion and society have shown that secularization is not an inevitable historic process but rather a specific narrative scheme and thus about a culturally established rule system. Moreover, through this rule system we are able to organize different individual elements in order to derive a shared narrative meaning. As such, the narrative scheme provides an interpretive framework for organizing individual and collective experience in order to create a convincing narration. Therefore, in order to adequately reflect on the current social and political challenges, it is necessary to gain a better understanding of the narrative scheme of secularization and its crisis.The proposed project wants to make a contribution to this by analyzing the two end-points of the era which will be the moment in which the narrative scheme has not found its canonical form yet, as well as the moment in which it is about to dissolve. The project wants to make its contribution in the context of Scandinavian literary history: Thus, it is to be investigated how literature from Denmark, Norway, or Sweden took part in shaping and implementing the narrative scheme around 1900 and in dissolving or reorganizing it since 2000: Which voices articulate the narrative scheme and which positions are strengthened through these voices? Which specific literary methods of cultural self-interpretation have been used? What logics did literary texts use during the phase when the narrative scheme was established in order to make it credible or to develop alternatives? What doubts do literary texts raise and to which defense strategies do they lead during the recent crisis of the paradigm?The project aims to cover three fields: a) narrating secularization around 1900, b) narrating secularization around 2000; the two synchronic subprojects will be complemented by a diachronic study on c) narrating Christmas (1800 to this day); in the third study Christmas is perceived as a phenomenon that can help us to comprehend how the secular self-interpretation of Northern European societies has changed over the last 200 years.Through its genuine literary approach this project will contribute to the re-evaluation of how we speak about religion at a time in which the fundamental narrative scheme that has fulfilled this function so far has entered a state of crisis.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants