Mulled wine, ginger biscuits, looking back and forward

On Friday, December 9th we gathered together, enjoyed of some mulled wine and ginger biscuits (as it is tradition during Christmas time) and looked back on some past events in the first three-year period of the CoE.

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Risto Saarinen presented his book Recognition and Religion: A Historical and Systematic Study which has just been published by the Oxford University Press. Although a personal monograph, the study has also been a collective work, since the manuscript has been circulated and commented by many CoE members and several other collaborators.

 

[In photo: Prof. Saarinen; Dr. Ulla Tervahauta and Dr. Ivan Miroshnikov]

CoE members has published a lot during the past three years, but Saarinen especially mentioned two conference proceedings which explore new frontiers and offer novel scholarly results. These are the special issue of “Religious Recognition” in the Open Theology journal (de Gruyter) edited by Heikki J. Koskinen and Ritva Palmén as well as forthcoming volume of Reflections on Recognition edited by Maijastina Kahlos, Heikki J. Koskinen and Ritva Palmén.

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In photo from left tp right: post-doctoral researchers Heikki Haara and Ilse Paakkinen together with professor (Church History) Aila Lauha.

Regarding doctoral dissertations, three diss. has already been successfully defended: Timothy Riggs (Canadian) 2014, Ilse Paakkinen (Finnish) 2016 and Ivan Miroshnikov (Russian) 2016. Ilmari Karimies, Joona Salminen, and Heikki Haara are going to defend their diss. in the spring term 2017. The CoE has sponsored their work in various financial and supervisory ways.

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For the second three-year period 2017–2019 we had an international open call. We received totally 78 applications, mostly very good, for 7–9 research positions. Many of our earlier Finnish scholars got a prolongation between 1 to 3 years. New international post-doctoral researchers are Dr. Siiri Toiviainen from Durham (second from the right side of the picture), Dr. Nicholas Faucher from Paris-Sorbonne and Dr. Sara Gehlin from Lund. Congratulations for our new members. We are looking for cooperating with you!

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All photos: Heikki J. Koskinen

Wishing you all a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year 2017!