Search for Articles:
Title / Keyword
Author / Affiliation / Email
Journal
Article Type
 
 
Advanced Search
 
Section
Special Issue
Volume
Issue
Number
Page
 
1.3
0.7
Journals
Religions
Special Issues
Vulnerability in Theology, the Humanities and Social Sciences
share announcement

Vulnerability in Theology, the Humanities and Social Sciences

A special issue of Religions (ISSN 2077-1444). This special issue belongs to the section "Religions and Health/Psychology/Social Sciences".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (31 August 2024) | Viewed by 4067

Special Issue Editors

Prof. Dr. Hildegund Keul

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Faculty of Catholic Theology, Julius-Maximilians-Universität Würzburg, 97070 Würzburg, Germany
Interests: vulnerability as a key concept in theology, science and society; vulnerability, vulnerance and resilience; engravings of mysticism in systematic theology; religion, ritual and sacrament—theology as heterology
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Prof. Dr. Claudia Bruns

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Institut für Kulturwissenschaft, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, D-10117 Berlin, Germany
Interests: vulnerability; gender, sexuality and body history; anti-semitism and colonial racism; national religion/religious fundamentalism; cinematic memory of the Holocaust and genocide
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Τhe natural and life sciences have denigrated the concept of vulnerability for a long time in research, treating it through the lens of weakness. However, since the turn of the millennium, theology, the humanities, and social sciences have become involved in research on vulnerability, and vulnerability is no longer viewed through the binary coding of vulnerability and resilience, but rather, it is understood in a more complex way, taking into account its multiple effects of power, including ‘vulnerance out of vulnerability’.

The COVID-19 pandemic has changed the discourse once more. On one hand, the concept has been narrowed again in the social debates. On the other hand, vulnerability has developed into a new dispositive of power. Both developments challenge vulnerability research regarding what interdisciplinary approaches can yield.

In this Special Issue, the contributions of vulnerability research in theology, the humanities, and the social sciences will be worked out in connection with this challenge. We welcome all articles from the perspective of the individual disciplines as well as those written from transdisciplinary perspectives. The range of thematic fields is also broad and can for example include discourses on migration, climate change, gender, right-wing populism, race, and both sexual and spiritual violence.

We request that, prior to submitting a manuscript, interested authors initially submit a proposed title and an abstract of 400–600 words summarizing their intended contribution. Please send it to the guest editors ([email protected]; [email protected]) or to the Religions editorial office ([email protected]). Abstracts will be reviewed by the guest editors for the purposes of ensuring proper fit within the scope of the Special Issue. Full manuscripts will undergo double-blind peer review.

You may choose our Joint Special Issue in Societies.

Prof. Dr. Hildegund Keul
Prof. Dr. Claudia Bruns
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a double-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Religions is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1800 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • vulnerability
  • resilience
  • vulnerance
  • dispositive of power
  • gender perspectives

Benefits of Publishing in a Special Issue

  • Ease of navigation: Grouping papers by topic helps scholars navigate broad scope journals more efficiently.
  • Greater discoverability: Special Issues support the reach and impact of scientific research. Articles in Special Issues are more discoverable and cited more frequently.
  • Expansion of research network: Special Issues facilitate connections among authors, fostering scientific collaborations.
  • External promotion: Articles in Special Issues are often promoted through the journal's social media, increasing their visibility.
  • e-Book format: Special Issues with more than 10 articles can be published as dedicated e-books, ensuring wide and rapid dissemination.

Further information on MDPI's Special Issue polices can be found here.

Published Papers (6 papers)

Download All Papers
Order results
Result details
Show export options expand_more Show export options expand_less
Select all
Export citation of selected articles as:

Research

12 pages, 235 KiB  
Article
On the Ethics of Mediating Embodied Vulnerability to Violence
by Meenakshi Gigi Durham
Religions 2024, 15(9), 1127; https://doi.org/10.3390/rel15091127 - 18 Sep 2024
Abstract
Media ethics has long been haunted by the question of representing human beings’ vulnerability to violence. While journalism and photojournalism have an obligation to report on the realities of violence and suffering in the world, the “spectacle of suffering” is fraught with ethical [...] Read more.
Media ethics has long been haunted by the question of representing human beings’ vulnerability to violence. While journalism and photojournalism have an obligation to report on the realities of violence and suffering in the world, the “spectacle of suffering” is fraught with ethical dilemmas. In this essay, I seek to theorize the ethics of vulnerability to violence in media representation. As a starting point, I argue for the politics of embodiment as a generative process that constitutes differential vulnerabilities. I move then to consider the way embodied vulnerabilities play out in the media, as exemplified by recent events such as the Black Lives Matter and MeToo movements as well as in times of war, from Vietnam to, more recently, Ukraine and Israel/Palestine. This leads to considerations of spectatorship: who looks and who is looked at? How are these relations of gazing related to the vectors of social and geopolitical power? Are images of embodied vulnerability simply media spectacles that reinforce power hierarchies, or are they powerful prosocial messages that might mobilize humanitarian activism? To address these epistemic questions, I propose that the feminist ethics of care encompasses an invitational rhetoric that can guide media praxis. Care ethics is aligned with various religious epistemologies, and because of that, I argue for it as an umbrella framework that has application in a variety of national and cultural contexts. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Vulnerability in Theology, the Humanities and Social Sciences)
20 pages, 336 KiB  
Article
Creation by Means of Loss and the Paradox of Expenditure—A Contribution of Theology to the Vulnerability Dispositive
by Hildegund Keul
Religions 2024, 15(9), 1106; https://doi.org/10.3390/rel15091106 - 13 Sep 2024
Viewed by 264
Abstract
This article argues that the COVID-19 pandemic has created a new dispositive of power, the vulnerability dispositive, and it clears up what a power dispositive is. It then explains what theology can contribute to this new dispositive. The paradox of expenditure (creation by [...] Read more.
This article argues that the COVID-19 pandemic has created a new dispositive of power, the vulnerability dispositive, and it clears up what a power dispositive is. It then explains what theology can contribute to this new dispositive. The paradox of expenditure (creation by means of loss) plays a special role here. Human vulnerability is an unprecedented power in personal and political life, social and cultural life, and not least in religion. It is therefore not surprising that it has become a key concept in international, interdisciplinary research in recent decades. At least since the 1980s, it has resulted in an enormous number of scientific publications in almost all scientific disciplines. For Christian theology, this has particular significance because of the doctrine of the Incarnation: when God becomes human in Jesus Christ, God risks being wounded. Christianity ascribes salvific significance to this path into vulnerability. But what significance does this have for interdisciplinary discourse beyond theology? What can theology contribute to interdisciplinary vulnerability research? The starting point for the following considerations is a specific point in vulnerability discourse: the new dispositive of vulnerability that emerged during the COVID-19 pandemic. It made vulnerability an important argument in social, political, and religious debates. The vulnerability paradox is particularly important in this context. This paradox holds that strategies designed to protect against certain dangers paradoxically intensify the damage if that damage nevertheless occurs. Theology can supplement this paradox, which is highly destructive, with a paradox that in turn promotes and strengthens life: the expenditure paradox that says that creation can occur by means of loss. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Vulnerability in Theology, the Humanities and Social Sciences)
16 pages, 576 KiB  
Article
The Paradoxical Power of Vulnerability—What It Reveals about Abuse and Cover-Up
by Marianne Servaas and Wim Vandewiele
Religions 2024, 15(8), 958; https://doi.org/10.3390/rel15080958 - 7 Aug 2024
Viewed by 656
Abstract
Researching the question of how the Roman Catholic Church (RCC), and by extension other institutional systems, respond or do not respond to the lived reality of abuse and its cover-up cannot be done without seeking to understand the underlying issue: What is the [...] Read more.
Researching the question of how the Roman Catholic Church (RCC), and by extension other institutional systems, respond or do not respond to the lived reality of abuse and its cover-up cannot be done without seeking to understand the underlying issue: What is the RCC responding (or not responding) to? One elucidating and perhaps surprising answer lies in the little and often misunderstood word vulnerability. Vulnerability, most probably counter-intuitively, has in fact the power to enhance violence or to reverse its destructive influence. This thought forms the basis for an exploration into what Professor Dr. Hildegund Keul has named the vulnerability and expenditure paradox. The logic in both of them seems understandable and straightforward. Yet, when genuinely understood, they are unsettling. They reveal an uncomfortable dilemma, a reality check and, ultimately, a choice as the paradox raises the rather earthly question: do we attempt to cheat death and therefore lose life, or do we opt for “creation through loss”? The first might, though linked to violence, lead to a feeling of security and invulnerability. The second exemplifies the passion of authentic suffering, humility and identity dependence. From a Christian perspective, it is the incarnation of love. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Vulnerability in Theology, the Humanities and Social Sciences)
►▼ Show Figures

Figure 1

14 pages, 203 KiB  
Article
On Becoming Human and Being Humane: Human Rights, Women’s Rights, Species Rights
by Debra Bergoffen
Religions 2024, 15(7), 822; https://doi.org/10.3390/rel15070822 - 8 Jul 2024
Viewed by 496
Abstract
This essay focuses on the nexus of vulnerability and rights. It argues that in transforming vulnerability from a stigma that alienated women from their humanity to the signature of human dignity, women bridged the gap between the liberatory promise of human rights and [...] Read more.
This essay focuses on the nexus of vulnerability and rights. It argues that in transforming vulnerability from a stigma that alienated women from their humanity to the signature of human dignity, women bridged the gap between the liberatory promise of human rights and its exploitative patriarchal politics. It finds that the ideas of Mary Wollstonecraft, Simone de Beauvoir, Drucilla Cornell, and Jean-Luc Nancy were/are crucial to this transformed idea of dignity. Religious ideas have played a complex role in this transformation. Wollstonecraft appealed to theological ideas of the soul to contest men’s claims that the Bible enshrined women’s subordination to men. Current abortion politics in the U.S., and the Iranian women’s Women, Life, Freedom rebellion continue to show how sacred texts have been used to defend and reject women’s demands for rights. Religious and secular arguments for the dignity of vulnerability, used by feminists to re-write the sexual difference, direct us to rethink our exploitative relationship to the earth and the multiple species it harbors. As we take up the task of confronting the environmental crisis of our times, they call on us to see ourselves as stewards of the earth’s bounty who are morally obliged to create humane relationships with our other-than-human neighbors. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Vulnerability in Theology, the Humanities and Social Sciences)
12 pages, 255 KiB  
Article
The Intersection of Gender-Based Violence and Vulnerance in Pastoral Care
by Ute Leimgruber
Religions 2024, 15(7), 776; https://doi.org/10.3390/rel15070776 - 26 Jun 2024
Viewed by 884
Abstract
This paper examines several aspects of vulnerability, vulnerance, and resilience in pastoral care, with a focus on women in the Roman Catholic Church. It critiques gendered ideologies and the intersection of gender-based violence and systemic risks in pastoral care settings. Through doctrinal analysis [...] Read more.
This paper examines several aspects of vulnerability, vulnerance, and resilience in pastoral care, with a focus on women in the Roman Catholic Church. It critiques gendered ideologies and the intersection of gender-based violence and systemic risks in pastoral care settings. Through doctrinal analysis and lived experiences, it argues pastoral care settings with their systemic vulnerances and asymmetries enable abuse, often by clerics. The concept of “vulnerance” sheds light on power dynamics, emphasizing the importance of trauma-sensitive pastoral care with high professional standards to foster resilience among victims. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Vulnerability in Theology, the Humanities and Social Sciences)
20 pages, 313 KiB  
Article
Reframing Vulnerability through an Embodied Theological Lens: Towards Ethical Engagement in a Globalized Context
by Carolina Montero Orphanopoulos
Religions 2024, 15(7), 766; https://doi.org/10.3390/rel15070766 - 24 Jun 2024
Viewed by 707
Abstract
This study examines the evolving concept of human vulnerability within the context of globalization and contemporary societal complexities. Its aim is to provide a comprehensive understanding of vulnerability’s proposed definition and its ethical relevance, particularly through an embodied ethical–theological lens. The research argues [...] Read more.
This study examines the evolving concept of human vulnerability within the context of globalization and contemporary societal complexities. Its aim is to provide a comprehensive understanding of vulnerability’s proposed definition and its ethical relevance, particularly through an embodied ethical–theological lens. The research argues that this anthropological category when approached from an interdisciplinary perspective, reveals nuanced ethical dimensions essential for addressing contemporary challenges. Through the synthesis of insights from various disciplines, the study delineates the intricate interplay between corporeal experiences, affective states, and ethical considerations in understanding vulnerability. Interdisciplinary research methods were employed, drawing from theology, psychology, sociology, and philosophy. Grounding the inquiry in human experience and dialogues within different disciplinary narratives, the study explores vulnerability’s multifaceted nature and its implications for ethical engagement. The conclusions underscore the imperative role of theology in fostering ethical responses to contemporary dilemmas. By reframing vulnerability within an interdisciplinary and embodied framework, the research enriches ethical reflection and praxis, promoting human flourishing in a globalized world. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Vulnerability in Theology, the Humanities and Social Sciences)
Show export options expand_more Show export options expand_less
Select all
Export citation of selected articles as:
 
Displaying articles 1-6
Back to TopTop