Postdoctoral Researcher

Postdoctoral Researcher - Interreligious Dialogue, Power and Global Discourses

How did interreligious dialogue become a global response to religious diversity, conflict, and social cohesion - and which religious, secular, and colonial assumptions continue to shape it? Would you like to investigate these questions and contribute to an international and interdisciplinary research project on interreligious dialogue? Then we invite you to apply for this postdoctoral research position.

The Faculty of Theology and Religious Studies at KU Leuven is looking for a postdoctoral researcher to investigate the global genealogies and discourses of interreligious dialogue and to contribute to the comparative and theoretical development of a larger research project on interreligious dialogue in different societal contexts.

Project

Interreligious dialogue (IRD) has become an important tool worldwide for addressing religious diversity. Although dialogue is often presented as a universal means of promoting mutual understanding, social cohesion, and peaceful coexistence, critical scholars point out that contemporary dialogical practices may also be intertwined with Christian normativity, secular governance logics, and colonial legacies. This project examines these tensions by critically analyzing the historical development, discursive shaping, and local implementation of interreligious dialogue.

As a postdoctoral researcher, you will lead the research package that examines the global genealogies and discourses of interreligious dialogue. You will analyze how international organizations, Christian churches, and global Islamic organizations have framed interreligious dialogue, particularly since the security shift following 9/11, as a response to religious diversity, violence, extremism, citizenship, and social cohesion. In doing so, you will examine how different discursive traditions converge, diverge, or are in tension with one another, and to what extent contemporary dialogical discourses reproduce, transform, or challenge colonial, Christian, and secular normative frameworks.

You will use Discourse-Historical Analysis and qualitative analytical methods to analyze an extensive corpus of policy documents, ecclesiastical texts, and statements from international religious organizations. Based on this research, you will develop a series of scholarly publications and make a significant contribution to the theoretical elaboration of the project.

In addition, you will play a central role in the comparative synthesis of the entire research project. Together with the Principal Investigator (PI) and the research team, you will develop a comparative and power-sensitive theoretical framework that links the findings from the discursive research with the ethnographic studies in Flanders and Morocco, thereby contributing to an innovative theoretical framework on interreligious dialogue as a global discourse and local practice.

Responsibilities

• You will conduct independent research into the genealogies and global discourses of interreligious dialogue.
• You will build an international corpus of policy documents, ecclesiastical texts, and documents from international religious organizations and analyze it using Discourse-Historical Analysis and qualitative analytical methods, including NVivo.
• You will develop your own research agenda within the project's objectives and publish the results in international peer-reviewed journals.
• You will assume academic leadership of the work package on the discursive analysis of global interreligious dialogue and coordinate its planning and progress in consultation with the project leaders.
• You will actively contribute to the theoretical and conceptual development of the project and, together with the Principal Investigator, lead the comparative synthesis of the various work packages.
• You will provide substantive and methodological guidance to doctoral researchers and foster academic exchange within the research team.
• You will present research findings at international conferences and actively build an international research network.
• You will participate in the organization of research seminars, workshops, and other academic activities related to the project.
• You will be available for other forms of service within the Faculty of Theology and Religious Studies for up to 10% of your time.

Profile

• You have earned, or will have earned by the start of the project at the latest, a PhD in religious studies, social sciences, social and cultural anthropology with a focus on religion, theology, or a related discipline.
• You have a strong research profile and a demonstrable interest in interreligious dialogue, religious diversity, and/or critical approaches to religion, secularism, coloniality, and power.
• You have experience with qualitative rese