Press releases

Headscarves and minarets or bearded men praying: Islam's image in Germany and its media is often characterize ed by clichés. In a joint publication, photographer Julius Matuschik and religious scholar and political scientist Dr. Raida Chbib showcase images that transcend the usual stereotypes. The bilingual illustrated book "Moin und Salam", by Goethe University Frankfurt's Academy for Islam in Research and Society, has now been published by Kerber Publishing House. 

FRANKFURT. Using historical images, snapshots of everyday life, multimedia links and explanatory texts, photographer Julius Matuschik and researcher Dr. Raida Chbib trace the history of Islam in Germany from the past to the present, exploring the question: Do Muslims and their religion belong to Germany? The illustrated book "Moin und Salam" shows that rather than being a question of "if", the answer should instead focus on "since when". Using select historical documents, Matuschik and Chbib show that Islam did not just arrive in Germany with the guest workers. Traces of Muslim life date back much further.

The five chapters of the book shine a spotlight on topics such as identity, affiliation, religious practices and holidays, Muslim youth subcultures as well as the first mosques and community foundations. The pictures are accompanied by short introductions of dedicated personalities or initiatives from Muslim communities that showcase the voluntary work that has been ongoing for years to promote coexistence in a pluralistic society. On more than 200 pages, the illustrated book not only reveals the diversity of Muslim life in Germany – whose multitude is probably unknown to many. The photographs also offer insights into the everyday lives of Muslims.

"German media often use imagery that portray Muslims and Islam in a one-sided and stereotypical manner. These recurring images create a framing effect that makes the Muslim presence appear foreign, dangerous or exotic. This imagery does not reflect our immigration society, in which religious freedom prevails and of which Muslims have long been a natural part," says the photographer. 

Julius Matuschik and Dr. Raida Chbib already collaborated on the homonymous multimedia "Moin und Salam" blog, which – together with the islamimbild.de image archive – is based on Matuschik's practical project, funded by Stiftung Mercator and carried out at the Academy for Islam in Research and Society (AIWG). 

"One of our objectives in this project has been to create a knowledge transfer between science and practice that takes place at eye level, which is also one of the AIWG's main goals. The photographic research and audiovisual material constitute the framework for examining the history, backgrounds and contexts, and thus also for the accompanying texts. This approach brought to light exciting facts and questions, including how the act of making the history of minority groups more visible can contribute to a more pluralistic German culture of remembrance ," says Dr. Raida Chbib. 

Chbib and Matuschik's joint illustrated book is designed with a broad, international audience in mind.

Publication: Moin und Salam. Muslimisches Leben in Deutschland – Muslim life in Germany. Eine Reportage. Edited by Julius Matuschik and Raida Chbib. Kerber: Berlin, Bielefeld, 2024 (208 p., hardcover German/English, ISBN 978-3-7356-0952-6). Publisher's website https://www.kerberverlag.com/de/2109/moin-und-salam.

Save the date
A discussion with authors Julius Matuschik and Dr. Raida Chbib will take place on June 8, 2024. Further information will be available on the AIWG homepage soon. 

Julius Matuschik works as a photojournalist for various online and offline media. He is active in Cameo Kollektiv e.V., where he works together with others to realize socio-cultural projects and implement measures promoting cultural and political education. He first began photographically documenting Islam in Germany in 2013.

Dr. Raida Chbib is managing director of the Academy for Islam in Research and Society at Goethe University Frankfurt. Her research focuses on migration and religion, religious diversity, the organizational processes of Islam, as well as relations between the state and Islam in both Germany and Europe. She studied political science, international law and Islamic studies at the University of Bonn and received her doctorate in religious studies at Ruhr University Bochum (RUB).

About the AIWG
The Academy for Islam in Research and Society (AIWG) at Goethe University Frankfurt conducts interdisciplinary research and transfer activities with a focus on Islamic Theological Studies and Muslim life in Germany. It connects all faculties for Islamic Theological Studies or Islamic religious pedagogy found at universities in Germany. The academy addresses issues of social participation by including perspectives related to religion. The AIWG is funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research. 

Further links:
https://www.islamimbild.de/overview 
https://moinundsalam.de/ 

Images
The photos taken by Julius Matuschik are available for download at https://www.uni-frankfurt.de/152452480

Captions: 
(1) Medical student Säli enjoying her hobby: longboarding. 
(2) The Omar Ibn Al Khattab Mosque in Berlin. 
(3) Interior of the central mosque in Cologne.
(4) Children's sports coach Leona Osmanaj in Hanover. 
(5) Prayer pulpit in the Fatih Camii in Berlin Kreuzberg. 
(6) Soccer tournament "Imams against priests" in Berlin. 

The copyright of all images lies with Julius Matuschik. The images offered for download on our website may be used in the context of reporting on the illustrated book.

Further information and press contact (for interview requests)
Stefanie Golla-Dehmamy
Coordinator Science Communication and PR 
Academy for Islam in Research and Society 
Goethe University Frankfurt 
Phone: +49 (0)69 798-22459
E-Mail golla@aiwg.de
Homepage https://aiwg.de/

If you would like to order a review copy, please contact the publisher directly:
Anne Levke Vorbeck, Email: annelevke.vorbeck@kerberverlag.com

About the AIWG
The Academy for Islam in Research and Society (AIWG) at Goethe University Frankfurt conducts interdisciplinary research and transfer activities with a focus on Islamic Theological Studies and Muslim life in Germany. It connects all faculties for Islamic Theological Studies or Islamic religious pedagogy found at universities in Germany. The academy addresses issues of social participation by including perspectives related to religion. The AIWG is funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research. 

Editor: Dr. Anke Sauter, Science Editor, PR & Communication Office, Tel: +49 (0)69 798-13066, Fax: +49 (0) 69 798-763 12531, sauter@pvw.uni-frankfurt.de 

The British Academy's Global Professorships are designed to strengthen the UK's research capacity by further enhancing collaborations with internationally renowned scholars. Linguist Prof. Dr. Saloumeh Gholami was recently awarded a Global Professorship at the renowned University of Cambridge.

FRANKFURT. The Global Professorships give internationally recognized academics the opportunity to undertake high-risk, curiosity-driven research in the humanities and social sciences at a UK research institution. Recipients are chosen by the highly respected British Academy and UK universities have the right to nominate one researcher per year. Having been nominated by the University of Cambridge, Prof. Dr. habil. Saloumeh Gholami and her research project Persisting Through Change: A Study of Oral Literature and Cultural Interaction in the Zoroastrian Community were ultimately selected by the British Academy for one of a total of eight Global Professorships awarded in 2023. The linguist is a professor of minority languages in the Middle East at Goethe University Frankfurt's Institute for Empirical Linguistics. Endowed with around €1 million (~ £900,000), her Global Professorship in Cambridge will begin on September 1, 2024. 

Saloumeh Gholami will be researching the oral traditions of the Zoroastrians, which have survived in the now endangered Zoroastrian Dari (Behdini) language. Zoroastrianism is considered to be one of the world's oldest monotheistic religions, with an estimated 150,000 members, the largest communities of which, in addition to Iran, can be found in India, Pakistan, Australia, Canada, the USA and the UK. Gholami analyzes how oral literature developed in the Zoroastrian community and how – under the influence of the Islamic majority culture – it was handed down. Her multidisciplinary approach sets out to uncover the cultural dynamics between a minority's language, literature and society in the context of the majority culture. Gholami has served as board member of the Goethe University-led LOEWE research cluster "Minority Studies: Language and Identity" since 2020. Known by its German acronym, LOEWE is the German federal state of Hesse's program for the development and promotion of scientific and economic excellence.

In 2022, the president of Goethe University Frankfurt nominated the linguist as a Goethe Fellow at the Forschungskolleg Humanwissenschaften – Institute for Advanced Studies. The same year, she was awarded the prestigious fellowship of Oxford University and its Oxford School of Rare Jewish Languages (OSRJL), where she researches Gorani manuscripts in Hebrew script. In 2023, the German Research Foundation (DFG) recognized Saloumeh Gholami's project, which is funded with around half a million euros, and her commitment to researching Judeo-Iranian languages.

Image for download: https://www.uni-frankfurt.de/151803858 

Caption:
Linguist Saloumeh Gholami is a member of the board of directors of the LOEWE research cluster "Minority Studies: Language and Identity" at Goethe University Frankfurt (Photo: @2014 gholami)

Further information
Prof. Dr. habil. Saloumeh Gholami
Professor of Minority Languages in the Middle East 
LOEWE-Research Cluster: Minority Studies, Language and Identity 
Institute for Empirical Linguistics 
Faculty of Linguistics, Cultures and Arts 
Goethe University Frankfurt
Phone: +49 (0)69- 798 24690
gholami@em.uni-frankfurt.de

Editor: Pia Barth, Science Editor, PR & Communication Office, Theodor-W.-Adorno-Platz 1, 60323 Frankfurt, Tel. +49 (0)69 798-12481, Fax +49 (0)69 798-763-12531, p.barth@em.uni-frankfurt.de 

An international study involving Goethe University Frankfurt has investigated the impact state and non-state funding have had on the live performing arts during the pandemic. The investigation shows that while the situation of artists in Germany was overall more positive than elsewhere, certain areas merit some catching up. 

FRANKFURT. The British Academy-funded research project "Pandemic Preparedness in the Live Performing Arts: Lessons to learn from Covid-19 across the G7" ran from April 2023 to January 2024. Its aim: To compare how government and non-government funding has affected the work of institutions, organizations, performing artists and freelancers in the G7 countries during the pandemic, focusing in particular on a comparison between the USA, Canada, the UK and Germany. The co-investigator of the project's German team was Prof. Heidi Liedke from Goethe University's Institute of English and American Studies (IEAS), with Ronja Koch acting as its research associate. One of Liedke's research areas is digital forms of contemporary theater and the pandemic's impact on theater in the UK and Germany. 

As part of the project, the research teams conducted extensive literature syntheses of publications from 2020-2023, looking at both academic and journalistic publications as well as policy papers relating to theater, opera and dance. Liedke also spoke with representatives of several state theaters, the German federal government's department of theater, dance and performance, as well as Deutscher Bühnenverein [German Stage Association], among others. 

The €2 billion "Neustart Kultur" funding program is the first of its kind providing an unprecedented amount of funding to culture in Germany – at a scale that is also unique by international standards. The program provided many people with financial security, albeit not to the same extent: while permanent employees of municipal and state theaters received short-time work benefits, independent and self-employed artists struggled with numerous applications for financial support. That being said, project funding was available at the federal and, above all, the state level, and could be obtained both quickly and unbureaucratically. It was particularly important that performances involving a physical gathering of people no longer constituted a prerequisite for funding – offering freedom and space to further develop one's own art. Many artists were appreciative of the fact that politicians spoke of the importance of culture and its promotion to Germany; they felt seen. 

The pandemic and the associated social distancing regulations led to a lot of experimentation with digital formats. However, many institutions lacked a comprehensive digital strategy – both in terms of artistic practice as well as with regard to their internal structures. This is particularly true of rural areas, where internet access remains a problem. There did, however exist a certain funding focus on rural areas, allowing new performative formats to emerge while at the same time promoting digitalization. Generally speaking, public spaces were increasingly included, with theaters such as Frankfurt's Mousonturm artists' house, for instance, building a special open-air stage. 

"Artists and theaters in Germany and Canada received significantly more support than those in other countries," Prof. Liedke says. The state of Hesse's “Masterplan Kultur" [master plan for culture] and the resilience managers employed by some state theaters (e.g. in Hanover or Darmstadt) constituted best practice examples at a joint conference, attended by a politician from the House of Lords, amongst others. The debate on whether to include arts funding in the German constitution also met with great interest. "This is precisely what artists in the UK themselves are discussing and want to take to the political arena," she adds. 

All of this notwithstanding, Liedke points out that the German system also has its weaknesses: compared to other countries, German theaters still need to become considerably more accessible – both for employees as well as for audiences. In addition, minorities need to be given greater consideration. Beyond that, there is also room for improvement in terms of funding strategy and co-determination. Bureaucratic hurdles and the lack of coordination between the various funding offers have made it particularly difficult for freelancers to access funds. It would make sense for various cultural and political actors to be involved in the development process, as was the case with Hesse's "Masterplan Kultur", for example. The five recommendations for action for political decision-makers in the UK are available on the project's homepage. 

Project homepage: https://www.exeter.ac.uk/research/institutes/sci/research/affiliatedprojects/pandemicpreparedness/ https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/documents/5253/tBA_Summary_report_v4.pdf 

Images for download: https://www.uni-frankfurt.de/151525656 

Caption: The British Academy-funded research project "Pandemic Preparedness in the Live Performing Arts: Lessons to learn from Covid-19 across the G7", of which Goethe University Frankfurt was a participant, has presented its results. (Copyright: University of Exeter) 

Further information
Prof. Dr. Heidi Lucja Liedke
Professor of English Literature
Institute of English and American Studies
Goethe University Frankfurt
liedke@em.uni-frankfurt.de
https://www.uni-frankfurt.de/136371678/Heidi_Liedke
@heidilulie (X)

Editor: Dr. Anke Sauter, Science Editor, PR & Communication Office, Tel: +49 (0)69 798-13066, Fax: +49 (0) 69 798-763 12531, sauter@pvw.uni-frankfurt.de

When the human immune system recognizes and attacks infected or abnormal cells, it does so in highly complex, multi-stage processes. Biochemist and structural biologist Robert Tampé from Goethe University Frankfurt's Institute of Biochemistry has already uncovered parts and sequences of these mechanisms. The €2.5 million ERC Advanced Grant enables him to build on his successful research into the molecular architecture and mechanisms of the cellular immune response. With this distinction, Tampé is one of 255 Excellence Grant recipients selected by the European Research Council (ERC) from 1,829 applications submitted. 

FRANKFURT. The cell's outer shell determines whether the human adaptive immune system identifies pathogens or not. Figuratively speaking, the cell membrane is the arena where two key players meet: On the one hand, there are receptors, of T cells for example, which are specialized in reacting to signs, known as antigens, for a cell that is degenerated or infected by a virus. On the other hand, it is the infected or abnormal cell itself that produces these antigens in the form of small peptides in its interior, then transports them to its surface. If a T cell receptor on the membrane recognizes an antigen that matches it, it binds to it, which in turn triggers an intricate mechanism at the end of which the abnormal cell is eliminated. This property of T cells is the reason for their increased use as a customized tool in immunotherapy. 

Biochemist and structural biologist Robert Tampé, a specialist in the structural analysis of membrane protein complexes of the adaptive immune system, has now been awarded a five-year, €2.5 million European Research Council Advanced Grant for his project Unraveling the Supramolecular Architecture of Molecular Machineries in Adaptive Immunity ("ImmunoMachines"). ERC Advanced Grants support groundbreaking research projects by outstanding scientists. 

Robert Tampé's research project aims to decipher the spatial and temporal structure of as yet unexplained processes in the cell's immune response. His research team draws on and combines several scientific disciplines and methods, including cryogenic electron microscopy, the control of cellular processes by light, chemical and synthetic biology, in-situ structural biology, and others. Tampé is certain that "there is a lot to discover at the interfaces of biology, chemistry, physics and medicine" and that such underlying research findings will lead to tangible benefits in therapeutic approaches. "It is the dream of every researcher in this field to understand how the T-cell receptor works, which would pave the way to ultimately producing customized T-cell receptors that can treat infectious diseases, autoimmune diseases and cancer." 

This is Tampé's second ERC Advanced Grant – he received his first in 2017. A year later, he was awarded a Reinhart Koselleck Project by the German Research Foundation. Since 2022, he has headed the Collaborative Research Center 1507 on “Protein Assemblies, Machineries, and Supercomplexes in Cell Membranes". In 2023, he received the Schaefer Research Award from Columbia University, New York. 

The European Research Council (ERC) selected 255 projects by leading researchers from the 1,829 submissions across 19 member states and associated countries it had received, meaning that just under fourteen percent of the proposals were successful. The winners include 50 German, 31 French, 28 British, 22 Italian and a further 28 researchers from other countries. 

Set up by the European Union in 2007, the ERC is the premier European funding organization for excellent frontier research, offering financing to creative researchers of any nationality and age to run projects based across Europe. It is led by the Scientific Council, an independent governing body composed of eminent international scientists and scholars, which is responsible for its strategic direction. 

Image for download: https://www.uni-frankfurt.de/151953015 

Caption: This is structural biologist and biochemist Robert Tampé's second ERC Advanced Grant (Photo: Uwe Dettmar) 

Further information
Robert Tampé, PhD
Professor / Director
Institute of Biochemistry
Goethe University Frankfurt
Tel: +49 (069) 798 29475
E-Mail: tampe@em.uni-frankfurt.de
https://biochem.uni-frankfurt.de/the-institute-of-biochemistry/cellular-biochemistry/
https://sfb1507.de
https://twitter.com/Tampe_Lab/

Editor: Pia Barth, Science Editor, PR & Communication Office, Theodor-W.-Adorno-Platz 1, 60323 Frankfurt, Tel. +49 (0)69 798-12481, Fax +49 (0)69 798-763-12531, p.barth@em.uni-frankfurt.de

One of the most fundamental interactions in physics is that of electrons and light. In an experiment at Goethe University Frankfurt, scientists have now managed to observe what is known as the Kapitza-Dirac effect for the first time in full temporal resolution. This effect was first postulated over 90 years ago, but only now are its finest details coming to light. 

FRANKFURT. It was one of the biggest surprises in the history of science: In the early days of quantum physics around 100 years ago, scholars discovered that the particles which make up our matter always behave like waves. Just as light can scatter at a double slit and produce scattering patterns, electrons can also display interference effects. In 1933, the two theorists Piotr Kapitza and Paul Dirac proved that an electron beam is even diffracted from a standing light wave (due to the particles' properties) and that interference effects as a result of the wave properties are to be expected. 

A German-Chinese team led by Professor Reinhard Dörner from Goethe University Frankfurt has succeeded in using this Kapitza-Dirac effect to visualize even the temporal evolution of the electron waves, known as the electrons' quantum mechanical phase. The researchers have now presented their results in the journal Science. 

“It was a former doctoral researcher at our institute, Alexander Hartung, who originally constructed the experimental apparatus," says Dörner. “After he left, Kang Lin, an Alexander von Humboldt fellow who worked in the Frankfurt team for 4 years, was able to use it to measure the time-dependent Kapitza-Dirac effect." To do so, it was necessary to further develop the theoretical description, too, as Kapitza and Dirac did not take the temporal evolution of the electron phase specifically into consideration at that time. 

In their experiment, the scientists in Frankfurt first of all fired two ultrashort laser pulses from opposite directions at a xenon gas. At the crossover point, these femtosecond pulses – a femtosecond is a quadrillionth (one millionth of one billionth) of a second – produced an ultrastrong light field for fractions of a second. This tore electrons out of the xenon atoms, i.e. it ionized them. Very shortly afterwards, the physicists fired a second pair of short laser pulses at the electrons released in this way, which also formed a standing wave at the center. These pulses were slightly weaker and did not cause any further ionization. They were, however, now able to interact with the free electrons, which could be observed with the help of a COLTRIMS reaction microscope developed in Frankfurt. 

“At the point of interaction, three things can happen," says Dörner. “Either the electron does not interact with the light – or it is scattered to the left or to the right." According to the laws of quantum physics, these three possibilities together add up to a certain probability that is reflected in the wave function of the electrons: The cloud-like space in which the electron – with a certain probability – is likely to be, collapses, so to speak, into three-dimensional slices. Here, the temporal evolution of the wave function and its phase is dependent on how much time elapses between ionization and the moment of impact of the second pair of laser pulses. 

“This opens up many exciting applications in quantum physics. Hopefully, it will help us to track how electrons transform from quantum particles into completely normal particles within the shortest space of time. We are already planning to use it to find out more about the entanglement between different particles that Einstein called 'spooky'," says Dörner. As so often in science, putting long-established theories to the test again and again has been worthwhile here, too. 

Publication: Kang Lin, Sebastian Eckart, Hao Liang, Alexander Hartung, Sina Jacob, Qinying Ji, Lothar Ph. H. Schmidt, Markus S. Schöffler, Till Jahnke, Maksim Kunitski, Reinhard Dörner: Ultrafast Kapitza-Dirac effect. Science (2024) https://doi.org/10.1126/science.adn1555 

Pictures for download:
https://www.uni-frankfurt.de/151585293/
https://www.uni-frankfurt.de/151585310/ 

Captions:
Image 1: Reinhard Dörner (from left to right), Markus Schöffler, Sina Jacob, Maksim Kunitski, Till Jahnke, Alexander Hartung, Sebastian Eckart 

Image 2: Time dependent interference fringes from the ultrafast Kapitza Dirac Effect. An electron wave packet is exposed to two counterpropagating ultrashort laser pulses. The time span from back to front is 10 pico seconds. (Copyright: Goethe University) 

Further information
Professor Reinhard Dörner
Institute of Nuclear Physics
Goethe University Frankfurt
Tel.: +49 (0)69 798-47003
doerner@atom.uni-frankfurt.de
https://www.atom.uni-frankfurt.de/

Editor: Dr. Markus Bernards, Science Editor, PR & Communication Office, Theodor-W.-Adorno-Platz 1, 60323 Frankfurt, Tel: +49 (0) 69 798-12498, bernards@em.uni-frankfurt.de