Publisher: Columbia University Press (April 2020)

German, Jew, Muslim, Gay offers an astonishing perspective on the history of modern Germany and German-speaking Central Europe from the vantage of a man who united multiple marginal identities in himself, devoted his life to promoting religious utopias and secular brotherhoods, and considered himself as part of a spiritual elite that held the key to Germany’s salvation. Hugo Marcus (b., 1880, Posen [today, Poznañ], Poland; d., 1966, Basel, Switzerland) was an extraordinary individual. He is the only figure to have played an important role in the gay rights movement and in establishing Islam in Germany.

Table of Contents

CHAPTER 1: Fighting for Gay Rights in Berlin, 1900–1925
CHAPTER 2: Queer Convert: Protestant Islam in Weimar Germany, 1925–1933
CHAPTER 3: A Jewish Muslim in Nazi Berlin, 1933–1939
CHAPTER 4: Who Writes Lives: Swiss Refuge, 1939–1965
CHAPTER 5: Hans Alienus: Yearning, Gay Writer, 1948–1965
Conclusion: A Goethe Mosque for Berlin

Source: Columbia University Press

The purpose of the Action is to provide a transnational and interdisciplinary approach capable of overcoming the segmentation that currently characterizes the study of relations between Christianity and Islam in late medieval and early modern Europe and the Mediterranean.

Over the last thirty years, some separate geographic and academic areas have been defined in this research field: the Iberian Peninsula, Italy, Central Europe and the Balkans, and Greece and the different islands of the Mediterranean.

These different geographical areas have been analyzed in isolation and have been further disjointed in a scientific context defined by the separation of disciplines and chronologies.

The intention of the Action is to mitigate this academic distortion by creating a common space for scientific exchange and reflection.

This space currently involves institutions from 31 different European and Mediterranean countries as well as around 100 senior and junior researchers coming from different disciplines (history, history of art, philology, anthropology, social sciences, history of the science, politics, etc.).

The creation of this network will help to provide a comprehensive understanding of past relations between Christianity and Islam in the European context through the addressing of three main research problems: otherness, migration and borders. Beyond the strictly academic realm, the Action also aims to revive diversity and Euro-Mediterranean relations in education, at a moment when Europe is at a cultural and political crossroads.

Working Groups

The Action has three Working Groups:

• WG1 The (imaginary) construction of the other,

• WG2 Migration and Identity – National Identities, Local Identities, Religious Identities, and

• WG3 Beyond Borders, that will act as platforms for thematic discussion.

The work methodology will be based on the interaction of the different traditions upon the discussion of common questions.

The general objective of the Action is the creation of a stable network of researchers working on late medieval and early modern relations between Christianity and Islam in Europe, in order to identify common questions and open a transnational and transdisciplinary debate on them that will generate findings that can be exported to the entire academic community and society at large.

The Action will hold 3 Training Schools focused on interdisciplinary methodological research about late medieval and early modern connections between Christianity and Islam in Europe and the Mediterranean. It is expected that this initiative will result in the creation of a transnational community of doctoral students.

This output will have a great long-term impact in the discipline due to its capacity to promote research models. For this reason, the Action will take a special care of the design and the implementation of the Training Schools.

The web of the Action intends to serve as a reference in the subject for scholars and the interested public.

Website: https://is-le.eu/