Contending Modernities
Contending Modernities is a multi-year, interdisciplinary research and education initiative that partners with secular and religious traditions from around the world. It is directed by Ebrahim Moosa, the Mirza Family Professor of Muslim thought and Islamic Societies. The project seeks to generate new knowledge and greater understanding of the ways religious and secular forces interact in the modern world in their bid to advance the common good.
Currently, Contending Modernities operates three research streams: Theopolitics in an Age of Disruption; Religion, Arts, and the Humanities; and Religion, Technology, and the Self. Anchoring work across these streams is a vision of scholarship grounded in the grammar and vocabularies of religious and secular traditions and simultaneously invested in bringing those traditions into critical conversation with the disciplines of the humanities, such as anthropology, sociology, philosophy, and the arts. In its work, the initiative confronts some of the most challenging issues that face the world at this time, from the rise of authoritarianism, to artificial intelligence, to the erosion of the value of humanistic inquiry.
In pursuit of these research interests, the initiative houses an academic blog; publishes a series with the University of Notre Dame Press; and hosts in-person and online workshops, lectures, and conferences at Notre Dame and with partners across the world. The initiative has received major grants from the John Templeton Foundation, the Henry Luce Foundation, and other collaborators in pursuit of applied educational programs and scholarship, including the five-year Madrasa Discourses project. You can find out more about past activities of the initiative and contributors here.