University of Bayreuth graduate receives Bavarian Culture Prize

Dr Benedikt Römer's dissertation examines the growing community of Persian-speaking evangelical Christians in Iran since the 1990s. This community has experienced considerable repression by the government of the Islamic Republic of Iran, prompting many to emigrate into exile and found Persian-speaking diaspora churches there. The work analyses publications and media productions of these exile churches, in particular five magazine series and 70 hours of video material, in order to examine the conceptions of an "Iranian-Christian" national identity. Iranian evangelical Christians reinterpret central aspects of Iranian cultural heritage and thus externalise the claim of Iranian Christianity to a firm place in Iran's national self-image. A further focus of the thesis is to examine the link between religious practice and exile, with Iranian evangelicals seeing their expulsion as part of a divine plan that could lead to a return to Iran or the 'Christianisation' of Iran. The dissertation offers a unique insight into the religious landscape and complexities of the Iranian evangelical community and thus contributes to a better understanding of this issue.

"Working in the junior research group at the University of Bayreuth was a very formative time for me. I am very grateful for the support and supervision I received from Prof Paula Schrode and Dr Benjamin Weineck," says the Bayreuth prizewinner. After the end of his work in the BMBF-funded junior research group "Contemporary Islamic Cultures" at the University of Bayreuth, Dr Römer moved to the newly founded Institute of Cultural Studies at the University of the Federal Armed Forces in Munich. Here he works as a research assistant at the Chair of Religious Studies, specialising in Islam.