Alienation

What is alienation? To what extent do states of alienation pose a challenge to what we commonly understand as identity? What potential can be found within the traditions of our culture to help shape a society in the 21st century in a constructive way? Within the framework of the theoretical analysis by the Jena-based sociologist Hartmut Rosa of modern ways of life, possibilities are discussed for incorporating forms of religiosity - as the culturally symbolic transmission of experiences - into a debate on alienation. What Rosa describes pejoratively as the 'late-modern resonance disaster of the resurgence of religion' is understood here not so much as a turning away from the subject of religious study, but rather as a call to seek out what resonates within forms of religiosity. The aim here is to transform these forms, to rethink them and to find a constructive contribution to the social and individual questions that concern us all.