Henning Laugerud | University of Bergen (original) (raw)
Books by Henning Laugerud
ANIMATION BETWEEN MAGIC, MIRACLES AND MECHANICS Principles of Life in Medieval Imagery, 2023
When it comes to images, we are all animists. Deep down, we all know that images can-at least pot... more When it comes to images, we are all animists. Deep down, we all know that images can-at least potentially-be alive or come to life. Now adays, we may tend to rationalize our ingrained animism and explain it away as a mere projection only happening in the space between image and viewer. In the Middle Ages, however, imagery made enthusiastic use of magical, miraculous and mechanical means of animation, empowered and ensouled by both natural and supernatural principles of life. This animist book investigates magic, miracles and mechanics as motors of animation and seeks to understand the living image in solidarity with medieval experience rather than dismissive alienation of it. Effigies did bleed, weep or lactate, either through divine intervention or through hydraulic machinery. Statues did move or speak, either as demonic oracles or as talking heads with implanted speaking tubes. Marvels made by magic or by miracles were real, as real as the wonders of physical mechanics moving bodily matter. We just need to look and listen more carefully to comprehend these fluid realities, even whenespecially when-they challenge our received worldview. Animation was by no means uncontested or uncontradicted, but even its stiffest critics knew that gods and demons could intervene in inanimate matter to set it in motion, to speak in tongues and exude the liquids of life. 2.0_Animation_Overtraek.indd 1 2.0_Animation_Overtraek.indd 1 31.
Religiøs tro og praksis i den dansk-norske helstat fra reformasjonen til opplysningstid, ca. 1500-1814, 2010
I prosjektet ønsker vi å studere de religiøse forhold i Danmark-Norge fra reformasjonen til opply... more I prosjektet ønsker vi å studere de religiøse forhold i Danmark-Norge
fra reformasjonen til opplysningstidens gjennombrudd. I denne sammenheng oppfatter vi at et dansk-norsk helhetsperspektiv er innlysende. De danske kongers riker var en kompleks størrelse både politisk og rettslig, men i et dansk-norsk perspektiv er det langt på vei grunn til å tenke i et helstatsperspektiv. Danmark og Norge delte konge, rikene hadde felles lover på de viktigste områder, preste- og embetsutdannelsen var felles, og det var den samme preste- og embetsstand i hele riket.
Northern European Reformations Transnational Perspectives, 2020
This book examines the experiences and interconnections of the Reformations, principally in Denma... more This book examines the experiences and interconnections of the Reformations, principally in Denmark-Norway and Britain and Ireland (but with an eye to the broader Scandinavian landscape as well), and also discusses instances of similarities between the Reformations in both realms. The volume features a comprehensive introduction, and provides a broad survey of the beginnings and progress of the Catholic and Protestant Reformations in Northern Europe, while also highlighting themes of comparison that are common to all of the bloc under consideration, which will be of interest to Reformation scholars across this geographical region.
Reformation without the People. Catholic Norway before and after the Reformation. Reformasjon uten folk. Det katolske Norge i før- og etterreformatorisk tid., 2018
Reformasjonen ble i Norge gjennomført som et kongelig dansk pålegg i 1536/-37. Fra da av skulle s... more Reformasjonen ble i Norge gjennomført som et kongelig dansk pålegg i 1536/-37. Fra da av skulle staten og dens borgere i det dansk-norske dobbeltmonarki bekjenne seg til den evangelisk-lutherske tro. Trosskiftet hang sammen med tap av nasjonal selvstendighet og kom som en omveltning uten forankring hverken i det folkelige eller i det nasjonale. Det var først fra 1537 at reformasjonsarbeidet startet, og dette var en lang prosess som kanskje ikke ble avsluttet før på 1800-tallet. Religionsskiftet dikterte et brudd med de religiøse og kulturelle praksiser og forestillinger som gjennom mer enn fem århundrer var blitt en innleiret del av folkets virkelighetsforståelse. Disse lot seg ikke uten videre utrydde. De hadde et langt etterliv hos befolkningen, men ble av den nye kulturelle og religiøse eliten omfortolket og utdefinert som overtro og trolldom. Motstanden mot reformasjonens innføring var både et grasrot fenomen og et nasjonalt og kirkelig prosjekt ledet av Norges siste erkebiskop, Olav Engelbrektsson. Senere ble Norge en del av Romas mot-reformatoriske strategi, alt mens befolkningen i mangt og meget fortsatte å praktisere sin tro på «gamlemåten». I denne boken presenteres den lange historien om trosskiftet i Norge i hele sin bredde. Her skildres det religiøse og politiske spillet rundt reformasjonens innførelse, fromhetslivet i norsk sen middelalder, katolske martyrer, hemmelige jesuittmisjonærer og vitale katolske tradisjoner i etterreformatorisk tid. Forfatteren presenterer hittil ukjent materiale så vel som kjent stoff i et nytt perspektiv. Denne historien har aldri tidligere vært samlet mellom to permer.
See URL link to webpage above ...
Review of Henning Laugerud, Salvador Ryan and Laura Katrine Skinnebach (eds), The Materiality of ... more Review of Henning Laugerud, Salvador Ryan and Laura Katrine Skinnebach (eds), The Materiality of Devotion in Late Medieval Northern Europe (Dublin: Four Courts Press, 2016)
The Saturated Sensorium Principles of Perception and Mediation in the Middle Ages., 2015
The Middle Ages integrated the human senses and unified their media into a culture of saturated s... more The Middle Ages integrated the human senses and unified their media into a culture of saturated sensation. The saturated sensoriùm nurtured principles of perception and mediation permeated with paradox, intersensorial entanglement, and multimodal interchange. This book addresses medieval modes of multi- and intermediality in material as well as immaterial culture and cultural history. It exemplifies the sensory and multisensory experiences sustained by medieval religion, art, archaeology, architecture, literature, liturgy, music, monasticism, miracles, cult, piety, love, eating, drinking, cognition, recollection, and burial. It ponders over perceptual practices performed as ritual, devotion, consumption (sacred or secular), memory, sanctity (in persons or percepts), church environment, sacramental imagery, romantic representation, and word-image-song-dance remediation. It illuminates the intertwined and compound character of the five Aristotelian categories of visus (sight), auditus (hearing), tactus (touch), olfactus (smell), and gustus (taste), showing that there was indeed far more to the senses and to sense experience than this classical categorisation might suggest. It aims to saturate our sense of medieval mediation beyond established modern and classical categories of communication.
Edited by Hans Henrik Lohfert Jørgensen, Henning Laugerud and Laura Katrine Skinnebach
With contributions by Hans Henrik Lohfert Jørgensen, Kristin Bliksrud Aavitsland, Brian Patrick McGuire, Jørgen Bruhn, Sigurd Kværndrup, Laura Katrine Skinnebach, Nils Holger Petersen, Mads Dengsø Jessen, Tim Flohr Sørensen, Jette Linaa and Henning Laugerud
This volume explores aspects of the devotional world of late medieval northern Europe, with a spe... more This volume explores aspects of the devotional world of late medieval northern Europe, with a special emphasis on how people interacted with texts, images, artefacts and other instruments of piety at the level of the senses. It focuses on the materiality of medieval religion and the manner in which Christians were encouraged to engage their senses in their devotional practices: gazing, hearing, touching, tasting and committing to memory. In so doing, it brings together the ideals of medieval mystical writing and the increasingly tangible and material practice of piety, which would become characteristic of the period.
Contributors: Berndt Hamm (U Erlangen-Nürnberg); Rob Faesen (KU Leuven); Henning Laugerud (U Bergen); Salvador Ryan (SPCM); Laura Skinnebach (U Bergen); Soetkin Vanhauwaert and Georg Geml (KU Leuven); Barbara Baert (KU Leuven); Hans Henrik Jørgensen (U Aarhus).
Henning Laugerud is associate professor at the Department of Linguistics, Literary and Aesthetic Studies, U Bergen. Salvador Ryan is professor of ecclesiastical history at St Patrick’s College, Maynooth. Dr Laura Katrine Skinnebach is based at Aarhus University where she is the recent recipient of a Danish Research Council Postdoctoral Grant for Independent Research in the Humanities.
THIS VOLUME HAS NOW BEEN PUBLISHED - as of January 2016
This volume takes as its theme the devotional cultures of European Christianity, from the dawn of... more This volume takes as its theme the devotional cultures of European Christianity, from the dawn of the French Revolution to that later revolution which was the Second Vatican Council. At one level it deals with what might be called, in devotional terms, a ‘long nineteenth century’. The collection is divided into three parts. The first is composed of five essays that explore the theme of spiritual and devotional renewal in Norway, Ireland, Italy and France. The second part examines questions pertaining to devotional culture in the arts, with specific studies related to aspects of sacred music, iconography and architecture. The final part addresses the use of devotional instruments, respectively hymnody and religious emblems, to identify individuals and groups over and against a specified ‘other’, whether that ‘other’ be in 1850s’ England, 1930s’ Spain or 1970s’ Belfast. Many of the contributions were first presented as papers at a five-day workshop for the European Network on the Instruments of Devotion (ENID) held at St Patrick’s College, Thurles, Ireland, which culminated in an international conference on ‘The Material Culture of Catholic Devotion, c.1850–c.1950’ in January 2008.
Contributors: Henrik von Achen (U Bergen), Arne Bugge Amundsen (U Oslo), David J. Burn (Katholieke U, Leuven), Sheridan Gilley (U Durham), Eli Heldaas Seland (U Bergen), E. Frances King (QUB), Ewa Klekot (U Warsaw), Georgios Kordis (U Athens), Sarah Fiona Maclaren (Loyola U), Brendan McConvery (SPCM), Peter McGrail (Liverpool Hope U), Peter de Mey (Katholieke U, Leuven).
The so-called ‘return of religion’ in world-affairs has by now become rather obvious. The secular... more The so-called ‘return of religion’ in world-affairs has by now become rather obvious. The secularisation process in Western culture has proven, if not a myth, at least grossly overrated, and the weberian claim of ‘die Entzauberung der Welt’ is perhaps nothing more than a wishful myth. Belief and religion are certainly returning as focal concerns in modern philosophical debate. Interestingly, this ‘religious turn’ is most clearly seen in so-called post-modern or post-structuralist thinking. Today we are witnessing the dissolution of philosophical theories such as positivist scientism and marxism that thought they had definitively liquidated religion. After modernity, there are no more strong philosophical reasons either to be an atheist refusing religion or to be a theist refuting science.
This, or similar, attitudes form a common point of departure for all the contributors to this anthology, being the reason why we all feel that the studies of matters concerning religion in all aspects of life are of importance. Today’s situation in Europe illustrates the need for historical knowledge and perspective on culture and religion, particularly Christianity and all its denominational varieties. Christianity’s influence on and in European culture cannot be overestimated, particularly understood as a dynamic and multifaceted force.
The purpose of this anthology is to present a variety of studies on devotion and its instruments and to give a presentation of the work of ENID and its individual members. The aim of our work is to shed light on what we believe to be central aspects of Christianity and its influence on and in European cultures, and it is our hope that this anthology can present some new insights into the histories and cultures of Europe.
The European Network on the Instruments of Devotion or ENID, is an international research network coordinated from the University of Bergen, Norway. It focuses on the instrumentality of Christian piety and devotional practices, from 14th century devotio moderna to Vatican II in the 20th century. Scholars from aesthetics, history, art history, literature, musicology, philosophy and theology form a cross disciplinary group.
Special issue of ARV on Memory, Memory studies and Cultural Memory. Edited by Henning Laugerud. ... more Special issue of ARV on Memory, Memory studies and Cultural Memory. Edited by Henning Laugerud.
In various forms, the perspective of memory has held a central position in many areas of cultural-historical research since the beginning of the twentieth century. This perspective is, however, part of a long and complex tradition.
The theme of this issue of Arv is also memory, but in this yearbook, the focus is slightly shifted in relation to the earlier research interest in the collective, or the supra-individual memory. In this collection of contributions, the perspective – to a greater degree, but not solely – will be to look at memory
as something both individual and collective, and the way in which the “individual” and the “collective” can be said to meet – not always without resistance – in memory.
Reflections on memory, its art, meaning and significance, has a long tradition going back to antiquity, also in matters concerning human knowledge and understanding of culture.
We shall attempt to encircle the subject through a series of concrete examples from Antiquity, the Middle Ages and early modern times up to our near past, taken from the historic empirical material, where the examples also will serve as exempla in the classical rhetorical sense – namely as exemplary.
Norsk fritenkerhistorie 1500-1850. Oslo, Humanist forlag, 2001. Forord, Innledning og Del I, fra ... more Norsk fritenkerhistorie 1500-1850. Oslo, Humanist forlag, 2001. Forord, Innledning og Del I, fra s. 9-141.
Det hagioskopiske blikk. Bilder, syn og erkjennelse i høy- og senmiddelalder. Dr. grads avhandl... more Det hagioskopiske blikk. Bilder, syn og erkjennelse i høy- og senmiddelalder.
Dr. grads avhandling. Universitetet i Bergen. 2005.
Avhandlingen er en studie av den visuelle kulturen i høy- og senmiddelalderens Europa. Den tar utgangspunkt i freskesyklusen til Andrea di Bonaiuto fra slutten av 1300-tallet i kapitelsalen i dominikanerkonventet Sta. Maria Novella i Firenze i et forsøk på å avdekke periodens blikk. Avhandlingens sentrale fokus er å se i hvilke sammenhenger bilder ble diskutert for derved å finne frem til de erkjennelsesmessige sammenhenger de inngikk i. Avhandlingens målsetting er å (re-)konstruere en historisk-kulturell ”optikk”, og se på sammenhengene mellom bilder, syn og erkjennelse.
Hovedkonklusjonene i avhandlingen er at sansning i middelalderen ble sett på som en sentral, og muligens også den primære vei til Gudserkjennelse. Dette gjøres på bakgrunn av en gjennomgang av sentrale teologers behandling og diskusjon av bilder og bilders teologiske signifikans. Sentralt i denne sammenheng står Thomas av Aquino (ca. 1226-1274). Her finner man en forståelse av bildet som det som fører til prototypen, som vil si Kristus-Gud. Sentralt i denne forståelsen er det vi kan definere som det anagogiske blikk. Dette er et blikk som tar utgangspunkt i det sansbare og derfra beveger betrakteren seg til det ikke-sansbare guddommelige. Forholdet mellom den åndelige og konkrete betrakting er prosessuell, og synet spiller i begge former for beskuelse en grunnleggende rolle. Fysisk syn og åndelig syn befinner seg på ulike nivåer, men på den samme optiske skala, med glidende overganger fra det ene nivået til det andre. Fysisk syn og intellektuelt eller åndelig syn, og dermed erkjennelse, henger altså nært sammen. Dette gir det fysiske bilde nådeformidlende karakter.
Bildets erkjennelsesmessige betydning blir også i avhandlingen sett i forhold til middelalderens erindringskultur, og det argumenteres for at bildene i seg selv såvel som i samspill med omgivelsene i det sakrale rom har en retorisk funksjon. Den retoriske funksjon har som mål at bildets gjenstand, det som avbildes, skal lagres og ha en anagogisk funksjon i erindringen. Dette handler ikke om mnemoteknikk i en snever ”instrumentell” forstand. Erindringen er av erkjennelsesmessig karakter som dels peker bakover til Guds handlinger i historien, dels den aktuelle nåtidige betraktning og aktuelle handling som tilsist peker fremover mot frelsen. Bildene blir en ”synskanal” som i en viss forstand både er i og utenfor den menneskelige tid. Bildet blir et vindu til det guddommelige. Bildet er et uttrykk for det hellige som viser seg gjennom bildene i en uendelig kjede av tegn. Kommunikasjonen med det hellige, med Gud, er en strøm av tegn som flyter frem og tilbake mellom verden og evigheten gjennom bildet. Bildet blir et hellig tegn, et tegn i den troendes uendelige meningsfulle semiotiske univers. Vi kan altså forstå bildene, og det rom de befinner seg i, som en slags synsmaskin, et hagioskop, beregnet på å se det hellige.
Et sentralt teoretisk poeng i avhandlingene er å vise til bildenes familiaritet i middelalderen. Det vil si at det er en art ”likhet” mellom ulike former for bilder; fysiske, mentale, språklige osv. Denne bildenes familiaritet understreker bildenes betydningsmessige flertydighet og har dermed relevans for den aktuelle teoretiske fagdebatt, både i forhold til tolkningsteori og problematiseringen av moderne forestillinger om kunst, kunstverk og estetikk.
Papers by Henning Laugerud
Archivium Hibernicum - Irish Historical Records, 2024
The aim of this article is modest: simply to further knowledge about this intriguing saint and he... more The aim of this article is modest: simply to further knowledge about this intriguing saint and her followers, a symbol of the close historical ties between Ireland and Norway, the Irish and the Norse, from the early to the later Middle Ages, which are a part of a multi-faceted rich history of relations between these two regions, far more interesting, varied, and complex than familiar accounts of the “Vikings” and the Battle of Clontarf. The story of St. Sunniva is a part of this history and might perhaps contribute to a more nuanced historiographical understanding also of the greater cultural environment of the North-Atlantic. The contribution start with the legend of St. Sunniva, the main story of her life, and works its way through the history of these traditions.
![Research paper thumbnail of IMAGES AS AGENTS [IMAGINES AGENTES] Memory and Animation](https://attachments.academia-assets.com/119165066/thumbnails/1.jpg)
](COMUNICAZIONI SOCIALIOMUNICAZIONI SOCIALI JOURNAL OF MEDIA, PERFORMING ARTS AND CULTURAL STUDIESJOURNAL OF MEDIA, PERFORMING ARTS AND CULTURAL STUDIES, 2024
I take my point of departure in one of the Norwegian painted altar-frontals from the 13th century... more I take my point of departure in one of the Norwegian painted altar-frontals from the 13th century, from the church in Kinsarvik, and the early 14th Century Crucifix from the church of Fana outside of Bergen, and through these two specific medieval examples try to unravel some aspects of this animated and performative image culture, and the animated potential of common images and imagery through the lens of memory. Which is not just an important cognitive function of the human mind, but also a crucial cultural system. Memory makes up the cognitive environment and fundamental matrix of thinking. I argue that both the two-dimensional painted altar-frontal, and the three-dimensional ‘hyper-realistic’ sculpture might have worked as ‘image agents’ [imagines agentes], images with agency, through the movement of- and in the image user’s memory, that may be seen as a nexus between the outer and inner images and as such as a bodily and enlivening agent. Embodied and alive – articulating the performative and productive quality (or potential) of memoria, in a movement of dialogical transfiguration as animated and animating image(s). In the medieval image culture animation might be seen as a ‘total cultural fact’ – at the core of the cognitive environment of imagery – animating and animated. Animation is not only in the mind of the beholder, but in the epistemology, creation, interaction, and materiality of images. Images are embedded in social action, and animation is deeply constitutive of the production of meaning. Animation relates to the ontology of images and is a fundamental aspect of the life with images – in the pre-modern as well as today.
Aarhus University Press eBooks, Aug 17, 2023
De Gruyter eBooks, Nov 19, 2018
ANIMATION BETWEEN MAGIC, MIRACLES AND MECHANICS Principles of Life in Medieval Imagery, 2023
When it comes to images, we are all animists. Deep down, we all know that images can-at least pot... more When it comes to images, we are all animists. Deep down, we all know that images can-at least potentially-be alive or come to life. Now adays, we may tend to rationalize our ingrained animism and explain it away as a mere projection only happening in the space between image and viewer. In the Middle Ages, however, imagery made enthusiastic use of magical, miraculous and mechanical means of animation, empowered and ensouled by both natural and supernatural principles of life. This animist book investigates magic, miracles and mechanics as motors of animation and seeks to understand the living image in solidarity with medieval experience rather than dismissive alienation of it. Effigies did bleed, weep or lactate, either through divine intervention or through hydraulic machinery. Statues did move or speak, either as demonic oracles or as talking heads with implanted speaking tubes. Marvels made by magic or by miracles were real, as real as the wonders of physical mechanics moving bodily matter. We just need to look and listen more carefully to comprehend these fluid realities, even whenespecially when-they challenge our received worldview. Animation was by no means uncontested or uncontradicted, but even its stiffest critics knew that gods and demons could intervene in inanimate matter to set it in motion, to speak in tongues and exude the liquids of life. 2.0_Animation_Overtraek.indd 1 2.0_Animation_Overtraek.indd 1 31.
Religiøs tro og praksis i den dansk-norske helstat fra reformasjonen til opplysningstid, ca. 1500-1814, 2010
I prosjektet ønsker vi å studere de religiøse forhold i Danmark-Norge fra reformasjonen til opply... more I prosjektet ønsker vi å studere de religiøse forhold i Danmark-Norge
fra reformasjonen til opplysningstidens gjennombrudd. I denne sammenheng oppfatter vi at et dansk-norsk helhetsperspektiv er innlysende. De danske kongers riker var en kompleks størrelse både politisk og rettslig, men i et dansk-norsk perspektiv er det langt på vei grunn til å tenke i et helstatsperspektiv. Danmark og Norge delte konge, rikene hadde felles lover på de viktigste områder, preste- og embetsutdannelsen var felles, og det var den samme preste- og embetsstand i hele riket.
Northern European Reformations Transnational Perspectives, 2020
This book examines the experiences and interconnections of the Reformations, principally in Denma... more This book examines the experiences and interconnections of the Reformations, principally in Denmark-Norway and Britain and Ireland (but with an eye to the broader Scandinavian landscape as well), and also discusses instances of similarities between the Reformations in both realms. The volume features a comprehensive introduction, and provides a broad survey of the beginnings and progress of the Catholic and Protestant Reformations in Northern Europe, while also highlighting themes of comparison that are common to all of the bloc under consideration, which will be of interest to Reformation scholars across this geographical region.
Reformation without the People. Catholic Norway before and after the Reformation. Reformasjon uten folk. Det katolske Norge i før- og etterreformatorisk tid., 2018
Reformasjonen ble i Norge gjennomført som et kongelig dansk pålegg i 1536/-37. Fra da av skulle s... more Reformasjonen ble i Norge gjennomført som et kongelig dansk pålegg i 1536/-37. Fra da av skulle staten og dens borgere i det dansk-norske dobbeltmonarki bekjenne seg til den evangelisk-lutherske tro. Trosskiftet hang sammen med tap av nasjonal selvstendighet og kom som en omveltning uten forankring hverken i det folkelige eller i det nasjonale. Det var først fra 1537 at reformasjonsarbeidet startet, og dette var en lang prosess som kanskje ikke ble avsluttet før på 1800-tallet. Religionsskiftet dikterte et brudd med de religiøse og kulturelle praksiser og forestillinger som gjennom mer enn fem århundrer var blitt en innleiret del av folkets virkelighetsforståelse. Disse lot seg ikke uten videre utrydde. De hadde et langt etterliv hos befolkningen, men ble av den nye kulturelle og religiøse eliten omfortolket og utdefinert som overtro og trolldom. Motstanden mot reformasjonens innføring var både et grasrot fenomen og et nasjonalt og kirkelig prosjekt ledet av Norges siste erkebiskop, Olav Engelbrektsson. Senere ble Norge en del av Romas mot-reformatoriske strategi, alt mens befolkningen i mangt og meget fortsatte å praktisere sin tro på «gamlemåten». I denne boken presenteres den lange historien om trosskiftet i Norge i hele sin bredde. Her skildres det religiøse og politiske spillet rundt reformasjonens innførelse, fromhetslivet i norsk sen middelalder, katolske martyrer, hemmelige jesuittmisjonærer og vitale katolske tradisjoner i etterreformatorisk tid. Forfatteren presenterer hittil ukjent materiale så vel som kjent stoff i et nytt perspektiv. Denne historien har aldri tidligere vært samlet mellom to permer.
See URL link to webpage above ...
Review of Henning Laugerud, Salvador Ryan and Laura Katrine Skinnebach (eds), The Materiality of ... more Review of Henning Laugerud, Salvador Ryan and Laura Katrine Skinnebach (eds), The Materiality of Devotion in Late Medieval Northern Europe (Dublin: Four Courts Press, 2016)
The Saturated Sensorium Principles of Perception and Mediation in the Middle Ages., 2015
The Middle Ages integrated the human senses and unified their media into a culture of saturated s... more The Middle Ages integrated the human senses and unified their media into a culture of saturated sensation. The saturated sensoriùm nurtured principles of perception and mediation permeated with paradox, intersensorial entanglement, and multimodal interchange. This book addresses medieval modes of multi- and intermediality in material as well as immaterial culture and cultural history. It exemplifies the sensory and multisensory experiences sustained by medieval religion, art, archaeology, architecture, literature, liturgy, music, monasticism, miracles, cult, piety, love, eating, drinking, cognition, recollection, and burial. It ponders over perceptual practices performed as ritual, devotion, consumption (sacred or secular), memory, sanctity (in persons or percepts), church environment, sacramental imagery, romantic representation, and word-image-song-dance remediation. It illuminates the intertwined and compound character of the five Aristotelian categories of visus (sight), auditus (hearing), tactus (touch), olfactus (smell), and gustus (taste), showing that there was indeed far more to the senses and to sense experience than this classical categorisation might suggest. It aims to saturate our sense of medieval mediation beyond established modern and classical categories of communication.
Edited by Hans Henrik Lohfert Jørgensen, Henning Laugerud and Laura Katrine Skinnebach
With contributions by Hans Henrik Lohfert Jørgensen, Kristin Bliksrud Aavitsland, Brian Patrick McGuire, Jørgen Bruhn, Sigurd Kværndrup, Laura Katrine Skinnebach, Nils Holger Petersen, Mads Dengsø Jessen, Tim Flohr Sørensen, Jette Linaa and Henning Laugerud
This volume explores aspects of the devotional world of late medieval northern Europe, with a spe... more This volume explores aspects of the devotional world of late medieval northern Europe, with a special emphasis on how people interacted with texts, images, artefacts and other instruments of piety at the level of the senses. It focuses on the materiality of medieval religion and the manner in which Christians were encouraged to engage their senses in their devotional practices: gazing, hearing, touching, tasting and committing to memory. In so doing, it brings together the ideals of medieval mystical writing and the increasingly tangible and material practice of piety, which would become characteristic of the period.
Contributors: Berndt Hamm (U Erlangen-Nürnberg); Rob Faesen (KU Leuven); Henning Laugerud (U Bergen); Salvador Ryan (SPCM); Laura Skinnebach (U Bergen); Soetkin Vanhauwaert and Georg Geml (KU Leuven); Barbara Baert (KU Leuven); Hans Henrik Jørgensen (U Aarhus).
Henning Laugerud is associate professor at the Department of Linguistics, Literary and Aesthetic Studies, U Bergen. Salvador Ryan is professor of ecclesiastical history at St Patrick’s College, Maynooth. Dr Laura Katrine Skinnebach is based at Aarhus University where she is the recent recipient of a Danish Research Council Postdoctoral Grant for Independent Research in the Humanities.
THIS VOLUME HAS NOW BEEN PUBLISHED - as of January 2016
This volume takes as its theme the devotional cultures of European Christianity, from the dawn of... more This volume takes as its theme the devotional cultures of European Christianity, from the dawn of the French Revolution to that later revolution which was the Second Vatican Council. At one level it deals with what might be called, in devotional terms, a ‘long nineteenth century’. The collection is divided into three parts. The first is composed of five essays that explore the theme of spiritual and devotional renewal in Norway, Ireland, Italy and France. The second part examines questions pertaining to devotional culture in the arts, with specific studies related to aspects of sacred music, iconography and architecture. The final part addresses the use of devotional instruments, respectively hymnody and religious emblems, to identify individuals and groups over and against a specified ‘other’, whether that ‘other’ be in 1850s’ England, 1930s’ Spain or 1970s’ Belfast. Many of the contributions were first presented as papers at a five-day workshop for the European Network on the Instruments of Devotion (ENID) held at St Patrick’s College, Thurles, Ireland, which culminated in an international conference on ‘The Material Culture of Catholic Devotion, c.1850–c.1950’ in January 2008.
Contributors: Henrik von Achen (U Bergen), Arne Bugge Amundsen (U Oslo), David J. Burn (Katholieke U, Leuven), Sheridan Gilley (U Durham), Eli Heldaas Seland (U Bergen), E. Frances King (QUB), Ewa Klekot (U Warsaw), Georgios Kordis (U Athens), Sarah Fiona Maclaren (Loyola U), Brendan McConvery (SPCM), Peter McGrail (Liverpool Hope U), Peter de Mey (Katholieke U, Leuven).
The so-called ‘return of religion’ in world-affairs has by now become rather obvious. The secular... more The so-called ‘return of religion’ in world-affairs has by now become rather obvious. The secularisation process in Western culture has proven, if not a myth, at least grossly overrated, and the weberian claim of ‘die Entzauberung der Welt’ is perhaps nothing more than a wishful myth. Belief and religion are certainly returning as focal concerns in modern philosophical debate. Interestingly, this ‘religious turn’ is most clearly seen in so-called post-modern or post-structuralist thinking. Today we are witnessing the dissolution of philosophical theories such as positivist scientism and marxism that thought they had definitively liquidated religion. After modernity, there are no more strong philosophical reasons either to be an atheist refusing religion or to be a theist refuting science.
This, or similar, attitudes form a common point of departure for all the contributors to this anthology, being the reason why we all feel that the studies of matters concerning religion in all aspects of life are of importance. Today’s situation in Europe illustrates the need for historical knowledge and perspective on culture and religion, particularly Christianity and all its denominational varieties. Christianity’s influence on and in European culture cannot be overestimated, particularly understood as a dynamic and multifaceted force.
The purpose of this anthology is to present a variety of studies on devotion and its instruments and to give a presentation of the work of ENID and its individual members. The aim of our work is to shed light on what we believe to be central aspects of Christianity and its influence on and in European cultures, and it is our hope that this anthology can present some new insights into the histories and cultures of Europe.
The European Network on the Instruments of Devotion or ENID, is an international research network coordinated from the University of Bergen, Norway. It focuses on the instrumentality of Christian piety and devotional practices, from 14th century devotio moderna to Vatican II in the 20th century. Scholars from aesthetics, history, art history, literature, musicology, philosophy and theology form a cross disciplinary group.
Special issue of ARV on Memory, Memory studies and Cultural Memory. Edited by Henning Laugerud. ... more Special issue of ARV on Memory, Memory studies and Cultural Memory. Edited by Henning Laugerud.
In various forms, the perspective of memory has held a central position in many areas of cultural-historical research since the beginning of the twentieth century. This perspective is, however, part of a long and complex tradition.
The theme of this issue of Arv is also memory, but in this yearbook, the focus is slightly shifted in relation to the earlier research interest in the collective, or the supra-individual memory. In this collection of contributions, the perspective – to a greater degree, but not solely – will be to look at memory
as something both individual and collective, and the way in which the “individual” and the “collective” can be said to meet – not always without resistance – in memory.
Reflections on memory, its art, meaning and significance, has a long tradition going back to antiquity, also in matters concerning human knowledge and understanding of culture.
We shall attempt to encircle the subject through a series of concrete examples from Antiquity, the Middle Ages and early modern times up to our near past, taken from the historic empirical material, where the examples also will serve as exempla in the classical rhetorical sense – namely as exemplary.
Norsk fritenkerhistorie 1500-1850. Oslo, Humanist forlag, 2001. Forord, Innledning og Del I, fra ... more Norsk fritenkerhistorie 1500-1850. Oslo, Humanist forlag, 2001. Forord, Innledning og Del I, fra s. 9-141.
Det hagioskopiske blikk. Bilder, syn og erkjennelse i høy- og senmiddelalder. Dr. grads avhandl... more Det hagioskopiske blikk. Bilder, syn og erkjennelse i høy- og senmiddelalder.
Dr. grads avhandling. Universitetet i Bergen. 2005.
Avhandlingen er en studie av den visuelle kulturen i høy- og senmiddelalderens Europa. Den tar utgangspunkt i freskesyklusen til Andrea di Bonaiuto fra slutten av 1300-tallet i kapitelsalen i dominikanerkonventet Sta. Maria Novella i Firenze i et forsøk på å avdekke periodens blikk. Avhandlingens sentrale fokus er å se i hvilke sammenhenger bilder ble diskutert for derved å finne frem til de erkjennelsesmessige sammenhenger de inngikk i. Avhandlingens målsetting er å (re-)konstruere en historisk-kulturell ”optikk”, og se på sammenhengene mellom bilder, syn og erkjennelse.
Hovedkonklusjonene i avhandlingen er at sansning i middelalderen ble sett på som en sentral, og muligens også den primære vei til Gudserkjennelse. Dette gjøres på bakgrunn av en gjennomgang av sentrale teologers behandling og diskusjon av bilder og bilders teologiske signifikans. Sentralt i denne sammenheng står Thomas av Aquino (ca. 1226-1274). Her finner man en forståelse av bildet som det som fører til prototypen, som vil si Kristus-Gud. Sentralt i denne forståelsen er det vi kan definere som det anagogiske blikk. Dette er et blikk som tar utgangspunkt i det sansbare og derfra beveger betrakteren seg til det ikke-sansbare guddommelige. Forholdet mellom den åndelige og konkrete betrakting er prosessuell, og synet spiller i begge former for beskuelse en grunnleggende rolle. Fysisk syn og åndelig syn befinner seg på ulike nivåer, men på den samme optiske skala, med glidende overganger fra det ene nivået til det andre. Fysisk syn og intellektuelt eller åndelig syn, og dermed erkjennelse, henger altså nært sammen. Dette gir det fysiske bilde nådeformidlende karakter.
Bildets erkjennelsesmessige betydning blir også i avhandlingen sett i forhold til middelalderens erindringskultur, og det argumenteres for at bildene i seg selv såvel som i samspill med omgivelsene i det sakrale rom har en retorisk funksjon. Den retoriske funksjon har som mål at bildets gjenstand, det som avbildes, skal lagres og ha en anagogisk funksjon i erindringen. Dette handler ikke om mnemoteknikk i en snever ”instrumentell” forstand. Erindringen er av erkjennelsesmessig karakter som dels peker bakover til Guds handlinger i historien, dels den aktuelle nåtidige betraktning og aktuelle handling som tilsist peker fremover mot frelsen. Bildene blir en ”synskanal” som i en viss forstand både er i og utenfor den menneskelige tid. Bildet blir et vindu til det guddommelige. Bildet er et uttrykk for det hellige som viser seg gjennom bildene i en uendelig kjede av tegn. Kommunikasjonen med det hellige, med Gud, er en strøm av tegn som flyter frem og tilbake mellom verden og evigheten gjennom bildet. Bildet blir et hellig tegn, et tegn i den troendes uendelige meningsfulle semiotiske univers. Vi kan altså forstå bildene, og det rom de befinner seg i, som en slags synsmaskin, et hagioskop, beregnet på å se det hellige.
Et sentralt teoretisk poeng i avhandlingene er å vise til bildenes familiaritet i middelalderen. Det vil si at det er en art ”likhet” mellom ulike former for bilder; fysiske, mentale, språklige osv. Denne bildenes familiaritet understreker bildenes betydningsmessige flertydighet og har dermed relevans for den aktuelle teoretiske fagdebatt, både i forhold til tolkningsteori og problematiseringen av moderne forestillinger om kunst, kunstverk og estetikk.
Archivium Hibernicum - Irish Historical Records, 2024
The aim of this article is modest: simply to further knowledge about this intriguing saint and he... more The aim of this article is modest: simply to further knowledge about this intriguing saint and her followers, a symbol of the close historical ties between Ireland and Norway, the Irish and the Norse, from the early to the later Middle Ages, which are a part of a multi-faceted rich history of relations between these two regions, far more interesting, varied, and complex than familiar accounts of the “Vikings” and the Battle of Clontarf. The story of St. Sunniva is a part of this history and might perhaps contribute to a more nuanced historiographical understanding also of the greater cultural environment of the North-Atlantic. The contribution start with the legend of St. Sunniva, the main story of her life, and works its way through the history of these traditions.
COMUNICAZIONI SOCIALIOMUNICAZIONI SOCIALI JOURNAL OF MEDIA, PERFORMING ARTS AND CULTURAL STUDIESJOURNAL OF MEDIA, PERFORMING ARTS AND CULTURAL STUDIES, 2024
I take my point of departure in one of the Norwegian painted altar-frontals from the 13th century... more I take my point of departure in one of the Norwegian painted altar-frontals from the 13th century, from the church in Kinsarvik, and the early 14th Century Crucifix from the church of Fana outside of Bergen, and through these two specific medieval examples try to unravel some aspects of this animated and performative image culture, and the animated potential of common images and imagery through the lens of memory. Which is not just an important cognitive function of the human mind, but also a crucial cultural system. Memory makes up the cognitive environment and fundamental matrix of thinking. I argue that both the two-dimensional painted altar-frontal, and the three-dimensional ‘hyper-realistic’ sculpture might have worked as ‘image agents’ [imagines agentes], images with agency, through the movement of- and in the image user’s memory, that may be seen as a nexus between the outer and inner images and as such as a bodily and enlivening agent. Embodied and alive – articulating the performative and productive quality (or potential) of memoria, in a movement of dialogical transfiguration as animated and animating image(s). In the medieval image culture animation might be seen as a ‘total cultural fact’ – at the core of the cognitive environment of imagery – animating and animated. Animation is not only in the mind of the beholder, but in the epistemology, creation, interaction, and materiality of images. Images are embedded in social action, and animation is deeply constitutive of the production of meaning. Animation relates to the ontology of images and is a fundamental aspect of the life with images – in the pre-modern as well as today.
Aarhus University Press eBooks, Aug 17, 2023
De Gruyter eBooks, Nov 19, 2018
Konsthistorisk tidskrift, Sep 1, 2010
... tolkning. Om forståelsen av middelalderens bilder, København, 2003, s. 137–154, se også Hans ... more ... tolkning. Om forståelsen av middelalderens bilder, København, 2003, s. 137–154, se også Hans Henrik Lohfert Jørgensen, »Fra sløret glimt til åbenbaret syn«, i Mette Birkedal Bruun og Britt Istoft (red.), Undervejs mot Gud. Rummet ...
Kunst og kultur, Oct 27, 2016
Aarhus University Press eBooks, Jun 30, 2015
Material Religion, Oct 19, 2020
The Journal of Ecclesiastical History, 2021
The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this p... more The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, expressed or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
Images of Knowledge
The topic for Henning Laugerud’s contribution "The Optics of Understanding: Sight, sensi... more The topic for Henning Laugerud’s contribution "The Optics of Understanding: Sight, sensing and discourses of knowledge in early modern Europe" is what he terms “the optics of understanding”. His point of departure is in the importance of sight as a common feature in the discourses of knowledge and understanding in Europe in the sixteenth and seventeenth century. Laugerud questions certain understandings and ideas about historical development. He aims to shine light on some aspects of the period’s visual culture, the understanding of visual perception/ sensing and its wider epistemological and cultural consequences. Laugerud points to how discourses pertaining to the visual within “natural history”, the “arts” and “religion” were all concerned with knowledge and understanding of both this world and the next, the physical as well as the metaphysical. They were interconnected and had some important basic understandings in common, relating sight to the central cognitive faculties of man. The chapter closes with a discussion of the possible genealogy of these ways of thinking about knowledge and understanding.
Handbook of Pre-Modern Nordic Memory Studies
Northern European Reformations
In their chapter Henning Laugerud and John Odemark relate Danish-Norwegian material to the histor... more In their chapter Henning Laugerud and John Odemark relate Danish-Norwegian material to the historiography of the reform and acculturation of ‘popular cultures’ in a British, and broader European context. In particular, the authors are concerned with how the notion of superstitio was deployed to construct religious otherness in reformation polemics, and how reformation polemics contributed to the construction of the intellectual categories and objects of emerging studies of folklore and popular religion. Alexandra Walsham has shown that the British reformation discourse on superstition foreshadowed the study of folklore in Victorian and Edwardian Britain, not least because it was centred on ‘the realm of speech’ seen as ‘the natural habitat’ of superstition. Similarly, this chapter discusses the historical discourses about Catholicism as superstition, and examines the genealogy of one of the constitutive analytical categories of folklore, superstitio, in Denmark-Norway.
Handbook of Pre-Modern Nordic Memory Studies
Material Religion, 2020
A short presentation of the Collection of Medieval and Early Modern Church Art at the University ... more A short presentation of the Collection of Medieval and Early Modern Church Art at the University Museum in Bergen, Norway. Particularly the medieval collection is of great historical significance and quite unique.
Material Religion, 2017
engagement with recent evidence from arguably the most famous Roman sacred grove, that of Diana a... more engagement with recent evidence from arguably the most famous Roman sacred grove, that of Diana at Nemi where pilgrims hung offerings from branches and from where the now infamous myth of the rex Nemorensis and the so-called “golden bough” originates. This is perhaps a consequence of Hunt’s emphasis on the power of trees in the imagination, rather than in lived experience. There is also a tendency at times to over-emphasize the significance of observations derived from one tree or one case study, and to extend these uncritically to “the Roman imagination,” “Roman thinking,” “Roman thinkers,” and “the Roman world” when it is not always clear that this wider application is sustainable. Despite this, however, the book demands to be read by anyone serious about “reviving Roman religion.”
I 2004 og 2005 gjennomførte undertegnede to prosjekter på oppdrag fra Riksantikvaren, Stavkirkepr... more I 2004 og 2005 gjennomførte undertegnede to prosjekter på oppdrag fra Riksantikvaren, Stavkirkeprogrammet. Resultatet av dette arbeidet foreligger i de to prosjektrapportene som publiseres her.
Det første prosjektet, i 2004, var en vurdering den kultur- og kunsthistoriske verdi til kirkekunsten i stavkirkene. Prosjektet omhandlet kirkekunsten i stavkirkene i Numedal og Sogn. Målet med prosjektet var å gjennomføre en ”grov-vurdering”, samt at eventuelle viktige fordypningsfelt skulle påpekes. Det andre prosjektet, i 2005, var en undersøkelse av kirkeutsmykningen i Rollag stavkirke i Numedal, sett i en større kultur- og kunsthistorisk sammenheng. Prosjektet var en første undersøkelse for å ta opp noen av de foreslåtte fordypningsfelt fra den første rapporten, i en konkret studie. Heller ikke her ble det lagt opp til et omfattende arbeid, men til en begrenset enkeltstudie for å tematisere og eksemplifisere de problemstillinger ”stavkirkematerialet” kan reise.
This book addresses medieval modes of multi-and intermediality in material as well as immaterial ... more This book addresses medieval modes of multi-and intermediality in material as well as immaterial culture and cultural history. It exemplifies the sensory and multisensory experiences sustained by medieval religion,
This volume explores aspects of the devotional world of late medieval northern Europe, with a spe... more This volume explores aspects of the devotional world of late medieval northern Europe, with a special emphasis on how people interacted with texts, images, artefacts and other instruments of piety at the level of the senses. It focuses on the materiality of medieval religion and the manner in which Christians were encouraged to engage their senses in their devotional practices: gazing, hearing, touching, tasting and committing to memory. In so doing, it brings together the ideals of medieval mystical writing and the increasingly tangible and material practice of piety, which would become characteristic of the period. Four Courts Press.
Irish Theological Quarterly, 2019
Statement: This conference is concerned with the agency and life of material objects and evolves ... more Statement:
This conference is concerned with the agency and life of material objects and evolves around the investigation of two interlaced objectives. First, the conference will shed light on understudied aspects of medieval visual culture, focusing in particular on the agency of images and material objects. Second, it will provide new cutting-edge theoretical reflections and methodologies concerning the study of material agency and “living images” today. We argue that the cultural use of and interaction with images may be regarded as more than mere historically or culturally specific phenomena. Rather, it concerns the ontology of images and constitutes a fundamental aspect of our life with images,
in the pre-modern as well as in the contemporary. It is our contention that images are embedded in social interaction and that animation is deeply constitutive of the production of meaning. Animation, we argue, is not only located in the mind of the beholder, but in the epistemology, creation, interaction and materiality of images. Furthermore, we will argue that medieval animation may inform contemporary views on animation and provide us with a more precise vocabulary to capture current phenomena for instance in the digital world. The conference aim to be interdisciplinary and trans-historical in itsperspective and targets scholars of visual studies, material studies, study of religions, anthropology, medieval studies and theology. It is also relevant
more generally for current discussions about the life and agency of seemingly dead matter.
Program for the conference, 2022
Valkendorf Conference, 2022
In November 1522 Erik Valkendorf, the metropolitan archbishop of Nidaros, died in Rome. He had tr... more In November 1522 Erik Valkendorf, the metropolitan archbishop of Nidaros, died in Rome. He had travelled to the Holy See to discuss King Christian II's curtailment of ecclesiastical jurisdiction in the realm of Denmark-Norway, and to get papal support in his fight against the expansive monarch. Arriving in Rome early in 1522, Valkendorf found the ambitious new basilica at the Vatican under construction and the chair of St. Peter vacant. It took almost a year before the newly elected Pope Hadrian VI made it to Rome and took up his office. Before the pontiff was ready to receive his archbishop from the far north, Valkendorf had left this world. The pope praised him posthumously for his loyalty and endurance in fighting for libertas ecclesiae, the freedom of the church. His longstanding conflict to royal power made Valkendorf's secretary compare him to St. Thomas Becket.
ENID 20th Anniversery Jubilee Conference: Relics and Reliquaries - Seeing is Believing., 2023
In is Dialogus Miraculorum from around 1220, Caesarius of Heisterbach tells a story about a pious... more In is Dialogus Miraculorum from around 1220, Caesarius of Heisterbach tells a story about a pious knight and a fraudulent priest. The knight had a deep devotion to St. Thomas Becket and wanted more than anything else to obtain some relics of him. The dishonest priest got hold of this information, went to the knight, and claimed that he had some horse’s reins that had belonged to the saint and that they often had worked great miracles for him. The knight paid the priest handsomely for these false relics. However, as Caesarius writes: “God to Whom nothing is impossible, willing to reward the faith of the knight, deigned to perform many miracles in honour of His martyr by means of this bridle.” In the end he built a church to house the relics. Caesarius introduces this story with the following: “In my judgment ignorance in such matters excuses the fault; and piety always wins grace (pietas meritur gratiam). It is certain that this seems to be true, since sometimes the Lord works miracles through false relics to the honour of the saints to whom they are ascribed, and for those who do honour to them in good faith.”
There is, at least, two things we can learn from this: The one is the obvious belief in Gods possibilities to work wonders the way he pleases, and that the final test is always the devout persons piety. The other one is equally obvious; the relics were false and Caesarius and his readers knew it. Another example, if less edifying, is “The Pardoners Tale” from Chaucers Canterbury Tales. Where the topic, among other things, are fraudulent relics and swindlers making money on it. There was an outspoken concern about these questions in the Middle Ages. Everybody knew the possibility of fraud. Medieval people where not gullible idiots. The veracity of miracles and relics were constantly questioned, but they did of course believe in the possible reality of such occurrences. It cannot be claimed that these stories of saints, relics and their miracles are just really something else, like hallucinations, cynical trickery or other phenomena that might be given as fanciful modern quasi-psychological explanations. The belief in saints and their relics are simply grounded in a different understanding and worldview than what is the dominant contemporary one.
Taking the question of relics and miracles – and their veracity – as a point of departure. My aim in this paper is to use a “Skinnerian” approach, or what we somewhat loosely could describe as a “post-colonial” perspective on the medieval past. We must avoid what Herbert Butterfield defined as the “Whig fallacy” in his classic study from1931, viewing the past through the lens of modern thought: an idea of progressivism that projects itself upon the past. I want to take the past seriously, accepting what they hold to be true and their belief systems as rational. We need to accept that our sense of reality is not epistemologically superior to or more truthful than that of the periods we study.
Materialities and Devotion - Medieval Europe in Motion V, 2019
The bodily, material and sensual (in all meanings of this word) was a significant aspect of medie... more The bodily, material and sensual (in all meanings of this word) was a significant aspect of medieval devotions. Such embodied devotional practices were closely connected to memory and mnemotechnical practices. Memory worked on different but interlaced levels, structured around a set of visual concepts and figurations that involved the whole sensorium. In this context, images of all kinds were crucial. In this paper, I will take a closer look at the relation between visions, the visual and memory, to understand the possible “devotional agency” of images. How “viewing” was not only a matter of interpretation or cognition, but also a transformative process. The visionary mystic of the Middle Ages is in this respect a kind of “prototype” for a more general devotional goal open to all and sundry though their engagement by and with images.