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On the path to a capable and future-oriented dialogue among the cultures

Within the course of lectures "Humanismus im Dialog“ at the KWI ambassador of the Department for Foreign Affairs and special representative for “the dialogue among the cultures”, Heidrun Tempel, summed up a series of enduring projects established through the German foreign cultural and educational policy to help in supporting cultural exchange, downsizing prejudices and developing comprehension in cultural diversity. The lecture was moderated by Prof. Dr. Jürgen Straub.
Regarding to past global events and incidents Tempel points out the increasing awareness for foreign cultures and growing political interest in not only “islamic societies” but also in “eastern and far eastern societies”.  In accepting every event gains global consequences and the changing view on culture diversity the politics are trying to avoid the leaving of such events to chance by developing “the dialogue among the cultures” to abolish stereotypes and concepts of hatred and fear.  
In his annotation Prof. Dr. Jörn Rüsen, director of the Humanism Project, assesses politic is changing and culture is in this elementary change of structure central medium and agent of it. Thus politic is searching for universal principals of intercultural orientation to reach a consensus between the cultures.

 

"Humanism in Islam - An Intercultural Discourse" has ended successfully

In cooperation with the Goethe-Institute Egypt, the KWI-Project "Humanism in the Era of Globalization", which is supported by the Mercator Foundation, has arranged the international symposium "Humanism in Islam - An Intercultural Discourse" from April 6th to 8th 2009. Scholars from Egypt, Germany, India, Mexico, the Netherlands and Taiwan exceptionally took their part in this event, held in the Bibliotheca Alexandrina (the picture shows Jörn Rüsen, head of the Humanism-Project, to his right Ilse Lenz from Bochum and Oliver Kozlarek from Mexico). One of the most important aims of the Humanism-Project, a sharp outline of the cultural differences with regards to the understanding of the personhood of human beings, as well as an exploration of the possibility of an intercultural humanism, has been met. There was neither a lack of principles, nor one of controversies, and just because of that, the agreements in the analysis of the relationship between the Islamic countries and the West are so valuable.
The vitality of religion within the conflicts of our time has rarely been articulated as explicitly as in the debates between the muslim participators and the representatives of the secular cultures - but also among themselves. The muslim participators emphacized their religious traditions in opposition to the cultural dominance of the West with great selfconsciousness. On the other hand, the non-muslim participators were willing to accept and discuss these differences and to put them accross.

In the light of the emerging differences it was of great importance for the whole debate to show the chinese, indian and latin-american perspectives on humanism. Thus, the dabate was able to avoid the fatal narrowness of the very complicated East-West-antagonism and could attain a truly intercultural dimension. Naturally, there was no simple solution for these conflicts. But there was indeed an agreement on the existence of a basic face of humanity, exceeding all cultural differences.

The participation of Ibrahim Abouleish (winner of the Alternative Nobelprice and founder of the SEKEM-Project in Egypt), Heidrun Tempel (Commissioner for Cultural Dialogue of the German Dapartment for Foreign Affairs), Mohamed Shehat El-Gundi (Secretary-General of the Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs) and of the prominent Muslim Public Intellectual Gamal Al-Banna highly contributed to the characteristic quality of this event. Following the conference the head of the Humanism-Project, Jörn Rüsen, accompanied by the other participators of the symposium travelled to SEKEM, where they were given an introduction on this facility by its founder Ibrahim Abouleish.

 

International Symposium “Humanism in Islam - An Intercultural Discourse”

This Symposium is organised in corporation of the Bibliotheca Alexandrina, the Goethe-Institute in Egypt, and the project on "Humanism in the Era of Globalisation - an Intercultural Dialogue on Humanity, Culture and Values" of the Institute for Advanced Study in the Humanities (KWI) Essen/Germany. All three institutes agree upon the necessity of an intercultural valid humanism as an essential element of cultural orientation in the process of globalisation.
It is therefore high time to establish a dialogue between Western and non-Western civilizations on their interrelationship as well as their understanding of fundamental values and cultural identity and diversity so that cultural confrontations can be reduced and new shared insights and ways of recognition of the interrelation of civilizations may be developed, strengthened and demonstrated.
The Symposium contributes to this dialogue by thematizing the traditions of countries which are deeply influenced by Islam. It discusses the peculiarity of humanism in the context of these conditions and their topical importance for the lives of the people. It brings Islamic humanism into a discursive relationship to other humanistic traditions in Europe, India, China and Latin-America. By doing so it tackles the highly debated issue of the interrelationship of religion and secularism in respect to modern humanism. Middle Eastern and Western perspectives are brought together in a comparative perspective as well as in a perspective of mutual critique and recognition.
The Symposium is dedicated to the aim of renewing the different traditional humanisms and perpetuating them into the future of world society. Program
For further information and registration please contact Aladdin Sarhan, Coordinator of Humanism-Project at KWI: aladdin.sarhan@kwi-nrw.de ; see www.kwi-humanismus.de 
Marcel Siepmann, März 2009