Organisers: Conference by the Verein für Reformationsgeschichte / Society for Reformation History and the German Historical Institute, London

Venue: GHIL

The call for participation was key to the Reformation movement. While the modern term is commonly associated with individual agency and civic engagement, early modern understandings of participation encompassed a broader semantic range, extending from theological notions of partaking and of ecclesiological belonging to social, legal, and political forms of engagement. Christ participates in God’s attributes and Christians participate in divine salvation, in the Church and in the sacraments. At the same time, individuals and groups participated in multiple ways in movements for religious reform, inviting us to consider a wide range of actors, their motivations for and methods of engagement, and their integration into histories of the Reformation. The conference invites contributions that address, for the period from the late C.15th to the mid C.17th, questions such as: In what legal and political contexts did the term or concept of "participation" emerge, and how was it deployed? Did it function merely as a descriptive category, or did it carry ideological implications? In what spheres of religious, cultural, political, and economic life did participation assume practical significance? What participatory practices can we identify? And how did the Reformation, with its diverse dynamics, affect contemporary understandings of participation?

Themes might include (but are by no means limited to):

• Politics and participation.

• Law and participation.

• Prayer, liturgy and participation in religious practice.

• Women, gender and participation.

• Theological understandings of participation.

• Geographies of religious participation: local, regional, global.

We invite scholars from all fields of academic research to participate in a conference that will take place in London from the 30th September to the 2nd October 2027. We hope to be able to provide funding for travel and accommodation (applications to funding bodies are in progress).

Paper proposals (in German or English) accompanied by a 150-word abstract and a CV (no more than 2 pages of A4) are most welcome. Submissions can be sent to the following email-address by the 15th September 2026: info@reformationsgeschichte.de

Call for papers [PDF]