The Religion Factor

After intensive ethnographic and archaeobotanical research as part of our research project, we can identify some trends in the cereal crops of Odisha, India. First of all, it is clear that the new policies of the state, implemented by various governmental...

How and when did millets become so deeply entangled with the cultures and lifeworlds of the Parenga, the Didayi, and other millet-cultivating communities in the highlands of Odisha? Under what circumstances were various millets chosen to become part of the...

Nidhi Trivedi and Ashutosh Kumar, the two PhD researchers of the NWO project, have now each completed sixteen months of ethnographic research in two different Adivasi villages. They investigated how millets are embedded in the lifeworlds of the local...

The millet revival and associated new policies are encumbered by a fundamental and complex problem our research projects deal with: the disconnection of crops and culture. In Odisha, while millets are now celebrated as a “salvage crop” for the future, the...

Archaeobotanical and historical studies have shown that a changing fate of millets is not unprecedented (de Wet 2000, Fuller 2014, Fuller et al. 2010, Haaland 2011, Kingwell-Banham and Fuller 2012, Morrison 2016). During the Late Harappan period, for...

During his visit to the White House on June 21 2023, India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi was served “Marinated Millets” by his host, US President Joe Biden, an appreciation of the importance of the International Year of Millets 2023 that was launched by...

Afro-Brazilian religions that emerged in Brazil during the colonial period, significantly influenced by African spiritual traditions transmitted by enslaved people as well as Christianity and Amerindian belief systems. Many misconceptions surround these...

The 14th Dalai Lama's 90th birthday next year marks an auspicious moment in the history of modern Buddhism. Around this milestone, he will decide whether to reincarnate and, therefore, whether his lineage will continue. The current Dalai Lama, Tenzin...

The problem of acceptance for the LGBTQ+ community within secular society has been a controversial one, intensified by the empowerment movements of the late 20th century. The constant contradictions within especially conservative religions, make the...

In this post, I want to discuss a new form of spirituality that is emerging in contemporary Iran. Its followers do not choose a specific name for their community but emphasize that they are seekers of ‘Presencing Awareness’. This anonymity, I assume, stems...