RelSciCom 2026

Inter­na­tion­al Online Work­shops for PhD and Post­grad­u­ate Stu­dents – organ­ised by REMID e.V. and INFORM

What is the point of your PhD? What is the point of being an expert? How can you demon­strate your knowl­edge to poten­tial employ­ers both inside and out­side acad­e­mia? This series of work­shops will help you to artic­u­late the impor­tance of well-researched social sci­en­tif­ic infor­ma­tion and direct­ly con­tribute to knowl­edge cre­ation, includ­ing through social media and data­bas­es. 

Acad­e­mia car­ries civic respon­si­bil­i­ty to con­tribute crit­i­cal per­spec­tives on reli­gion and world­views to the pub­lic sphere. It is not easy to com­mu­ni­cate evi­dence-based research find­ings to the pub­lic, but it is more impor­tant than ever in con­tem­po­rary times, where knowl­edge is fierce­ly con­test­ed and false infor­ma­tion and ‘fake news’ leads to a cri­sis of exper­tise. These work­shops will give you the con­fi­dence and the skills to enter these pub­lic debates. 

When and what?

RelSci­Com 2026 is a coop­er­a­tion between INFORM and REMID e.V. It is a series of four work­shop days dur­ing which par­tic­i­pants will learn how, why, and through which media they can com­mu­ni­cate their research to the gen­er­al pub­lic. Each work­shop will include a pan­el dis­cus­sion with expe­ri­enced researchers, a ses­sion to learn tech­niques and meth­ods of trans­form­ing aca­d­e­m­ic research to pub­lic knowl­edge, and a ses­sion to put the new­ly acquired meth­ods to prac­tice. 

Par­tic­i­pants can sign up for one work­shop, or for all four, in which case they will receive a cer­tifi­cate of par­tic­i­pa­tion. Par­tic­i­pants must be PhD stu­dents reg­is­tered at either a British or Ger­man Uni­ver­si­ty. Work­shop dates are 16^th Jan­u­ary; 13^th Feb­ru­ary; 13^th March; 17^th April 2026. 

Workshop contents

Why Go Public?

The first in the series of work­shops will serve as an intro­duc­tion to the series, to the organ­is­ing par­ties, and to the impor­tance of going pub­lic with research. 

Both Inform and REMID e.v. have a knowl­edge exchange and sci­ence com­mu­ni­ca­tion mis­sion at their core. Inform was found­ed on the basis of mak­ing aca­d­e­m­ic research about reli­gious move­ments pub­licly acces­si­ble in order to reduce harm caused by mis­in­for­ma­tion. This remit remains as impor­tant as ever in con­tem­po­rary soci­ety in which mis­in­for­ma­tion abounds and con­tributes to polar­i­sa­tion. REMID is the cen­tral point of con­tact in Ger­many for trans­par­ent and well-found­ed sci­en­tif­ic com­mu­ni­ca­tion on reli­gion-relat­ed top­ics from a val­ue-neu­tral per­spec­tive. 

How­ev­er, ful­fill­ing this remit takes the courage of schol­ars to step beyond the con­fines of the ‘ivory tow­er’ and engage in pub­lic dis­cus­sions and the dis­sem­i­na­tion of their research beyond acad­e­mia. Whilst this is an impor­tant part of a scholar’s ‘impact’, the prac­ti­cal­i­ties of how to do it might not always be well cov­ered in stu­dents’ degree pro­grammes.

This work­shop will pro­vide dis­cus­sions and train­ing from schol­ars with lived expe­ri­ence of shar­ing their research with the pub­lic.

Self-Marketing and Social Media

In the sec­ond work­shop, you will learn how to self-mar­ket your research through social media. Experts will dis­cuss var­i­ous media plat­forms includ­ing web­sites, YouTube and Insta­gram. In the prac­ti­cal ses­sion, our expe­ri­enced expert will offer a prac­ti­cal work­shop that enables you to under­stand the pos­si­bil­i­ties of max­imis­ing YouTube and Insta­gram for both research and knowl­edge exchange, includ­ing such ques­tions as:

• How can I get start­ed? What should I con­sid­er before­hand?
• How do the plat­forms dif­fer and what pos­si­bil­i­ties do they offer?
• To what extent do I need to adapt to the rules of the plat­forms in order to com­mu­ni­cate sci­ence suc­cess­ful­ly?
• How do I find the right for­mat for me?
• How do I reach the intend­ed tar­get audi­ence? How do I grow that audi­ence?

Publishing in Databases & Public Source Data

Pub­lish­ing in select data­bas­es and project web­sites is an impor­tant way ear­ly career schol­ars can net­work with more senior schol­ars, estab­lish a pub­li­ca­tion record and con­tribute to more accu­rate pub­lic under­stand­ing. 

This work­shop will dis­cuss how to get direct­ly involved in knowl­edge cre­ation in the aca­d­e­m­ic study of reli­gions with atten­tion to strate­gic uses of time. Top­ics cov­ered will include pos­si­bil­i­ties for direct remu­ner­a­tion and ways of lever­ag­ing the ideas and net­works engaged in these activ­i­ties for fram­ing future grant appli­ca­tions and estab­lish­ing ongo­ing part­ner­ships for pub­lic engage­ment and impact. 

Specif­i­cal­ly we will look at the Data­base of Reli­gious His­to­ry and the New Reli­gios­i­ty Project, but we will also explore oth­er plat­forms such as the World Reli­gions and Spir­i­tu­al­i­ty Project.  This work­shop will be led by the team behind the New Reli­gios­i­ty Project.

Jobs, Social Transformations and Impact

This work­shop address­es the urgent need for effec­tive sci­ence com­mu­ni­ca­tion in the study of reli­gions.

In times of ris­ing con­spir­a­cy the­o­ries, new right nar­ra­tives, and algo­rithm-dri­ven echo cham­bers, well-informed out­reach is essen­tial. This fos­ters demo­c­ra­t­ic resilience, strength­ens pub­lic trust in aca­d­e­m­ic exper­tise, and high­lights the soci­etal rel­e­vance of the study of reli­gions. It also sets stu­dents up for jobs in acad­e­mia or in fields adja­cent to acad­e­mia, includ­ing civ­il ser­vice, pub­lic rela­tions, media, muse­ums and gal­leries, and research in oth­er con­texts.

By strength­en­ing com­mu­ni­ca­tion com­pe­ten­cies, par­tic­i­pants gain a com­pet­i­tive edge on the job mar­ket and for their post­doc projects and learn to engage diverse publics with nuanced, research-based insights. 

This work­shop will dis­cuss how Reli­gious Stud­ies stu­dents can have a pub­lic impact with their research, con­tribut­ing to social trans­for­ma­tion. The prac­ti­cal ses­sion will be split into the Ger­man and UK con­texts, where stu­dents will hear from experts in both acad­e­mia and beyond on careers after the study of reli­gion.

Shedule

Who are REMID and INFORM?