CALL FOR FOUR (4) CONFERENCE POSTER GRANTS TO PARTICIPATE IN FBK-ISR’S FORUM ON RELIGIOUS STUDIES — FOREST

Are you a PhD stu­dent in reli­gious stud­ies or relat­ed fields such as his­to­ry, phi­los­o­phy, the­ol­o­gy, soci­ol­o­gy, or anthro­pol­o­gy?

Would you be inter­est­ed in exchang­ing ideas with fel­low ear­­ly-career stu­dents and expe­ri­enced researchers on top­ics rel­e­vant to your area of study, while receiv­ing guid­ance, sug­ges­tions, and method­olog­i­cal sup­port?

Are you keen to explore research com­mu­ni­ca­tion meth­ods and learn sto­ry­telling and dis­sem­i­na­tion tech­niques?

If so, we encour­age you to apply for the Forum on Reli­gious Stud­ies (FoR­eSt), an inno­v­a­tive ini­tia­tive that offers a plat­form to dis­cuss the themes and meth­ods of your research in an engag­ing and col­lab­o­ra­tive envi­ron­ment at the Cen­tre for Reli­gious Sci­ences of the Bruno Kessler Foun­da­tion (FBK-ISR) in Tren­to.

FoR­eSt is designed for the com­mu­ni­ty of PhD stu­dents and ear­­ly-career researchers in Reli­gious Stud­ies, with the objec­tive of estab­lish­ing an open and inclu­sive envi­ron­ment for in-depth dis­cus­sions per­tain­ing to their spe­cif­ic research tra­jec­to­ries. The for­mat fos­ters dia­logue between a young researcher and two estab­lished schol­ars (one act­ing as a dis­cus­sant and the oth­er as an FBK men­tor). By invert­ing the tra­di­tion­al sem­i­nar struc­ture, the Forum on Reli­gious Stud­ies pro­vides PhD stu­dents with the oppor­tu­ni­ty to present an extend­ed paper on their cho­sen top­ic, artic­u­late any uncer­tain­ties or method­olog­i­cal chal­lenges, and sub­se­quent­ly receive feed­back and respons­es from senior dis­cus­sants as well as fel­low par­tic­i­pants, includ­ing PhD stu­dents, doc­tor­al grad­u­ates, and researchers at var­i­ous stages of their careers. The pri­ma­ry goal is to fos­ter broad, dynam­ic, and par­tic­i­pa­to­ry dis­cus­sions cen­tered on the speaker’s pro­posed sub­ject.

Addi­tion­al­ly, the Forum will fea­ture two after­noon ses­sions on Octo­ber 27th and 28th ded­i­cat­ed to themes relat­ed to the com­mu­ni­ca­tion and dis­sem­i­na­tion of research find­ings. These ses­sions will com­prise work­shops and round­table dis­cus­sions focus­ing pri­mar­i­ly on sto­ry­telling and com­mu­ni­ca­tion strate­gies. These activ­i­ties are orga­nized in col­lab­o­ra­tion with Ban­ca per il Tren­ti­no-Alto Adi­ge Südtirol of Tren­to.

Addi­tion­al­ly, the Forum will fea­ture two after­noon ses­sions on Octo­ber 27th and 28th ded­i­cat­ed to themes relat­ed to the com­mu­ni­ca­tion and dis­sem­i­na­tion of research find­ings. These ses­sions will com­prise work­shops and round­table dis­cus­sions focus­ing pri­mar­i­ly on sto­ry­telling and com­mu­ni­ca­tion strate­gies. These activ­i­ties are orga­nized in col­lab­o­ra­tion with Ban­ca per il Tren­ti­no-Alto Adi­ge Südtirol of Tren­to.

The par­tic­i­pa­tion grants (poster grants) offered through this call for appli­ca­tions are intend­ed for PhD stu­dents and post-doc­­tor­al fel­lows who have obtained their degrees with­in the past two years. Eli­gi­ble appli­cants should plan to attend the Forum as co-dis­­­cus­sant par­tic­i­pants, engage in the poster ses­sion, and par­tic­i­pate in the after­noon train­ing activ­i­ties as trainees.

Men­tor FBK:
Pao­lo COSTA
Vale­ria FABRETTI
Lucia GALVAGNI
Deb­o­ra TONELLI

Keynote Speak­ers:
Graziano LINGUA
Michael STAUSBERG

Speak­er Tavola roton­da:
Gabriele MARINO
Nicolò MONTI
Clau­dio GIUNTA
Sara HEJAZI

Forum Overview:
Top­ics (indica­tive, not exhaus­tive): reli­gious sci­ences, the­ol­o­gy, inter­re­li­gious dia­logue, reli­gious vio­lence, spir­i­tu­al spa­tial­i­ty, cul­tur­al stud­ies, phi­los­o­phy of reli­gions, soci­ol­o­gy of reli­gion, bioethics, sec­u­lar­i­sa­tion the­o­ry, con­tem­po­rary meta­mor­phoses of spir­i­tu­al­i­ty, anthro­pol­o­gy of reli­gions, his­to­ry of reli­gions.

Dura­tion: Three days

Loca­tion: Tren­to, Bruno Kessler Foun­da­tion

Date: 27–29 Octo­ber 2025

Lan­guage: Ital­ian, Eng­lish

The organ­i­sa­tion of the Forum is offer­ing a con­tri­bu­tion (Trav­el Grant) of up to 300 Euros to each select­ed par­tic­i­pant to cov­er the costs relat­ed to par­tic­i­pa­tion in the Forum through ana­lyt­i­cal reim­burse­ment of expens­es incurred for the pur­chase of trav­el tick­ets and accom­mo­da­tion.

No. 4 par­tic­i­pa­tion trav­el grants are avail­able and the select­ed can­di­dates will be cho­sen on the basis of the qual­i­ty and rel­e­vance of their research con­tri­bu­tions to the Forum. Appli­ca­tions will be reviewed by an inter­nal com­mit­tee of the FBK-ISR cen­tre.

Eli­gi­bil­i­ty cri­te­ria:
PhD stu­dents in Reli­gious Stud­ies and relat­ed dis­ci­plines are eli­gi­ble to apply.

Appli­cants must have a demon­stra­ble inter­est in the study of reli­gions and relat­ed phe­nom­e­na.

How to apply:
Inter­est­ed can­di­dates are invit­ed to apply by 15/09/2025. The appli­ca­tion pack­age must include the fol­low­ing doc­u­ments:
– A cur­ricu­lum vitae (CV) in Euro­pean for­mat high­light­ing aca­d­e­m­ic and pro­fes­sion­al back­ground;
– A short let­ter of intent of max­i­mum 2000 char­ac­ters, out­lin­ing your research inter­ests and explain­ing why you are inter­est­ed in par­tic­i­pat­ing in this forum;
– An abstract (max­i­mum 300 words) of the research project you intend to share dur­ing the forum;
– A draft of the poster that you intend to present and that takes into account the cri­te­ria of clar­i­ty of com­mu­ni­ca­tion and dis­sem­i­na­tion, both in terms of con­tent and lay­out;

Inter­est­ed appli­cants should send these doc­u­ments in a sin­gle PDF file by e‑mail to fbk.isr@fbk.eu with the sub­ject: ‘FOREST Grant Appli­ca­tion – [Sur­name]’.

Impor­tant dates:
– Appli­ca­tion dead­line: 15 sep­tem­ber 2025, at 11:59 PM
– Noti­fi­ca­tion of accep­tance: 27 sep­tem­ber 2025, at 3:00 PM