An event of the Forum on World Religions (FWR)
Program:
Opening Words
Bishop Benno Elbs, Governor Markus Wallner
Welcome message
History and significance of the Jewish community in Hohenems
Hanno Loewy, Jewish Museum Hohenems
Introduction
Kurt Schubert and the Second Vatican Council
Petrus Bsteh, Forum for World Religions
Keynote lecture
Muslim youth between tradition and modernity
Mouhanad Khorchide, Westphalian Wilhelm University of Münster
Laudation for Eva Grabherr
Felicitas Heimann-Jelinek
freelance curator, researcher and museum consultant
Award ceremony
Sigrid Jalkotzy-Deger, Austrian Academy of Sciences
Acceptance speech of the laureate
Eva Grabherr
Presentation
Hans Rapp, Catholic Church Vorarlberg
Musical design
Aydin Ballı, Saz and oud player, Alevi music
Following this, the guests are invited to a buffet.
Dr. Eva Grabherr was born in 1963 in Höchst in Vorarlberg. She studied at the universities of Innsbruck, Vienna and London. In Vienna she completed a Master's degree in history, and at University College a PhD in Jewish Studies. During her first semesters at the University of Innsbruck, she attended Professor Kurt Schubert's classic lecture on the Jewish religious parties in the age of Jesus. There she became interested in Jewish History and attended lectures at the Institute for the Old Testament. Kurt Schubert was crucial for her to go to Vienna for her further studies. There, in addition to history, she also studied at the Institute for Jewish Studies with Kurt Schubert.From 1990 to 1996 Grabherr was the first director of the re-founded Jewish Museum in Hohenems. During these years, she established the museum as an academic site for Jewish regional history and museology of Jewish museums, but also anchored the institution as a local and regional cultural and memory institution. From 1996 to 2000 she studied at the Department for Hebrew and Jewish Studies at University College London, alongside her projects in Austria and Germany. She graduated with a PhD from Yiddist Hugh Denman. Her thesis focused on a large find of private Jewish letters from the late 18th and early 19th centuries (Letters to Hohenems: A Microhistorical Study of Jewish Acculturation in the Early Decades of Emancipation).
From the end of 2001 Grabherr built up the Vorarlberg Project Office for Immigration and Integration for the Vorarlberg association Aktion Mitarbeit "okay. zusammen leben", which she heads today. "okay. zusammen leben" is a knowledge and competence centre for questions of immigration and integration with a broad repertoire. A central element in shaping a migration-related pluralistic society in Europe, especially after the "September 11" (2001), which was seen as a key event, is the question of the coexistence of Muslims and non-Muslims in European societies. The project of a cemetery for the Muslim population of Vorarlberg, realised in the municipality of Altach, for which Grabherr was in charge of the trial, has therefore received attention far beyond Austria.
Eva Grabherr was also awarded the prestigious Toni Russ Prize and the Honorary Cross of the State of Vorarlberg. A particular concern of the "Project Office for Immigration and Integration" founded and managed by her remains the ideological, cultural and political accommodation of the young descendants of former guest workers in Vorarlberg.
The Kurt Schubert Memorial Prize for Interreligious Dialogue is the only one among the numerous public awards that addresses the origin of all dialogical thinking. This hidden source of Jewish-Christian awakening became the path of hope against the formation and excesses of ideologies. The Foundation Committee carries on the legacy of the Judaist Kurt Schubert, this important representative of dialogue, through prominent award winners. It is our aim to make their example known and effective in the public. Contact and dialogue as well as the communication of historical experiences seem to be the only means to counter xenophobia, prejudice and anti-Semitism.
From the Christian-Jewish dialogue, its mandate was extended to all religions by the Second Vatican Council. Religions should find common ground, make peace with one another and work for the implementation and preservation of human rights. This is why this award ceremony has become a commitment of all religious communities in Austria. The public has also recognised that these values deserve protection.
The first prize winner, Hofrat Marko Feingold (d. 2019), was an unbending witness to the Nazi persecutions. The second, former mayor Alfred Stingl, was a prudent promoter of religious communities in Graz. The third prize winner is the Institute for Theology of Religion St. Gabriel with the professors Andreas Bsteh and Clemens Thoma. The fourth are Dr. Irmgard Aschbauer and Mag. Ruth Steiner as active helpers of the survivors of the concentration camp Mauthausen (award ceremony in Linz). The fifth prizewinner is the Islamic Studies scholar and pedagogue Univ. Prof. Dr. Zekirija Sejdini (award ceremony in Salzburg), the sixth prize went to the Institute for Jewish Studies with its director Univ. Prof. Dr. Ingeborg Fialová-Fürst in Olomouc/Czech Republic.
Organizer:
Forum for World Religions, Ecumenical Center for Interreligious Dialogue and Cooperation
Foundation committee:
Forum on World Religions (FWR)
Klosterneuburg Monastery
Ecumenical Council of Churches in Austria (ÖRKÖ)
Forum Time and Faith/Catholic Academic Association
Coordination Committee for Christian-Jewish Cooperation
Supported by:
Federal Ministry for Europe, Integration and Foreign Affairs
Land Vorarlberg
Monastery Neuburg Monastery
Jewish Museum Hohenems
Participation by registration only: forum@weltreligionen.at ►T 01 3178470
Source: Jewish Museum Hohenems