Four Postdoc Positions (m/f/d, E13 TV-L, 100%)

09.07.2025

Application deadline: 01.09.2025

The University of Tübingen invites applications for 

four Postdoctoral Researcher positions (m/w/d, E13 TV-L, 100%)

within the ERC-funded Synergy Project MANTRAMS, Mantras in Religion, Media, and Society in Global Southern Asia, specifically focusing on the multifaceted roles of mantras across cultures.

Position: Postdoctoral Researcher
Faculty: Faculty of Humanities
Job Vacancy Starting: December 1, 2025
Contract Duration: 24 months 
Employment Type: 100% (TV-L E-13)  

Your Field of Activity:

You will contribute to the MANTRAMS project’s Task Force 2 (TF2), which focuses on Sonic Efficacy in Global Southern Asia.  

Sonic efficacy in global Southern Asia employs immersive ethnography and participant observation, sound studies and sensory anthropology methods to pursue two research strands. 

1. The first, Religious sound, religious space: Mantras in sonic soteriology and place-making, will study ‘mantra’ as a relational category that considers the ways powerful syllables and sacred sounds are embedded within local sonic ideologies and musical genres. This research strand also studies inter-religious tensions and controversies surrounding competing soundscapes and amplified religious sounds. 

Three dimensions are particularly relevant here: 

• Music and music instruments. How do mantric practices share a sonic ideology that is common to genres of sacred sound like zikr, kirtan, bhajan, nam japa, paritta, etc. ?
• Health and healing. What is the therapeutic and medical efficacy of mantras? Why are mantra practitioners often situated in the fuzzy borderland between religion and traditional medicine?
• Place-making. What is that efficacious sounds do to the place where they are played, repeated, or amplified?

2. The second strand, Mantras from below: Ensounding the margins expands the conventional archive of Mantra Studies and gives centrality to sonic practices among Dalit religions, Adivasi traditions, Muslim healers, performers, drummers, subaltern communities, women, and gender minorities. This research component aims to rethink the traditional canon, often Sanskrit-centred and overrepresenting priestly elites. We propose instead prioritizing the grassroot and everyday mantra practices from people and places that are often considered to be at the margins (both social and geographical) of mantras’ authority and authenticity.

Research projects examining mantra in relation to drumming, sonic healing (e.g., in New Spiritualities and SBNR contexts), technologies of sound reproduction and amplification, and underrepresented areas (e.g., Tibetan and Himalayan region, mainland Southeast Asia) are welcome.

Your Future Tasks:

• Engage in interdisciplinary research focused on mantras and/as sound, and mantras as unequally distributed sounds.
• Publish your findings in peer-reviewed journals and edited volumes, and present your work at international conferences.
• Collaborate with our digital humanities team to engage actively in the development and data curation for the "OMnibus of Mantras" project website. This involves mapping and archiving sonic and visual representations of mantras across global Southern Asia, contributing to the design process, refining content, and regularly updating our online platforms with accessible, well-documented findings.
• Collaborate closely with the MANTRAMS team and Principal Investigators, including contributing to the planning and development of events, workshops and an interactive museum exhibition.
• Work effectively as part of an interdisciplinary and international team, contributing to joint research activities and supporting your colleagues in the achievement of the project’s goals.
• Assist in preparing reports for the MANTRAMS project.

Your Profile:

• Completed PhD or equivalent in Anthropology, Sound Studies, Religious Studies, Asian Studies, Indology, Ethnomusicology, or a closely related field.  
• Strong expertise and relevant experience in academic research on at least one of these topics in Asian contexts: sacred sound; oral literature and folklore; traditional music and dance; ritual, performance, festivals; religion and healing; traditional medicine; gender; body and embodiment; subaltern groups, minorities, and marginalized communities.  
• Excellent communication skills in written and spoken English, with the ability to work collaboratively in a big, international team.
• Proven research and publication record in relevant areas.
• Experience and willingness to conduct ethnographic fieldwork.
• Experience in independent scholarly writing to a high level of academic content and formal presentation.
• Proficiency in one or more modern Asian languages.
• Familiarity with digital humanities methods, multimedia and audiovisual formats are an asset. Experience in sound editing, graphic design and web design are not required, but certainly appreciated.

What We Offer:

You will be part of an ambitious and challenging interdisciplinary project, committed to cutting-edge research, ethical international collaboration, and creative formats of knowledge dissemination. 

We offer excellent training, access to extensive academic resources, a highly collaborative international environment and resources for funding your fieldwork, equipment, conferences and professionalization courses.

The University of Tübingen has ~ 28,000 students and more than 500 years of academic tradition. It has national excellence status and offers a vibrant research environment in a picturesque city. You will benefit from a variety of training opportunities and language courses as well as the university’s graduate academy.

Start date for successful applicants is 1st December 2025.

Application Process:

Please submit by 1st September 2025, in a single PDF file:

• Cover letter
• Curriculum Vitae
• Research project proposal (maximum 2,000 words, excluding notes and bibliography), including an outline of your potential contribution to the MANTRAMS team and project outcomes.
• List of publications and multimedia outputs
• Copies of academic certificates  
• Contact details of two referees

Applications must be sent by email to mantramsspam prevention@religwiss.uni-tuebingen.de  by September 1st, 2025. Informal inquiries are also welcome at this address. For further details about the project, you can look at the webpage . You are also warmly invited to listen to a project presentation recorded by the Centre for Yoga Studies at SOAS, London .

Employment (E13 TV-L, for 2 years;100%) will be arranged by the University of Tübingen. The positions are available immediately. Salary will be determined according to the German collective wage agreement in public service. The University of Tübingen is committed to equal opportunities and diversity. The University aims to increase the proportion of women in research and teaching and therefore urges suitable qualified women scientists to apply. Qualified international researchers are expressly invited to apply. Severely disabled persons with equal aptitude will be given preferential consideration.