I am incredibly honored to have been given the opportunity to begin February 1^st as a 4+4 PhD student at the Faculty of Arts. For me, this position is a dream come true. It means devoting my time to thinking, writing and teaching in the tradition of anthropology, which I have come to love. I look forward to working in the department of anthropology and beyond, with continued engagement in study and research environments. It also means that I can continue my work with the Danish Pentecostal communities, where I have done fieldwork as part of my MA studies in Visual Anthropology.

In the spring and summer of 2021, I studied with two Danish churches and two Danish missions in Tanzania, where I explored how people experience and feel God in their devotional practices and how these encounters move devotees to practices, which they describe as love in action. These practices include missionary activities in Denmark and in Tanzania, where the missionaries I work with have lived for over 20 years.

The project is titled Love in action: An anthropological examination of religious experience among Danish Pentecostals in Denmark and Tanzania and addresses both dimensions of deep personal emotions and continuing histories of global connections. Love in action refers to the sacrifice of Jesus symbolized by the cross, but also everyday religious experiences and moral encounters with others. My main supervisor is Christian Suhr, who is also the PI of the ERC project Heart Openings: The Experience and Cultivation of Love in Buddhism, Christianity, and Islam, but my field studies in Eastern Africa supplement the regions covered by the ERC project.

Contact: 

Katrine Vestergaard Pahuus
Institut for Kultur og Samfund 
Moesgård Allé 20
8270 Højbjerg
kpa@cas.au.dk