University of Heidelberg

Speakers

Anna Andreeva (University of Heidelberg)

Japanese Studies

Anna Andreeva received her BA from the Irkutsk Linguistic University in Siberia in 1997, where she was trained as translator in Japanese and English. She lived in Japan in 1998-2001, where she accomplished her MA in Japanese classical literature at Kanazawa University. Anna received her MPhil (2002) and PhD (2006) at Cambridge University, where she worked on the issues of esoteric Buddhism and Shinto in medieval Japan, before being awarded a postdoc at Reischauer Institute of Japanese Studies at Harvard for 2006-2007. During 2007-2010, she held the Margaret Smith Research Fellowship at Girton College. Currently, Anna is a research fellow and Assistant Professor in Japanese History at the Cluster of Excellence "Europe and Asia", Karl Jaspers Centre for Advanced Transcultural Studies, University of Heidelberg. She is coordinating the project "Religion and Medicine in Premodern East Asia" and teaching courses on Japanese Religions. 

Carmen Caballero-Navas (Universidad de Granada)

Jewish and Hebrew Studies

Carmen Caballero-Navas main research interests are: the reception and transmission of medical knowledge among medieval Jews, the Hebrew production on women's healthcare in the medieval West, the historical experience of medieval Jewish women and their interaction with women of other cultures who lived in the same milieu and shared similar experiences. She is also interested in modern Hebrew and its teaching to speakers of other languages.  

Jessey Choo (University of Missouri-Kansas City)

Chinese Studies  

Jessey J.C. Choo specializes in the cultural history of medieval China (c. 200-1000 CE). Her current research projects examine the Buddhist-influenced transformation of mortuary and commemorative rituals and the conceptualization of body in medical, political, and religious discourses. Both are centered on the ideas and expressions of personhood resulting from confluences of the “Confucian” emphasis on selfless filial piety and corporeality of family and the increasingly popular medical and religious practices pertaining to personal welfare and salvation. She received her doctorate from Princeton University (2009) and is currently an assistant professor at the University of Missouri – Kansas City.

M. Erica Couto-Ferreira (University of Heidelberg)

Assyriology

Érica Couto-Ferreira is currently working in the project "Medical systems in transition: The case of the Ancient Near East". Focusing her research on the analysis of cuneiform sources, she is producing a database on published cuneiform texts on healing as well as other content and bibliographic databases and tools that may help researches in the task of studying ancient Mesopotamian medicine. She is also working on the monograph 'A historical approach to healing in Mesopotamia. The transmission of cuneiform medical knowledge in the Ancient Near East'.
Érica Couto-Ferreira main research interests regard gynaecology and diseases of women in cuneiform texts, medical professions in antiquity, constitution and transmission of medical knowledge in the Ancient Near East, and lexicography of the body in Sumerian and Akkadian.    

Paolo Delaini (Università di Bologna)

Iranian studies    

Paolo Delaini is a pharmacist, currently working on a PhD about “The knowledge of the human body; anatomy and physiology, and the transmission of scientific knowledge in Sasanian times”, as part of the Iranianist research group under Prof. Antonio Panaino (DISMEC, Ravenna). Since 2007, he is responsible for a study of “Traditional Medicine, Birth and Motherhood” in a mountain community of people (called Yaghnobs) living in the Yaghnob Valley (Tajikistan), a research project carried out by the Italian Institute for Africa and Orient (IsIAO) and the Department of History and Methods for the Preservation of Cultural Heritage of the University of Bologna. Paolo Delaini is the author of a project, conducted in Italian pharmacies, supporting mothers who breastfeed entitled “Breastfeeding Friendly Pharmacy”; in 2010 the project received the patronage of Italian Committee for UNICEF.

Hans-Werner Fischer-Elfert (University of Leipzig)

Egyptology    

Hans-Werner Fischer-Elfert is Professor of Egyptology at Leipzig University and director of the Egyptological Institute and Egyptian Museum –Georg Steindorff– since 1999. He has previous teaching experience at the Universities of Hamburg, Heidelberg, Würzburg and Yale. His special interests are: Ancient Egyptian literature, magic, medicine and administrative documents in hieratic. Latest publications:
- Abseits von Ma’at. Fallstudien zu Außenseitern im Alten Ägypten (Würzburg 2005)
- Altägyptische Zaubersprüche. Mit Beiträgen von T. Sebastian Richter (Stuttgart 2005) 

Friedhelm Hoffmann (University of Munich)

Egyptology    

Friedhelm Hoffmann is Professor of Egyptology at the Ludwig-Maximilian-University Munich since 2010. He is specialized in the Late Period of Ancient Egypt, Demotic, Egyptian magic and medical texts and the History of Science in Egypt.

Giulia Pedrucci (Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei Roma)

Cultural Anthropology of the Ancient World / Ancient History  

Giulia Pedrucci received her MA in Classical Languages and Literature from the Università degli Studi di Bologna in 2002 with the master thesis "Il culto di Cibele frigia e la Sicilia. Santuari rupestri e iconografia della dea" ("The cult of Phrygian Cybele in Sicily. Rock sanctuaries and iconography of the goddess"). In 2007 she obtained the title of "Cultrice della materia" (Field expert) in Religions of the Classical World from the Department of Ancient History of the Università degli Studi di Bologna. She got her PhD in 2010 with a dissertation entitled “La via del latte. Allattamento e maternità fra Grecia e Sicilia. Percorsi archeologici, storico-religiosi, antropoligici e folclorici” ("The milk road. Breast-feeding and motherhood between Greece and Sicily. Archaeological, historical, religious, anthropological and folkloric approaches"). In 2011 Giulia spent the summer term as a grant holder at the Université de Fribourg in order to collaborate with Prof. Véronique Dasen.
Giulia Pedrucci currently holds a “Borsa di perfezionamento” (Advanced training grant) “Raffaele Pettazzoni” in the History of Religions at the Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei (Roma).  

Susanne Töpfer (University of Heidelberg)

Egyptology  

Susanne Töpfer received her Master’s degree in Egyptology from Leipzig University, where she has started working on her Ph.D. dissertation on “A (new)edition of the 'Embalming Ritual'”, a hieratic manuscript from Roman times concerning the technical and ritual practice of human embalmment. She worked in the Egyptian Museum at Leipzig University and in the ‘Book of the Dead Project’ at Bonn University. Susanne Töpfer is a researcher at the Cluster of Excellence “Asia and Europe in a Global Context” in the project C1 “Medical Systems in Transition: The case of the Ancient Near East”, focusing on the concepts and reception of gynaecological medical-systems in Egypt from Pharaonic till Roman times. Currently, she is working on two late-hieratic ritual papyri from Tebtunis. Her main research interests include funerary and ritual texts from the Graeco-Roman Period as well as Ancient Egyptian medicine and magic.  

Katja Triplett (University of Marburg)

Japanese studies  

Katja Triplett is Associate Professor (Akademische Rätin) at the Department of the Study of Religions and curator of the Museum of  Religions (Religionskundliche Sammlung) at Marburg University. Triplett graduated in the Study of Religions, Japanese linguistics and Anthropology, and obtained her doctorate in Marburg. She held a Postdoctoral Research Fellowship at the Centre for the Study of Japanese Religions, SOAS, University of London (2004-5). Her main fields of interest are Japanese religions in the late medieval and early modern periods with a focus on visual representations. Triplett has also done research on ritual practices in modern Japan. She is currently working on Buddhist healing rituals.