• New Open Access service: Digitisation on Demand

    (July 2024)

    There is a new service in RelBib, with which we can make public domain titles accessible, called Digitisation on Demand (DoD). This is a demand-driven service: you suggest a title from the extensive holdings of Tübingen University Library - we will digitize it for you free of charge if possible. The titles are then available to all users in Open Access via RelBib. We have described the procedure in detail on a separate page:

  • National License for World Religion Database (WRD) now available!

    (May 2022)

    For the new funding period (2022-2024), the FID Study of Religion has purchased free access to the World Religion Database at German universities, research institutes, and academic libraries. This national licence is funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG).

    The World Religion Database contains extensive demographic statistics on the respective religious affiliations in each country of the world. The data comes from surveys and polls and is supplemented by scientific estimates to enable comparisons and show developments. Data and estimates are provided for the period 1900 to 2050. The lists can be retrieved according to various criteria, e.g. by denomination or geography. This database is published and regularly updated by the Institute on Culture, Religion, and World Affairs (CURA), Boston University.

    Access to the national licence is being gradually activated for the participating institutions - please therefore check whether you already have access via your institution, otherwise we kindly ask for your patience. Alternatively, individuals with a permanent residence in Germany can also register for use at www.nationallizenzen.de.

    If you have any questions concerning our FID licenses, please do not hesitate to contact the RelBib team.

  • New feature: RelBib authority search and person information pages

    (December 2021)

    A new milestone has been reached with the introduction of the authority search and person information pages in RelBib. Next to the standard (RelBib) search and the full text search, a third tab called Persons / Corporations is now available above the RelBib search slot. In this tab, you can search specifically for authors, corporations and conferences or conference proceedings that are recorded in a standardised way and indexed in RelBib.

    And this is how you proceed: Select the tab "Persons / Corporations". Search for all persons, corporations and conferences recorded so far by clicking on FIND. You can narrow down your search results by using different facets:

    • Record Type: Person / Corporation / Conference (Proceeding)
    • External References: Authority files / Links to Wikipedia, Links to archives etc.
    • Occupation: Religious Studies Scholar / Historian / Sociologist etc.
    • Language: English / German / French etc.
    • Location: Berlin / Paris / London etc.

    RelBib authority search

    The person information pages contain basic biographical information as well as further links, e.g. to Wikipedia, archival material and external resources.

    The information available in RelBib on an author's publication range and activity is being processed and neatly presented on the person information pages:

    • literature by the author
    • literature about the author
    • related authors
    • topics (keywords) on which the author has published
    • a chronology of publications

    By the way: You can also access the person information page of an author recorded in a standardised way from any normal RelBib search: Simply click on the symbol next to the displayed person's name to obtain further information about this author. If you want to call up all titles of the same person available in RelBib, it is best to use the symbol next to the author's name.

    A few examples of well-known authors:

    We cordially invite you to try out this new search option and the person information pages in RelBib! Please do not hesitate to contact us for feedback.

  • RelBib Alerting service: Now also subscribe to journal bundles!

    (November 2021)

    We have expanded the RelBib Alerting Service: Now you can also subscribe to thematic journal bundles with a RelBib account. For example, do you want to stay up to date on newly published articles in journals related to religion in Asia? Then select the alert bundle "Asia", etc. You will receive an automatic e-mail notification when new content from journals in this bundle is published in RelBib. You can find a detailed description of the RelBib Alerting service on our help page:

    RelBib Alerting

  • Articles from collective works in RelBib

    (July 2021)

    Did you know that we also index articles from collective works in RelBib? With this project, we have taken up a desideratum from the academic community in the current FID funding phase. In the meantime, around 41,000 articles can be found in RelBib, which are mainly assigned to collected works relevant to the study of religion from the years 2010-2018. We will successively add further volumes.

    Search for articles from collective works in RelBib

  • Full text search now available!

    (August 2020)

    In addition to the well-known search and browsing options in RelBib you now have the possibility to search in full texts relevant to the study of religion. Simply change the search mode by clicking on the tab "Full texts" above the search slot. Here you can search for words, phrases or synonyms, which are even translated into different languages. The searchable digital corpus includes full texts, tables of contents and abstracts. Currently, we offer the full text search mainly for the Open Access titles indexed in RelBib, e.g. from our self-archiving service project. Very soon, however, texts from commercial publishers will also be made available for a permitted search. Pilot partners are the publishers Brill and Mohr Siebeck. The project was initiated by IxTheo and was adopted by RelBib. We invite you to take full advantage of the new feature in RelBib and send us your feedback. As we are still in the extended test phase of the full-text search, we are especially happy to receive suggestions for improvements that can make the search experience even better. Read more (zur Zeit nur deutsche Version!)

  • Now online: Evaluation of the Survey on research data management in the study of religion

    (January 2020)

    Finally, we were able to evaluate the survey on research data, which ran from June 4 to July 7, 2019 on the RelBib portal. 167 people took part in the survey, 120 of them made it to the end.

    Perhaps the results will help clarify how the study of religion scholars and the DVRW would like to position themselves in the emerging national research data infrastructure (NFDI).

    *Please note that the Survey as well as the evaluation is in German only.

  • Self-archiving service successfully started

    (December 2019)

    In May 2019, the FID Study of Religion started its green open access project, the "self-archiving service". Approximately 60 scholars of religion had registered for this project in the context of a brief survey in 2018. We offer the researchers a comprehensive service: From the indexing of all their published titles in RelBib to the legal examination of the individual contributions in terms of self-archiving possibilities to the digitisation of printed contributions that can be self-archived. All secondary publications are archived on a long-term basis in the subject repository of the study of religion, hosted by Tübingen University Library. The full texts can be accessed directly via RelBib.

    To date we have processed the publication lists of eleven scholars of religion and have already received further inquiries. We have been particularly pleased with the positive feedback such as:

    "...thank you very much for your message, your efforts and the careful examination of my list of publications. I am happy about this great service!"

    "Thanks for so much careful support!"

    "...a very, very big compliment for this undertaking!"

    If you are also interested in this FID service, you can find more information here: Self-archiving Service.

  • Eight journals indexed in RelBib with back issues

    (July 2019)

    One of the project goals for the current funding phase of the FID Study of Religion is to increase the number of titles that can be searched in RelBib. We are currently indexing about 240 journals relevant to the study of religion at the article level in our online bibliography. Further journals are to be added gradually. In the case of many journals that are currently indexed in RelBib, reference was only begun from a certain point in time; articles from older volumes are often missing. After consultation with the FID advisory board, we are now working at full speed to close the reference gap for a selection of journals.

    The gaps have already been closed for the following journals:

  • Research Data in the Study of Religion - Survey

    (June 2019)

    Attention: This survey is finished.

    Dear scholars of the study of religion!

    On 25 February 2019, the advisory board and the team of the FID Study of Religion dealt intensively with the topic of research data and research data management (RDM) in the study of religion.

    The reason for this meeting was the currently widely discussed and followed development of a National Research Data Infrastructure (NFDI), which was adopted by the German Joint Science Conference (GWK) in November 2018 by an agreement between the Federal Government and the States.

    Here you can find this agreement and further information on RDM.

    There are clear signs that the handling of research data will in future play a more prominent role in the scientific work process than in the past: Funding will be allocated on the basis of proven RDM, among other things. The formation of NFDI consortia in which users and providers of research data are to network in cooperation with scientific infrastructure institutions is already in full swing. The specialist associations are expected to actively identify the requirements if their subject is to be taken into account.

    The dialogue on research data and the RDM should therefore be brought into the community by the German Association for the Study of Religion (DVRW) as soon as possible. With this survey the FID Study of Religion would like to support the DVRW in this. On the basis of the survey and further discussions, the DVRW can develop a position paper that phrases the needs of the research community vis-à-vis the actors in the NFDI formation process. Depending on the survey results, the FID will examine the extent to which participation in the formation of NFDI consortia is necessary.

    We therefore kindly ask you to participate in the survey. The survey consists of 19 questions and will take about 10 minutes. It will end on 7 July 2019, after which the results will be published on the FID website.

    With your participation, you will also ensure that the subject of study of religion is not overlooked in its specificity with regard to research data during the development of the technical and infrastructural framework conditions.

    Many thanks!

    Please note that the survey is only available in German.

  • K10plus – a gain also for RelBib

    (March 2019)

    At the end of March, a major library project was brought to a successful conclusion: the Göttingen Library Network (GBV) and the Southwest German Library Network (SWB) have been merged. The outcome is a large data pool called K10plus which comprises over 180 million data records from libraries in ten federal states.

    The advantage for RelBib - many relevant records of libraries from the GBV area (including the SUB Göttingen, but also ULB Halle, TIB etc.), can now be easily tagged with the RelBib mark and thus made available in the bibliography.

  • Further funding of the FID Study of Religion

    (January 2019)

    Our DFG proposal for further funding of the FID Study of Religion for the next three years was approved with very benevolent votes of the expert jury and we are looking forward to tackling our various tasks and goals with fresh energy in January.

    The main tasks for the second funding period (2019-2021) are in brief:

    1. acquisition of academic literature according to the defined subject profile for the coverage of the peak demand
    2. substantial content expansion of the Open Access bibliography RelBib by
      • indexing of articles in collections (conference proceedings, Festschrift etc.)
      • inclusion of a larger number of journals in RelBib at the article level.
      • retrospective cataloguing of older volumes of journals that are already indexed at the article level
    3. After a long period of preparation we will finally start the FID self-archiving service. Those authors who responded to our survey last year will successively be contacted by us and asked for their literature lists.
    4. We are particularly proud and happy to have found cooperation partners with REMID e.V. and the Marburg University Library: The REMID archive collection has been managed by the REMID association so far and now will be permanently transferred to Marburg University Library, where it will be properly indexed in form and content during the next three years. The archive comprises approx. 580 journals, 80 of them current titles, and approx. 800 to 900 thematic folders with brochures and materials. The data will then be migrated to RelBib. Thus, for the first time it will be possible to search for archive material in the bibliography.

  • Zotero Group: How journal articles get indexed in RelBib

    (July 2018)

    In RelBib, journals relevant to the study of religion are listed not only as a whole, but also by their individual articles. But how do they get into RelBib? Our staff enter the article metadata (i.e. title, author(s), year of publishing, journal title etc.) into the cataogue of the Southwest German Library Network (SWB). This is very time-consuming and we have only limited personnel capacities. In many cases iti is possible to retrieve the article metadata semi-automatically with the help of the open source software Zotero. However, there are journals where this procedure does not work (so well). In order to be able to include the articles of these journals in RelBib, we have developed a simple procedure for cooperative indexing. Interested editors join our "Zotero Group" and enter the article data we need for RelBib. This is not a difficult task and we will support you in all questions. On our homepage you will find instructions for this procedure under "RelBib A-Z".

  • Follow-up application submitted!

    (May 2018)

    The FID Study of Religion is currently in its last year of DFG funding. For a further funding period of three years (2019-2021), we submitted a follow-up proposal to the DFG on 1 May. Project objectives and work steps for the new funding period have been drafted in close consultation with the new FID advisory board, which represents the interests of the academic community.

  • Academic Advisory Board of the FID Study of Religion

    (March 2018)

    In January 2018, an advisory board for the FID Study of Religion was founded, consisting of five representatives of the subject. The advisory board met for the first time on 21st March 2018 in Tübingen.

    The main task of the advisory board is to act as a link between the scholars of religion and the FID. There are regular meetings at which (new) steps in the work of the FID are to be discussed constructively. The advisory board will transfer the FID services already offered to the scientific community and give feedback to the FID from there, so that there is comprehensible clarity as to whether and how individual services should be expanded or restricted in future.

    Current members of the FID advisory board are:

    • Prof. Dr. Gritt Klinkhammer (University of Bremen / chairwoman of the DVRW)
    • Prof. Dr. Monika Schrimpf (University of Tübingen)
    • Prof. Dr. Horst Junginger (University of Leipzig)
    • Dr. Martin Radermacher (CERES Bochum)
    • Moritz Klenk (Universitäten Bern / Bonn).