Adjunct Assistant Professor
Email: merdjand@tcd.ie
I work across the disciplines of sociology, religious studies, peace studies, gender studies, politics and anthropology. My research has focused on the intersection of society, religious and cultural pluralism, nationalism, gender, conflict and peace building, with particular reference to post-1989 developments in Eastern Europe, the Balkans and Turkey.
I have held visiting research fellowships at Oxford University, New York University, the Center for Advanced Studies in the Humanities at Edinburgh University, the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington DC, the Netherlands Institute for Advanced Studies in the Humanities and Social Sciences, the Aleksanteri Institute at Helsinki University, and the Freiburg Center for Advanced Studies, among others. I have won research grants from the British Academy, the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD), Volkswagen Foundation, the Unites State Institute of Peace, the Leverhulme Trust, and the European Commission. I am the author of five books and over thirthy articles on religion and politics in post-communist society, and I have presented numerous papers at various international conferences throughout the world. Since 2018, I have also served as a visiting professor at the Centre for Trust, Peace and Social Relations at Coventry University.
My English language book publications include Religion, Nationalism, and Civil Society in Eastern Europe—the Postcommunist Palimpsest (Edwin Mellen Press, 2002), Religion as a Conversation Starter: Interreligious Dialogue for Peacebuilding in the Balkans (Continuum, 2009, with Patrice Brodeur), and Rediscovering the Umma: Muslims in the Balkans between Nationalism and Transnationalism (Oxford University Press, 2013). These books have made important contributions to their respective fields of study as reflected in multiple positive reviews in high-profile academic journals as well as in their consequent paperback editions and translation into foreign languages. My most recent book is an edited volume Women and Religiosity in Orthodox Christianity (Fordham University Press, 2021), which fills a gap in scholarship on women and Orthodox Christianity, offering in-depth explorations of the gender aspects of both the everyday lived Orthodox Christianity and the social and political engagements of Orthodox Christian women in different contemporary contexts.