Research Focus
Fieldsites and communities
RELI-GENE examines how genetic counselling and marriage regulation are experienced across diverse religious minority communities in Europe and the Middle East, with a focus on their transnational family networks
Palestinian minority communities
Jerusalem, the West Bank, Germany and Sweden
Syrian and Iraqi minority communities
Germany and Sweden
Ultra-Orthodox Jewish communities (Haredim)
Jerusalem, London and New York
Emirati communities
In the United Arab Emirates and their transnational links
Methodology
An interdisciplinary and multi-modal approach
RELI-GENE bridges the humanities, social sciences and life sciences through transdisciplinary research design that combines policy analysis, ethnographic research and digital methods to examine how genetics, religion and state power intersect in everyday life.
Document and discourse analysis
Analysis of laws, policy documents, media presentations, archival sources related to genetic counselling, marriage regulation and reproductive governance.
Ethnography and interviews
Interviews with policymakers, healthcare providers, religious leaders, community members and ethnographic observations of healing and counselling practices.
Arts-based and immersive methods
Oral history, virtual and augmented reality productions and visual workshops to support the co-production of knowledge and dissemination of research outcomes
Digital mapping and visualisation
Tracing kinship networks, migration trajectories and knowledge exchange across transnational networks.