Prof. Dr Ruard Ganzevoort is head of the department Beliefs & Practices at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam and teaches practical theology and spiritual care. He is also a member of the Senate at the Dutch parliament. Together with Dr. Srdjan Sremac, postdoctoral researcher, he will address the religious and cultural dimensions of trauma and coping with a special interest in the traumatic history of Dutch military presence in Srebrenica. The issues concerning trauma are further treated in the master's specialisation Peace, Trauma, and Religion.
ASSOCIATES
Dr Johan Roeland specialises in new religious movements; media, religion, and popular culture; and urban religion. He was a guest lecturer during the 2015 Public Lectures sessions, focusing on religion and religious framing in the media and remains involved in the master's specialisation Peace, Trauma, and Religion.
Dr Katja Tolstaja is the founder and director of INaSEC, the Institute for the Academic Study of Eastern Christianity, and is Associate Professor in Systematic Theology at the Vrije Universtiteit, Amsterdam. She specializes in the revival of the Russian Orthodox Church and the impact of the Soviet legacy on post-Soviet Russian Orthodoxy. As NWO-Veni laureate (2009-2012) she studied the transformation and (re-)invention of Orthodox theology and practice in Russia and Ukraine. She is currently working to initiate Theology after Gulag as a model for coming to terms with the traumatic Soviet past.
Dr Srdjan Sremac is a lecturer at the Department of Theology and Religious Studies at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam and the co-director of the Amsterdam Center for the Study of Lived Religion at the same university. Srdjan co-edits a book series Lived Religion and Societal Challenges published by Palgrave Macmillan. He is widely published with 17 (co-) authored or edited books and over 50 journal articles and book chapters.
