About the person

Dr. Ramona Jelinek-Menke studied sociology (BA) and religious studies (BA, MA) in Göttingen and Leipzig. She was then a doctoral student at the Department of Religious Studies at the University of Zurich, where she was awarded her doctorate in spring 2020. Her dissertation "Religion und Disability: Behinderung und Befähigung in religiösen Kontexten¹" (Tr.: Religion and Disability: Disability and Empowerment in Religious Contexts) was awarded summa cum laude and the Fritz Stolz Prize of the Swiss Society for Religious Studies. Since then, she has worked in the projects „Dynamiken religiöser Dinge im Museum²“ (Tr.: Dynamics of Religious Things in Museums (BMBF, University of Marburg) and „Extraordinary Bodies in African-Brazilian Religious Art³“ (Fritz Thyssen Stiftung, University of Marburg) as well as lecturing in Göttingen, Marburg, Lucerne and Zurich. In fall 2022, she was also a Visiting Scholar in the Disability Studies Program and at the Department of Theology and Religious Studies at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C. In the winter semester 2024/2025, Ramona Jelinek-Menke held the professorship for General and Comparative Religious Studies at the University of Marburg. Since March 2025, she has been a research assistant in the Teaching-Learning Lab: Accessibility and in the Department of Religious Studies at the Forum Internationale Wissenschaft at the University of Bonn.

Main research areas

• Religions of the present
• Material religion and religion in the museum
• Religion and violence
• Gender und Disability Studies
• Interpretative social research

Interviews
Interview on the SWR2 podcast "Glauben" , episode “Behindern oder befähigen? Christliche Einrichtungen und Inklusion.“ Link⁴.

Interview at Bayern 2 Podcast "Die Neue Norm", Episode #27 "Religion und Behinderung: Warum wir nicht an Heilung glauben."“ Link.⁵