My research concerns rituals, more specific the following areas: modern devotion: research into developments in contemporary ritual settings, popular religious ritual (pelgrimage), memorial culture. Currently there is a strong focus on place and space of ritual, on ritual and sacred zones in our culture.

see PDF file: CV+Publications.Paul.Post.actueel

 Dr. Paul Post (1953) studied in Utrecht and Rome (Theology, Religious and Ritual Studies, Christian Art). Since 1986 he has been involved as coordinator in a large-scaled multidisciplinary research programme on Christian pilgrimage. From 1988 until 1994 he was Head of the Department of European Ethnology at the Meertens Institute (Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences) in Amsterdam. There he initiated and coordinated a national programme on Places of pilgrimage in the Netherlands. Since 1994 he is Professor of Liturgical and Ritual Studies at the Tilburg Faculty of Theology, now: Department Religious Studies and Theology) and Director of the interfaculty and interuniversity Institute for Liturgical and Ritual Studies located in Tilburg. In the period 1991-2001 he was a member of the steering committee of the national research programme Dutch Culture in a European Context (a national priority programme of NWO). In 2006 he was a member of the national assessment panel Theology/Religious Studies of Finland (coordinated by the Academy of Finland in Helsinki). From Tilburg he initiated and coordinated a research programme on Disaster ritual (2000-2001; funded by the KNAW) and on dynamics of ritual space in modern western society (2006-2009; Holy Ground: reinventing ritual space in modern Western culture, together with prof.dr. A.L. Molendijk (RUG), funded by NWO, cf. The Future of the Religious Past). From 2007 he has initiated and coordinates (together with Prof. W. van Beek, PhD) an international programme on Sacred sites (2007ss.; funded by SANPAD), a collaboration of Tilburg and Bloemfontein (SA). He is research director of the Department Religious Studies and Theology, and since 2010 vice dean for research of the Faculty of Humanities.

His main interests are theory and methods of ritual and liturgical studies, the anthropological dimensions of ritual, popular religion (especially pilgrimage), religious iconography and architecture, and (post)modern developments in ritual. For the last five years all his research has been concentrated around the theme of located religion and ritual space.

He is editor-in-chief of Liturgia condenda (international series, Peeters: Leuven), Meander (national series), editor-in-chief of Jaarboek voor liturgie-onderzoek, and Netherlands Studies in Ritual and Liturgy, Member Advisory Board of Questions Liturgiques / Studies in Liturgy, Member of Societas Liturgica, and AKL (Arbeitsgemeinschaft Katholischer Liturgiedozenten/Innen im Deutschen Sprachgebiet).

Recent books: (ed.): Een ander huis. Kerkarchitectuur na 2000 (Hilversum 1997); with J. Pieper en M. van Uden: The modern pilgrim (Leuven 1998); Het wonder van Dokkum. Verkenningen van populair religieus ritueel (Nijmegen 2000); (with M. Barnard, ed.): Ritueel bestek. Antropologische kernwoorden van de liturgie (Zoetermeer 2001); (et al. ed.): Christian feast and festival (Leuven 2001); (with L. van Tongeren, ed.): Devotioneel ritueel (Kampen 2001); (et al.): Disaster ritual (2003); Space for liturgy (Groningen/Tilburg 2004); Liturgische bewegingen. Thema?s, trends en perspectieven in tien jaar liturgiestudie (2006); (ed. with B. Kranemann): Die modernen ?Ritual Studies? als Herausforderung für die Liturgiewissenschaft / Modern Ritual Studies as a challenge for liturgical studies (2009);  with Arie L. Molendijk (eds.): Holy Ground. Re-inventing ritual space in modern western culture (= Liturgia condenda 24) (Leuven: Peeters 2010) ; Voorbij het ker