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Dr. Kilian Harrer

Research associate
Room: 03 304
Phone: +49 (0)6131-39 23459

E-Mail


Personal Details:

Studies (B.A. 2012, M.A. 2015) in History with a minor in "Sprachen, Literaturen und Kulturen" at the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München; Ph.D. (2021) from the University of Wisconsin-Madison with the dissertation topic "Places of Power, Spaces of Peril: Pilgrimage and Borders in Western Central Europe, c.. 1770-1810"; 2021-23 research associate at SFB 1369 ("Vigilance Cultures") at LMU Munich; since 2023 research associate at the Leibniz Institute of European History (IEG).

Research Interests:

Religion and Politics from the Enlightenment to the Napoleonic Era
Transnational history and borderlands
Early modern Central and East-Central European history
Work, Piety and Holidays in the Early Modern Period
Environmental history

Selected Publications:

“Troubled Feast, Contested Fast: The Uniate Dilemma and the Rural Economy in Eighteenth-Century Poland-Lithuania,” Jahrbücher für Geschichte Osteuropas 72, no. 1 (2024): 20–43.
“Mass Pilgrimage and the Usable Empire in a Napoleonic Borderland,” The Historical Journal 66, no. 4 (2023): 773–94.
“Enlightenment and Linseed Oil: Conflicts over Fasting Rigour in Eighteenth-Century Poland-Lithuania,” Food & History 21, no. 2 (2023): 139–60.
“The Keys of Heaven in the Hands of Women: History, Hierarchy, and Gender in Early Modern Catholicism,” Catholic Historical Review 106, no. 1 (2020): 50–76.
“La suppression de cinq paroisses à Tours (1777–1782): Un exemple de rationalité administrative au siècle des Lumières,” Dix-Huitième Siècle 46 (2014): 673–93.

Research projects:

Enlightenment and Holiday Reform in East-Central Europe

In the eighteenth century, Catholic populations in Europe as well as in other parts of the world were confronted with a wave of radical holiday reforms. At the request of secular rulers, popes exempted the people from the obligation to refrain from all field and manual labour for a series of saints' days and Marian days. Religious reform ideals and political economy interacted in these attempts to initiate an "industrious revolution" from above.

Excellent Insects: Beekeeping, Silk Farming and the Ecological Struggles of the Enlightenment

Engaging with a rich existing historiography on campaigns for ‘progress’ and ‘industriousness,’ this book project analyses insect farming as a distinct, socio-economically and ecologically significant arena of Enlightenment. I pay particular attention to the clergymen and Huguenot refugees who played key roles in promoting beekeeping and silk farming.

Transgressive Devotion: Pilgrims and Borders in the French Revolutionary Era

Throughout the turbulent decades around 1800, Catholic pilgrims mingled piety and politics in the borderlands between German- and French-speaking Europe. While clerical leadership remained important, the current book project shows how lay Catholics often mobilized themselves as they faced the political and religious challenges of Enlightenment reform, revolution, and Napoleon’s authoritarian rule.