معرفی
Dr. Sonja Luehrmann (1975–2019) was an Associate Professor of Anthropology at Simon Fraser University. She held a PhD from the University of Michigan’s Anthropology and History Program (2009). Her research focused on human transformability in socio-political contexts, particularly in the Soviet Union and post-Soviet regions, examining how institutions shape ideological and religious identities. She specialized in atheism studies, Orthodox Christianity, and the politics of reproduction.
Her major works include Secularism Soviet Style (2011) and Religion in Secular Archives (2015), which won the Waldo Gifford Leland Award (2016). She explored anti-abortion activism in the Russian Orthodox Church and collaborated internationally on sensory spirituality in Orthodox prayer. Her research methods combined archival work with ethnographic fieldwork in Russia’s Volga region.
Dr. Luehrmann’s awards included a Killam Postdoctoral Fellowship (2009–11) and grants from the SSRC and IREX. She investigated topics such as Soviet pedagogy, interethnic witchcraft perceptions, and gendered moral agency in post-Soviet contexts. Her legacy continues through her scholarship on Soviet-era atheism’s impact on contemporary religious memory and identity.
