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Prof. Dr. Stéphanie Homola

Prof. Dr. Stéphanie Homola

Institut für Sprachen und Kulturen des Nahen Ostens und Ostasiens
Juniorprofessur für Ethnologie mit Schwerpunkt asiatischer Raum

Anthropology of knowledge, anthropology of religion, anthropology of memory, divination, destiny, Chinese religions, popular science

Fieldwork: Taipei (Taiwan), Beijing, Kaifeng

Positions

2016-2017 Visiting Scholar, Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, Berlin (Department III, Artefacts, Action, and Knowledge) & Erlangen-Nuremberg University (IKGF): joint-project “Accounting for Uncertainty: Prediction and Planning in Asia’s History”
Post-doctoral Fellow, Chiang Ching-kuo Foundation for International Scholarly Exchange
2014-2016 Research Fellow, Collège de France, Prof. Anne Cheng’s Chair of Chinese Intellectual History
2014 Post-doctoral Fellow, Erlangen-Nuremberg University, International Consortium for Research in the Humanities (IKGF), “Fate, Freedom and Prognostication. Strategies for Coping with the Future in East Asia and Europe”
Since 2013

 

 Associate Research Fellow, Centre d’études sur la Chine moderne et contemporaine (CECMC), Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales (EHESS)

Education

2013 PhD in Social Anthropology, Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales

Connaissances du destin: anthropologie des pratiques de divination contemporaines en Chine et à Taïwan (Knowing fate: an anthropology of contemporary divinatory practices in China and Taiwan)
2008 MA in Social Science, major in Anthropology of China, EHESS
2006 BA in Chinese studies, National Institute of Oriental Language and Civilization (INALCO), Paris
2003 MSc, ESSEC Business School, Paris –– major in Law

 

 

articles in peer-reviewed journals

 

  1. “Ce que la main sait du destin: opérations et manipulations dans les pratiques divinatoires chinoises” (What the hand knows about destiny: processes and handlings within Chinese divination). Ethnographiques.org, 31, Special issue “La part de la main” coordinated by Nicolas Adell and Sophie Chevalier (online), www.ethnographiques.org/2015/Homola

 

  1. “The Fortunes of a Scholar: When the Yijing Challenged Modern Astronomy”. Journal of Asian Studies, 73.3, 733-752.

 

  1. “Le cas du „dragon chinois“: légende, destin et chance autour d’un jeu divinatoire” (The Case of “Chinese dragon”: Legend, Destiny and Luck in a Divination Game). Etudes chinoises, 33.2, 153-175.

 

  1. “Les usages de la main dans les calculs divinatoires” (The Uses of the Hand in Divinatory Calculations). Etudes chinoises, 33.1, 113-132.

 

  1. “Pursue Good Fortune and Avoid Calamity: The Practice and Status of Divination in Contemporary Taiwan”. Journal of Chinese Religions, 41.2, 124-147.

 

  1. “La relation de maître à disciple en question: transmission orale et écrite des savoirs divinatoires en Chine et à Taïwan” (Interrogating the Master-Disciple Relation: Oral and Written Transmission of Divinatory Knowledge in China and Taiwan). Extrême-Orient, Extrême-Occident, 35, Special issue “Les Astres et le Destin. Astrologie et divination en Asie orientale” coordinated by Pierre Marsone and Jean-Noël Robert, 11-43. Available on https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-01493088

 

Book chapters

 

  1. “From jianghu to liumang: working conditions and cultural identity of wandering fortune-tellers in contemporary China”. In Michael Lackner (ed.), Coping with the Future. Theories and Practices of Divination in East Asia. Leiden: Brill (Sinica Leidensa 138), 366-391.

 

  1. “Selections on Illness Divination from Bodhidharma’s Treasure of the Palm”. In C. Pierce Salguero (ed.), Buddhism and Medecine. An Anthology of Premodern Sources. New York: Columbia University Press, 486-493.

 

 

  1. “Judging destiny: doubt and certainty in Chinese divinatory rituals”. In Daniela Berti, Anthony Good and Gilles Tarabout (ed.), Of Doubt and Proof. Ritual and Legal Practices of Judgment. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2015, 39-57.

 

“Les pratiques divinatoires des Chinois en France: migration, globalisation et territoire”. In Vincent Goossaert and Fang Ling (ed.), La religion des Chinois en France. Paris: Éditions du CNRS (forthcoming).

 

“Les tourments de l’individu: égocentrisme et interdépendance dans les pratiques divinatoires chinoises”. In Patrick Sigwalt (ed.), Le sujet chinois et son environnement: manuel à l’usage de la clinique interculturelle. Paris: Editions du Cerf-Alpha (forthcoming).

 

“Echanges de savoir entre étudiants chinois et sinologues français à l’Institut des Hautes Etudes Chinoises (1927-1968)”. In Pierre-Étienne Will (ed.), Jean-Pierre Abel-Rémusat et ses successeurs. Deux cents ans de sinologie française en France et en Chine. Paris: Institut des Hautes Etudes Chinoises (forthcoming).

 

Book reviews

 

“Richard J. Smith, The I Ching: A Biography. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2012 (Lives of Great Religious Books)”. Etudes chinoises, 2014, 33.2, 194-197.

 

“Cheng Ying, in collaboration with Claude Aubert, The Peasants of Mancang: the Chronicle of a Taiwanese village”. China Perspectives, May-June 2006, 65, [online]:

http://chinaperspectives.revues.org/640