MAJA BJELICA, PhD, Research Associate

Institute for Philosophical Studies

Phone: +386 5 663 77 00

E-mail: maja.bjelica@zrs-kp.si

Research Areas:

• Philosophy, anthropology and musicology;
• Ethics of hospitality and intersubjectivity;
• Listening, Ethics of Listening
• Anthropology of religion
• Alevi Studies
• Applied ethnomusicology, community music
• Transdisciplinarity.

 Biography:

Maja Bjelica graduated from the Faculty of Arts of the University of Ljubljana in the framework of a double major in Philosophy and Musicology in 2011. She obtained a PhD in Anthropology in 2018 at the Faculty of Humanities at University of Primorska with a doctoral dissertation »A Philosophical-anthropological Study of the Possibilities of the Ethics of Hospitality: Breath, Silence and Listening in Spaces of intersubjectivity.«

Maja Bjelica has been working within the Institute for Philosophical Studies ZRS Koper since 2019, conducting research in the fields of ethics (ethics of listening, ethics of hospitality), anthropology of religion (Alevi studies), and philosophy of music (musicking, community music). Previously, she was employed as a young researcher at the same institute between 2013 and 2017, following the mentorship of Prof Dr Lenart Škof. During this period she trained as an assistant researcher also abroad, namely at the Department of Musicology at the National Conservatory of Turkish Music at Technical University in Istanbul (Turkey, 2015) with Dr Belma Oğul; at the Department of Thematic Studies, Gender Studies, Linköping University (Sweden, 2016) with Dr Nina Lykke; and the Department of Ethnomusicology and Ethnochoreology at the Irish World Academy of Music and Dance, University of Limerick (Ireland, 2017), with Dr Catherine Foley and Dr Colin Quigley. In the school year of 2012/2013, she taught music education at Ciril Kosmač Piran Elementary School.

She presents her research with scientific publications in peer-reviewed international journals and by participation at interdisciplinary scientific symposia and conferences. As (co)editor she collaborates in designing scientific collected volumes and journals (Poligrafi, Polish Journal of Aesthetics, Musicological Annual).

Research activity:

Dr Maja Bjelica participates in the research program “Liminal Spaces: Areas of Cultural and Societal Cohabitation in the Age of Risk and Vulnerability” (ARRS P6-0279), focusing on philosophical, anthropological and cultural aspects of cultural pluralism and intercultural dialogue. Special topics that she covers in this context are connected to the ethics of hospitality, as well as links between these topics and aspects of thinking of contemporary Europe and its borders (the researcher has devoted part of her specialization in her previous research work to Turkey and its cultures).

Dr Maja Bjelica was involved in different project teams led by members of the Institute of Philosophical Studies. She collaborated in the basic research project “Surviving the Anthropocene through Inventing New Ecological Justice and Biosocial Philosophical Literacy” (ARRS J7-1824), where she focused in researching (ethics of) listening as a practice or a path towards developing an ecological awareness and ethical cohabitation.

She collaborated also in the basic research project “Interreligious Dialogue – a Basis for Coexisting Diversity in the Light of Migration and the Refugee Crisis” (ARRS J6-9393) exploring the different aspects of the role of listening for interreligious dialogue, as it is an essential task for every person in order to contribute to interreligious communication. The researcher focused on the possibility of the emergence of an ethics of listening based on musical engagement, which represents a hospitable space of encouragement for mutually affectionate intersubjective gestures.

She was engaged in two other projects: “Reanimating Cosmic Justice: Poetics of the Feminine” (ARRS J6-8265), through which she focused on connecting the philosophy of Luce Irigaray with practices of the Turkish Alevi communities, and “Between Politicas and Ethics: Towards a New World Culture of Hospitality and Non-Violence” (ARRS J6-5565) to which she contributed as a young researcher through deepening the understanding of the ethics of hospitality through philosophies of continental thinkers, such as Emmanuel Levinas and Jacques Derrida.

She is actively involved in organizational and programme committees of international scientific conferences and other events organized by the Institute for Philosophical Studies. She contributed to the preparations the following events: Poesis of Peace (Gozd Martuljek, Slovenia, May 15–18, 2014), »borders/debordering«: Towards a New World Culture of Hospitality (Gozd Martuljek, Slovenia, June 30–July 3, 2016), Terrors of Injustice: Gender Violence and Ethics of Shame (Utrecht, Netherlands, October 4–5, 2018), New Philosophical and Theological Foundations for Christian-Muslim Dialogue (Portorož, Slovenia, May 27–29, maj 2019), Towards Tolerant and Plural Dialogues of Values and Religion in the Euro-Mediterranean (Triest, Italy, September 26–27, 2019), Religious Peace-Building, Inter-Religious Dialogue, Migrations and Refugee Crisis (Koper and online, April 19, 2021), Surviving the Anthropocene: Towards Elemental Literacy and Interdisciplinary Partnerships (online, May 24–2,6 2021), Airy Encounters: Respiratory Philosophy and Sound Arts (Helsinki, June 6–8, 2022).