Academic Life And Teaching In Post-Reformation Lutheranism
This chapter presents a history of post-Reformation Lutheran university life and teaching, focusing on the period from Melanchthon's death (1560) to the end of the 17th century. Since many of the patterns that shaped this period originated in a late-medieval shift in university culture, the chapter begins with a look back at these macro-historical trends. While previous efforts to portray early-modern Lutheran university culture have focused either on its material history or its intellectual history, the present approach regards the two as inextricably related and strives toward a more integrative view. The chapter provides both a useful introduction and a fresh perspective on this exciting period of early Lutheran history. As early-modern German societies developed into absolutist states, the politics of confessionalization provided an encompassing cultural context for much of private and public life. Keywords:academic life; confessionalization; early-modern German societies; post-reformation Lutheranism