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In recent decades, a new type of room has been established in public institutions in Europe: the rooms of silence. In this article, rooms of silence at three Scandinavian universities are analyzed with focus on intention, materiality, and use in relation to increased religious diversity in the student population, individualization, and ongoing secularization. This is done by using a typology which distinguishes between individual and collective use and use associated with religious, spiritual, and secular practices. The analyses show that plans and policies for the rooms emphasize stress-reduction and spiritual or secular reflection. The chaplains actively facilitate the shift from collective to more individual use of the rooms. The analyses also show that the restricted materiality of the rooms shapes practices in ways that either hinder collective Muslim prayer or force students to perform prayer as an individual “silent” action.

The article examines the newspaper constructions of religion in Danish newspapers in a quantitative longitudinal analysis from 1750 to 2000 and a more qualitative analysis of recent news production from the last forty years. For the longitudinal part, the database of the digitization of Danish newspapers project is used. Using the available tools for quantitative data analysis, the article shows that the category of religion and world religions has been visible in Danish newspapers since 1750. The coverage of world religions is often related to the coverage of international news. Overall, the article documents a remarkable continuity of the presence of religion. Examining the more recent material qualitatively, the article shows that although many religions have been historically visible in the news, they have most recently become more frequent in the debate sections than in the news sections. It is primarily Islam that is debated. This is connected with a shift from religious diversity as part of foreign news coverage to domestic news coverage, related to changes in the surrounding Danish society. Nevertheless, the coverage of Islam also displays a remarkable continuity.

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