This volume revisits the concepts of enchantment and sacralization in light of perspectives which challenge the modern notion that man (alone) is the measure of all things. As Bruno Latour has argued, the battle against superstition entailed shifting power away from God/the gods to humans, thereby disqualifying the agency of all the other objects in the world. Might enchantment and sacralization be understood in other ways than through this battle between almighty gods and almighty humans? Might enchantment be understood to involve processes where power and control are not distributed so clearly and definitely?Like social constructionists, Latour emphasizes that things are constructed; yet, like many other new materialists, such as Jane Bennett, Manuel De Landa and Karen Barad, he emphasizes that this construction is not the result of projecting meaning onto a passive and meaningless world, but a matter of compositional achievements, whereby assemblages of actants co-compose each other and frame, enable and delimit one another's agency.This move recognizes the active and entangled participation of players beyond the humans versus God(s) framework that informed the modernist project.
Understanding enchantment and sacralisation as compositionally and relationally constructed does not mean the same as understanding them as constructed by humans alone. What it means is one of the main questions posed in this book. In other words, if enchantment and sacralization are not understood (solely) in terms of projecting anthropocentric meaning onto mute objects, what are some promising alternative approaches - old and new - and what are their implications for how we understand modernity and for method and theory in the study of religion?
This volume revisits the concepts of enchantment and sacralization in light of perspectives which challenge the modern notion that man (alone) is the measure of all things. As Bruno Latour has argued, the battle against superstition entailed shifting power away from God/the gods to humans, thereby disqualifying the agency of all the other objects in the world. Might enchantment and sacralization be understood in other ways than through this battle between almighty gods and almighty humans? Might enchantment be understood to involve processes where power and control are not distributed so clearly and definitely?Like social constructionists, Latour emphasizes that things are constructed; yet, like many other new materialists, such as Jane Bennett, Manuel De Landa and Karen Barad, he emphasizes that this construction is not the result of projecting meaning onto a passive and meaningless world, but a matter of compositional achievements, whereby assemblages of actants co-compose each other and frame, enable and delimit one another's agency.This move recognizes the active and entangled participation of players beyond the humans versus God(s) framework that informed the modernist project.
Understanding enchantment and sacralisation as compositionally and relationally constructed does not mean the same as understanding them as constructed by humans alone. What it means is one of the main questions posed in this book. In other words, if enchantment and sacralization are not understood (solely) in terms of projecting anthropocentric meaning onto mute objects, what are some promising alternative approaches - old and new - and what are their implications for how we understand modernity and for method and theory in the study of religion?
Introduction: Towards More Symmetrical CompositionsPeik Ingman, Terhi Utriainen, Tuija Hovi and Mans BrooPART I: Revisiting Enchantment and Animism1. Objects as Subjects: Agency and Performativity in RitualsAnne-Christine Hornborg, Lund University2. Enchantment, Matter, and the Unpredictability of DevotionAmy Whitehead, University of Wales and Oxford Brookes University3. Empowerment and the Articulation of Agency among Finnish Yoga PractitionersMans Broo and Christiane Konigstedt, University of Munster4. Mastery and Modernity: Control Issues in the Disenchantment TaleLinda Annunen, Abo Akademi University, and Peik IngmanPART II: Political Concerns5. Recomposing Religion: Radical Agnosticism and Transformative SpeechMichael Barnes Norton, University of Arkansas6. Re-enchanting Body and Religion in a Secular Society: Touch of an AngelTerhi Utriainen7. Marian Apparitions: The Construction of Authenticity and Governance of Sacralization in the Shrine of Our Lady of the Rosary in PortugalNora Machado, Lisbon University Institute and University of Gothenburg8. Protection through the Invocation of Shared Thirds: Sacralization Without IconoclasmPeik IngmanPART III: Academic Concerns9. Enchanted Sight/Site: An Esoteric Aesthetics of Image and ExperienceJay Johnston, University of Sydney10. From Religion to Ordering Uncertainty: A Lesson from DancersMilan Fujda, Masaryk University, Czech Republic11. Enchanted Environment: Co-composing a Village History in the Archipelago of Southwestern FinlandJaana Kouri, University of Turku12. After Dis/enchantment: The Profanity of the Human SciencesStuart McWilliams, Abo Akademi UniversityEpilogue: When Things Talk BackKocku von Stuckrad, University of Groningen
Peik Ingman is a PhD candidate in Comparative Religion at Abo Akademi University, Finland. Tuija Hovi is University Lecturer in Comparative Religion at the University of Turku.Terhi Utriainen is Docent and Senior Lecturer in the Study of Religions at the University of Helsinki. Mans Broo is University Researcher in the Department of Comparative Religion at Abo Akademi University, Finland.
This volume brings the study of ritual, religion, and spirituality
into full conversation with agency, networks, and materiality. The
result is a fascinating and insightful resource that casts new
light on enchantment and sacralization, which become in the
authors' hands very useful analytical concepts. In a day when
traditional notions of 'religion' have lost relevance, a new set of
conceptual tools is important to develop. This book makes a
splendid contribution.
Professor David Morgan, Duke University
This is a wonderful book. It draws on sophisticated cutting edge
theory to provide significant new insights into ritual,
enchantment, and religious practice. I particularly enjoyed the
creative engagement with contemporary debates about 'religion' that
draws us back to empirical studies of the ethical and moral
challenges negotiated through the experience and practice of
religion.
Professor Douglas Ezzy, University of Tasmania; President:
Australian Association for the Study of Religion; Editor: Journal
for the Academic Study of Religion
Invoking the previously exorcised "religious" terms, enchantment
and sacralisation, this radical volume experiments with
re-positioning religion and the study of religion as relational
encounters. Facing down some suffocating polemics, the contributors
demonstrate what may be achieved by allowing new possibilities to
emerge from dialogue, reflection and a willingness to learn.
Professor Graham Harvey, The Open University
If your academic interests include Bruno Latour, vernacular
religion, materiality in religion, ritual, enchantment, or animism,
then this book is a must-have for your collection. However, even if
these topics fall outside of your normal research areas, I would
recommend this book if for no other reason than to see some ways in
which the field of religious studies is being reconfigured.
Novo Religio
Overall, this is an excellent book. It is not only approachable
from several different fields, but leaves the reader with multiple
perspectives from which to further investigate the enchantment of
new materialism.
Reading Religion
This collection is a major contribution to the emerging field of
enchantment studies, with papers that are almost uniformly
interesting and innovative.
Material Religion
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