Pub Date : 2022-12-01DOI: 10.1177/00377686221105770
Sonya Sharma, Sheryl Reimer-Kirkham
In sociological studies of religion and chaplaincy, there is little research on how gender plays a role in structural inequalities and experiences of women chaplains. Through research on the work of women chaplains in public healthcare in Vancouver (Canada) and London (England) this qualitative study revealed that while they have opportunities for leadership and ministry in chaplaincy, they are often on the margins of the religious institutions they are affiliated with and the secular medical organisations that employ them. Simultaneously, they confront the social structuring of gender and race that can affect them being overlooked. By applying a lived religion and feminist intersectional analysis, this research focuses on an area of study that has received scant attention.
{"title":"In plain view: Gender in the work of women healthcare chaplains.","authors":"Sonya Sharma, Sheryl Reimer-Kirkham","doi":"10.1177/00377686221105770","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00377686221105770","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>In sociological studies of religion and chaplaincy, there is little research on how gender plays a role in structural inequalities and experiences of women chaplains. Through research on the work of women chaplains in public healthcare in Vancouver (Canada) and London (England) this qualitative study revealed that while they have opportunities for leadership and ministry in chaplaincy, they are often on the margins of the religious institutions they are affiliated with and the secular medical organisations that employ them. Simultaneously, they confront the social structuring of gender and race that can affect them being overlooked. By applying a lived religion and feminist intersectional analysis, this research focuses on an area of study that has received scant attention.</p>","PeriodicalId":46442,"journal":{"name":"Social Compass","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2022-12-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9893302/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"9213144","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-12-01DOI: 10.1177/00377686221105780
Hervé Maupeu, Yonatan N Gez, Yvan Droz
As affirmed by the 2010 constitution, the Republic of Kenya is a secular country that promises both freedom of faith and freedom from religion. In practice, however, the realm of religion in Kenya is highly normative. The 2010s have seen the rise of a group seeking to challenge this status quo: Atheists in Kenya (AIK). The group met with fierce resistance, and its attempt to register as a legal society ended before the country's High Court. AIK's activism turned it into a social movement that demands a reexamination of the close ties between religion and the State. It is thus an important participant in a wide debate on secularism in Kenya. In addition, AIK may be read as a testimony to the country's present stage of democratization, which allows - if sometimes reluctantly - for new modes of social action and for the expression of claims that were formerly kept in check.
{"title":"Athéisme et sécularisme au Kenya : les tribulations des <i>Atheists In Kenya</i> (AIK).","authors":"Hervé Maupeu, Yonatan N Gez, Yvan Droz","doi":"10.1177/00377686221105780","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00377686221105780","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>As affirmed by the 2010 constitution, the Republic of Kenya is a secular country that promises both freedom of faith and freedom from religion. In practice, however, the realm of religion in Kenya is highly normative. The 2010s have seen the rise of a group seeking to challenge this status quo: Atheists in Kenya (AIK). The group met with fierce resistance, and its attempt to register as a legal society ended before the country's High Court. AIK's activism turned it into a social movement that demands a reexamination of the close ties between religion and the State. It is thus an important participant in a wide debate on secularism in Kenya. In addition, AIK may be read as a testimony to the country's present stage of democratization, which allows - if sometimes reluctantly - for new modes of social action and for the expression of claims that were formerly kept in check.</p>","PeriodicalId":46442,"journal":{"name":"Social Compass","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2022-12-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://ftp.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pub/pmc/oa_pdf/f2/28/10.1177_00377686221105780.PMC9893031.pdf","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"10650604","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-11-30DOI: 10.1177/00377686221133943
J. Colleyn
This article focuses on three different patterns of spirit possession in Mali, a country where spirits interact with human beings. Some Malian cases – but not all of them – comfort the well-received theory asserting that possession is a form of protest and is related to a historical crisis. African possession cults are generally considered as characteristics of marginal groups in response to the domination of a monotheist religion, especially Islam and Christianity, but several cults from the Minianka area contradict this ideal type. At a national level, some cults look for a compromise with the spirits, while others are aimed to get rid of them.
{"title":"Possession and exorcism on the margins of Islam: Mali","authors":"J. Colleyn","doi":"10.1177/00377686221133943","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00377686221133943","url":null,"abstract":"This article focuses on three different patterns of spirit possession in Mali, a country where spirits interact with human beings. Some Malian cases – but not all of them – comfort the well-received theory asserting that possession is a form of protest and is related to a historical crisis. African possession cults are generally considered as characteristics of marginal groups in response to the domination of a monotheist religion, especially Islam and Christianity, but several cults from the Minianka area contradict this ideal type. At a national level, some cults look for a compromise with the spirits, while others are aimed to get rid of them.","PeriodicalId":46442,"journal":{"name":"Social Compass","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2022-11-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44357442","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-11-30DOI: 10.1177/00377686221139214
Serena Bindi
Ethnographic analysis of the two main exorcistic practices in which married women are involved in Garhwal (India) shows that the theme of domestic conflict is central to both rituals. Addressing classical debates in anthropology about possession, this text raises two main questions: are these practices forms of feminine resistance to patriarchal social rules? And what is the notion of the person and her or his action in the world underlying these practices? Although these rituals may sometimes bring benefits to the women participating in them, women do not seem to perceive themselves nor to act as individuals who are resisting social structures, but more as part of collective networks of human and spiritual persons. As for the effects of these rituals, they are geared towards the preservation of family unity. This is achieved by the fact that, while evoking human conflict, these ritual devices subordinate it to the problem of divine conflict. Yet these practices do not only have an integrative function vis-à-vis conflicts that potentially endanger the family unit, but they also firmly establish the position of married women and their irreplaceability in the fabric of social life. Being close to the deities of their natal villages and easily affected by spirits of the dead, married women have an essential role in mediating with them and therefore in building and preserving the network of human and non-human beings on which the well-being of the family depends.
{"title":"Exorcising angry deities and spirits of the dead: Spiritual and earthly battles of married women in Uttarakhand (India)","authors":"Serena Bindi","doi":"10.1177/00377686221139214","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00377686221139214","url":null,"abstract":"Ethnographic analysis of the two main exorcistic practices in which married women are involved in Garhwal (India) shows that the theme of domestic conflict is central to both rituals. Addressing classical debates in anthropology about possession, this text raises two main questions: are these practices forms of feminine resistance to patriarchal social rules? And what is the notion of the person and her or his action in the world underlying these practices? Although these rituals may sometimes bring benefits to the women participating in them, women do not seem to perceive themselves nor to act as individuals who are resisting social structures, but more as part of collective networks of human and spiritual persons. As for the effects of these rituals, they are geared towards the preservation of family unity. This is achieved by the fact that, while evoking human conflict, these ritual devices subordinate it to the problem of divine conflict. Yet these practices do not only have an integrative function vis-à-vis conflicts that potentially endanger the family unit, but they also firmly establish the position of married women and their irreplaceability in the fabric of social life. Being close to the deities of their natal villages and easily affected by spirits of the dead, married women have an essential role in mediating with them and therefore in building and preserving the network of human and non-human beings on which the well-being of the family depends.","PeriodicalId":46442,"journal":{"name":"Social Compass","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2022-11-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44097389","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-10-25DOI: 10.1177/00377686221122981
Verónica Giménez Béliveau
This article proposes to study the contemporary implementation of Catholic exorcism rituals in France. It is a growing demand that challenges the Catholic Church and expresses discomforts in contemporary society. Based on a study conducted in France between 2016 and 2020, the research is spread over various dioceses and works with diverse actors (priests, exorcists, ritual requesters, lay collaborators) belonging to plural groups. Using qualitative strategies – mainly ethnography, active interviews and document analysis – this article analyses the population requesting exorcism, and attempts to understand the environments in which the practices are anchored and the work of the exorcists. This article shows the dialogue established between the practice of exorcism and medical interpretations, and the deployment of a new listening and regulation of the Church towards an increased demand which is related to indeterminate misfortunes linked to the field of health and healing.
{"title":"Exorcisme catholique en France contemporaine, entre thérapeutique et régulation institutionnelle","authors":"Verónica Giménez Béliveau","doi":"10.1177/00377686221122981","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00377686221122981","url":null,"abstract":"This article proposes to study the contemporary implementation of Catholic exorcism rituals in France. It is a growing demand that challenges the Catholic Church and expresses discomforts in contemporary society. Based on a study conducted in France between 2016 and 2020, the research is spread over various dioceses and works with diverse actors (priests, exorcists, ritual requesters, lay collaborators) belonging to plural groups. Using qualitative strategies – mainly ethnography, active interviews and document analysis – this article analyses the population requesting exorcism, and attempts to understand the environments in which the practices are anchored and the work of the exorcists. This article shows the dialogue established between the practice of exorcism and medical interpretations, and the deployment of a new listening and regulation of the Church towards an increased demand which is related to indeterminate misfortunes linked to the field of health and healing.","PeriodicalId":46442,"journal":{"name":"Social Compass","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2022-10-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44759512","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-08-12DOI: 10.1177/00377686221115529
Bénédicte Brac de la Perriére
In Burma, exorcism is readily observable as a healing practice, and appears as a relatively well-bound domain ensconced into the larger and manifold Burmese Buddhist esoterism known as the weikza path. In this article, exorcism will be examined to unveil what he does to the Burmese religion. Particularly, manifestation of nefarious beings provoked by specialists in their patients during séances, through supposedly erratic movement is opposed to spirit possession’s dances as exorcism to adorcism (de Heusch). It is argued that bodily behaviour is used by exorcist as a way to demonstrate whose spiritual beings’ worship should be abandoned by patients undertaking the exorcist cure and by weikza followers.
{"title":"Exorcism: A device of differentiation in Burmese Buddhism","authors":"Bénédicte Brac de la Perriére","doi":"10.1177/00377686221115529","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00377686221115529","url":null,"abstract":"In Burma, exorcism is readily observable as a healing practice, and appears as a relatively well-bound domain ensconced into the larger and manifold Burmese Buddhist esoterism known as the weikza path. In this article, exorcism will be examined to unveil what he does to the Burmese religion. Particularly, manifestation of nefarious beings provoked by specialists in their patients during séances, through supposedly erratic movement is opposed to spirit possession’s dances as exorcism to adorcism (de Heusch). It is argued that bodily behaviour is used by exorcist as a way to demonstrate whose spiritual beings’ worship should be abandoned by patients undertaking the exorcist cure and by weikza followers.","PeriodicalId":46442,"journal":{"name":"Social Compass","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2022-08-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42199200","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-08-12DOI: 10.1177/00377686221111967
Silvia Montenegro
In Morocco, people usually call Gnawa those communities of black Moroccans made up of descendants of slaves from sub-Saharan Africa (Mauritania, Senegal, Mali, Nigeria, and Guinea) who follow rituals merging Islamic traditions with pre-Islamic African traditions. Gnawa brotherhoods are organised into ‘houses’ called Dar Gnawa. Each house is led by a Mʿallem (a ritual master) who inherits his ancestor’s knowledge and is responsible for a group of apprentice musicians and dancers from the same town or from other places. Music and dancing are key elements in their religious ceremonies. Based on fieldwork carried out in 2012–2016 in a black community living in southeastern Morocco, a village in the desert, 50 km away from the border with Algeria, this article analyses the healing rituals performed by the brotherhood in the two Dar Gnawas in the town, in nearby villages, and in the annual festival. The aim of this article is to explain how Gnawas created their legitimacy and prestige as ‘professional’ healers.
{"title":"Music for healing: Black Gnawas and the ‘professional’ practice of dealing with spirits in southeastern Morocco","authors":"Silvia Montenegro","doi":"10.1177/00377686221111967","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00377686221111967","url":null,"abstract":"In Morocco, people usually call Gnawa those communities of black Moroccans made up of descendants of slaves from sub-Saharan Africa (Mauritania, Senegal, Mali, Nigeria, and Guinea) who follow rituals merging Islamic traditions with pre-Islamic African traditions. Gnawa brotherhoods are organised into ‘houses’ called Dar Gnawa. Each house is led by a Mʿallem (a ritual master) who inherits his ancestor’s knowledge and is responsible for a group of apprentice musicians and dancers from the same town or from other places. Music and dancing are key elements in their religious ceremonies. Based on fieldwork carried out in 2012–2016 in a black community living in southeastern Morocco, a village in the desert, 50 km away from the border with Algeria, this article analyses the healing rituals performed by the brotherhood in the two Dar Gnawas in the town, in nearby villages, and in the annual festival. The aim of this article is to explain how Gnawas created their legitimacy and prestige as ‘professional’ healers.","PeriodicalId":46442,"journal":{"name":"Social Compass","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2022-08-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41836835","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-08-04DOI: 10.1177/00377686221113253
Catherine Therrien, Josiane LE Gall, Francesco Cerchiaro
{"title":"Above and beyond social boundaries: Everyday life of Mixed Muslim–non-Muslim families in contemporary societies Au-delà des frontières sociales : le vécu des familles mixtes musulmanes-non-musulmanes dans les sociétés contemporaines","authors":"Catherine Therrien, Josiane LE Gall, Francesco Cerchiaro","doi":"10.1177/00377686221113253","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00377686221113253","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":46442,"journal":{"name":"Social Compass","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2022-08-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45395458","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-07-23DOI: 10.1177/00377686221108276
Diego Meza
In this article, I analyze the conversion retreats of the John XXIII Movement in Ipiales, Colombia in order to understand the swift spread of new Catholic groups in Latin America. Based on a qualitative research, I examined through twenty semi-structured interviews the definitions, narratives and meanings that some members and leaders of this movement attribute to their confessions and public testimonies of conversion. Instead of distinguishing John XXIII spiritual retreats and conversion testimonies as forms of domination, I propose the concept of pedagogies of conversion, in other words, a set of practices that seek to morally educate believers and that create a double economy of freedom and constraint. Finally, I drawn on various stories to show how moral agency relates to the intensity of these practices and to the past religious experiences of believers.
{"title":"La vérité sur soi-même : les pédagogies de conversion et les nouveaux mouvements religieux catholiques en Amérique latine","authors":"Diego Meza","doi":"10.1177/00377686221108276","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00377686221108276","url":null,"abstract":"In this article, I analyze the conversion retreats of the John XXIII Movement in Ipiales, Colombia in order to understand the swift spread of new Catholic groups in Latin America. Based on a qualitative research, I examined through twenty semi-structured interviews the definitions, narratives and meanings that some members and leaders of this movement attribute to their confessions and public testimonies of conversion. Instead of distinguishing John XXIII spiritual retreats and conversion testimonies as forms of domination, I propose the concept of pedagogies of conversion, in other words, a set of practices that seek to morally educate believers and that create a double economy of freedom and constraint. Finally, I drawn on various stories to show how moral agency relates to the intensity of these practices and to the past religious experiences of believers.","PeriodicalId":46442,"journal":{"name":"Social Compass","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2022-07-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45154361","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-07-01DOI: 10.1177/00377686221103713
Anastasios Panagiotopoulos, Eugenia Roussou
This article is a proposition and exploration of the term ‘transreligiosity’. We argue that transreligiosity is more apt to describe the transgressive character of religiosity, focusing more particularly on the transversality of spaces, symbolic or otherwise, which are created in religious phenomena. We examine the porosity of religious boundaries and, ultimately, propose the term transreligiosity to embrace them, placing emphasis on their transreligious character, while perceiving them as significant instantiations of transreligiosity. We take some of Latour’s key concepts on ‘purification’, to argue for the ultimate impossibility of it in the sphere of religiosity. While processes of purification have been powerful through efforts to institutionalize and centralize religiosity, at a vernacular level, this has had a contrary effect. Religious subjects have been distanced from a more direct participation (‘mediation’). Hence, they are constantly creating transreligious instances to abolish and transgress those rigid borders.
{"title":"We have always been transreligious: An introduction to transreligiosity","authors":"Anastasios Panagiotopoulos, Eugenia Roussou","doi":"10.1177/00377686221103713","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00377686221103713","url":null,"abstract":"This article is a proposition and exploration of the term ‘transreligiosity’. We argue that transreligiosity is more apt to describe the transgressive character of religiosity, focusing more particularly on the transversality of spaces, symbolic or otherwise, which are created in religious phenomena. We examine the porosity of religious boundaries and, ultimately, propose the term transreligiosity to embrace them, placing emphasis on their transreligious character, while perceiving them as significant instantiations of transreligiosity. We take some of Latour’s key concepts on ‘purification’, to argue for the ultimate impossibility of it in the sphere of religiosity. While processes of purification have been powerful through efforts to institutionalize and centralize religiosity, at a vernacular level, this has had a contrary effect. Religious subjects have been distanced from a more direct participation (‘mediation’). Hence, they are constantly creating transreligious instances to abolish and transgress those rigid borders.","PeriodicalId":46442,"journal":{"name":"Social Compass","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2022-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44781661","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}