Thursday, 17 October 2024, 14:00 GMT+2 (turkish Time 15:00 GMT+3)
The focus on “material religion” was developed as a critique of a strongly mentalistic understanding of religion as interior belief framed in modern secular formations. This understanding did not only systematically play down the tangible presence of religious material forms – buildings, images, objects, and even texts – in favour of a concern with the spiritual, invisible dimension. It also took a strong investment in religious material forms as a sign of inferiority (named “idolatry”, “fetishism” or “superstition”). The study of religion from a material angle, I argue in this lecture, does not imply a mere reversal of emphasis from spiritual to material. Rather, the materiality of religion is an apt starting point for critical concepts and methods in studying religion so as to move beyond lingering Eurocentrism and coloniality. What are the implications of this move for critical research on religion in Turkey? An answer to this question can only be offered by the workshop as a whole. Reflecting on my research on religion in Ghana by way of comparison, I will address limits and possibilities of translating the material religion approach to religious configurations in areas that so far have been analysed through a mentalistic lens. Which resources do they offer for theory formation?
Birgit Meyer is Professor of Religious Studies at Utrecht University. Trained as a cultural anthropologist, she studies religion from a material and postcolonial angle. Recent book publications include Figuration and Sensations of the Unseen in Judaism, Christianity and Islam: Contested Desires (2019, coedited with Terje Stordalen), and Refugees and Religion. Ethnographic Studies of Global Trajectories (2021, coedited with Peter van der Veer). She directs the research programme Religious Matters in an Entangled World.
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