Fabricating Religion : : Fanfare for the Common e.g. / / Russell T. McCutcheon.

• Superior document: Title is part of eBook package: De Gruyter DG Plus DeG Package 2018 Part 1
• VerfasserIn: McCutcheon, Russell T.,
• Place / Publishing House: Berlin ;, Boston : : De Gruyter, , [2018]; ©2018
• Year of Publication: 2018
• Language: English
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (X, 186 p.)

The revised essays collected here, four of which are published for the first time, continue a longstanding argument made by McCutcheon and others: that the study of religion would benefit from self-conscious scrutiny of its tools, the interests that may drive them, and the effects that might follow their use. The chapters examine a variety of contemporary sites in the modern field where this thesis can be argued, whether involving the anachronistic use of of the category religion when studying the ancient world to current interest in so-called critical religion or critical realist approaches. Moreover – contrary to some past characterizations of such critiques – a constructive way forward for the field is once again recommended and, at several sites, exemplified in detail: redescribing not only religion as something ordinary but also our tendency to create the impression of exceptional and thus set-apart things, places, and people. Aimed at scholars and students alike, the book is an invitation to examine our own scholarly practices and thereby take a more active role in shaping the field in which we carry out our work as scholars of this thing we call religion.

Table of Contents

Frontmatter -- Acknowledgements -- Contents -- Introduction: On Fabricating Religion -- 1. The Category “Religion” in Recent Publications: Twenty Years Later -- 2. “It’s (Not) Easy if You Try:” The Challenge to Imagine No Religion -- 3. A Question (Still) Worth Asking about The Religions of Man -- 4. “Man is the Measure of All Things:” On The Fabrication of Oriental Religions by European History of Religions -- 5. Identifying the Meaning and End of Scholarship: What’s at Stake in Muslim Identities -- 6. Of Concepts and Entities: Varieties of Critical Scholarship -- 7. Historicizing the Elephant in the Room -- 8. The Magic of the Melancholy: Shifting Gears in the Study of Religion -- 9. Fanfare for the Common e.g.: On the Strategic Use of the Mundane -- Author Index -- Subject Index