Multiple Secularities Beyond the West: Religion and Modernity in the Global Age

Description

Questions of secularity and modernity have become globalized, but most studies still focus on the West. This volume breaks new ground by comparatively exploring developments in five areas of the world, some of which were hitherto situated at the margins of international scholarly discussions: Africa, the Arab World, East Asia, South Asia, and Central and Eastern Europe. In theoretical terms, the book examines three key dimensions of modern secularity: historical pathways, cultural meanings, and global entanglements of secular formations. The contributions show how differences in these dimensions are linked to specific histories of religious and ethnic diversity, processes of state-formation and nation-building. They also reveal how secularities are critically shaped through civilizational encounters, processes of globalization, colonial conquest, and missionary movements, and how entanglements between different territorially grounded notions of secularity or between local cultures and transnational secular arenas unfold over time. Table of Contents Multiple Secularities beyond the West: An Introduction Part I: Religious Communities and the State: Fault-Lines of Religion and Secularity in South Asia Secular Anxieties and Transnational Engagements in India “Speaking” the Nation Secular: (E)merging Faces of India Anti-caste Radicalism, Dalit Movements and the Many Critiques of Secular Nationalism in India Part II: Nationalism, Islam and Democratization: Secular Dynamics in the Arab World Deviance as a Phenomenon of Secularity: Islam and Deviants in Twentieth-century Egypt—A Search for Sociological Explanations Secularity Contested: Religion, Identity and the Public Order in the Arab Middle East Part III: Secularities in East Asia Japanese Responses to Imperialist Secularization: The Postwar Movement to Restore Shinto in the Public Sphere The Religious-Secular Divide at the Community Level in Contemporary Japan Part IV: African Scenarios: (Post-)Colonial Secularity vs. African Religiosity? Moments of Insurgency: Christianity in South African Politics, from the 18th Century to Today After Pentecostalism? Exploring Intellectualism, Secularization and Guiding Sentiments in Africa Part V: The Sacred Secular: Secularities in post-Communist Central and Eastern Europe Vulnerable Post-Soviet Secularities: Patterns and Dynamics in Russia and Beyond Socialist Secularities: The Diversity of a Universalist Model Conclusions Between World Society and Multiple Modernities: Comparing Cultural Constructions of Secularity and Institutional Varieties of Secularism List of Contributors Index