In this blog post, Charlotte Hobson explores British sentiments around the sacred using the Monarchy as a case study, asking: who wants a Christian coronation?
NSRN Blog
The Critical Study of Nonreligion: An Invitation
In this post, NSRN Co-Director Chris Cotter places contemporary non-religion studies into conversation with the critical study of religion, assessing two dominant approaches in the field before extolling the virtues of a discursive approach as one way in which rigorous empirical work can be conducted ostensibly under the religion/non-religion binary and contribute to the critical project.
The ‘Secular AA’ Movement
In this blog post, Zachary Munro discusses the development of a non-religious recovery culture in Alcoholics Anonymous (AA), and how groups like Secular Organizations for Sobriety (SOS), and LifeRing Secular Recovery are renegotiating their relationships to AA’s origins in the evangelical “Oxford Group” of the 1930s. As this non-religious recovery culture grows, it continues to explore ways in which the Twelve Steps on the road from the “addicted-self” to the “recovering-self” might need neither God nor even “spiritual” discipline to work.
Myth and Solidarity in the Modern World: An Introduction
The world is awash with myths and fake news. The gut consensus among university-educated, post-Enlightenment minds appears to be that we should do away with myths altogether. But what about the positive role that myths play in underwriting shared action? My book, Myth and Solidarity in the Modern World: Beyond Religious and Political Division, sheds light on this positive role and how groups are facilitating the inclusive sharing of myths in diverse spaces. The following is a short introduction to that book.
Senses of the Secular Symposium
Co-organisers Justine Esta Ellis and Marek Sullivan report back on the day-symposium Senses of the Secular, held 21 May 2018 at Balliol College, Oxford.
Are There ‘Religion’ and ‘the Secular’ in Premodern Japan?
Scholars working on premodern Japan tend to project ‘religion’ and ‘the secular’ upon the socio-cultural context they study. My contention is that there was no ‘religion’ in premodern Japan. Therefore, there was no ‘secularity’ in premodern Japan, either.
Subtypes of Religious Nones in the United States and Canada
In this post Joel Thiessen and Sarah Wilkins-Laflamme updates us on their 2 year project which aims to answer what the difference is between ‘nones’ in the US and Canada.
Non-affiliated Believers and Atheists in Uruguay
In this post, Uruguayan sociologist Néstor Da Costa describes the rates and forms of nonreligion in Uruguay and the ways they are shaped by the country’s historical relationship with religious institutions.
Jack of all Trades? Introducing Law and Non-religion
In this post Helge Årsheim questions what could – and should – the study of law and non-religion be about?
Spirituality: Secular or Religious?
In this post Galen Watts questions whether the paradigm of secularization—exemplified by the recent work of Steve Bruce—is ultimately the most useful for studying spirituality. He contends that scholars might be better off eschewing essentialist definitions of “religion” and instead examining the various ways in which individuals operationalize the term “spirituality,” and for what purposes. Drawing from his qualitative research with Canadian millennials who self-identify as SBNR he argues that individuals who claim “spirituality” do so largely as a result of the religious imaginaries they hold. Thus investigating the nature of these imaginaries might prove far more fruitful than obsessing over whether
or notspirituality is “real religion” or not.
