The article contains an overview of theoretical and empirical work carried out by sociologists of religion in the study of new religious movements and the anticult movement since 1978; it pays special attention to the aftereffects of the mass suicide/murder of followers of Jim Jones in Guyana. The different theories as to why people join the movement are discussed-whether they are 'brainwashed,' what influences (pushes and/or pulls) the wider society has on the membership. Mention is made of the role of sociologists themselves as witnesses in court cases and as participant observers at conferences organized by the movements. Bibliographic details are supplied of writings about particular movements, in particular countries, and concerning particular problems (finances, family life, legal issues, conversion, 'deprograrnming,' etc) It is suggested that the differences between the movements are considerably greater than is often recognized and that there is a need for further comparative research and more refined classificatory systems before our theoretical knowledge can develop and be tested satisfactorily. Various changes (such as the demographic variables of an aging membership, the death of charismatic leaders, and the socialization of second-generation membership; changing relationships with the 'host' society; and the growth—or demise—of the movements) provide much more of interest for the sociologist to study in the future.

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English Given the theme of the ISSR Conference for which I was invited to prepare the paper, “Religion and Society: Challenging Boundaries”, I found myself asking what kind of boundaries are likely to be associated with different kinds of locations of religious identity, one, but only one, of which would be based on the nation. This involved: (1) contrasting the sociological relativism espoused by Mary Douglas with the Platonic essentialism associated with many believers; (2) considering the variety to be found between different types of boundaries; (3) constructing an ideal typology of some possible locations of religious identity and (4) hypothesizing about variations in the types of boundaries that each of the types of locations might exhibit. French Le thème de la conférence de la SISR pour laquelle j'ai été invitée à préparer la communication 'Religion et société: les frontières en question', m'a conduite à me demander quelles frontières pourraient être associées à différents types de localisation de l'identité religieuse. La nation ne constitue qu'un seul d'entre eux. Ceci a impliqué: (1) de mettre en contraste le relativisme sociologique adopté par Mary Douglas et l'essentialisme platonicien partagé par de nombreux croyants; (2) de prendre en compte la diversité des différents types de frontières que l'on peut trouver; (3) de construire une typologie des localisations possibles de l'identité religieuse et (4) d'imaginer les variations au sein des types de frontières dont chacun des types de localisation sera susceptible de faire preuve.

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