Crossing Spiritual Boundaries: Encountering, Articulating and Representing Otherworlds

Abstract

There is a growing critical social science literature around contemporary expressions of alternative spirituality. However, this literature appears to have overlooked a core feature of these spiritual experiences. For many contemporary alternative spiritual practitioners, spirit plays an active and ever present role in their everyday lives and relationships. However, the critical social science discourse has failed to adequately engage with this. Instead the dominant approach has been to suggest spirituality today is about a personal journey to the divine within, usually sustained by the purchase of widely available protean commodities such as crystals, Buddhas and weekend retreats. In this discourse the 'spirit' at the heart of spirituality has effectively been killed. It is my belief that this is in part a reflection of the inability of social science to encounter, articulate and represent such otherworldliness. Based on my experiences of participatory fieldwork with individuals and groups engaged in a wide range of spiritual practices, I suggest critical social science needs to be able to engage with the enchanted worlds which arise out of many contemporary spiritual experiences with respect, sensitivity and a little creativity. These practitioners are actively seeking connections between 'this' world and 'otherworlds' and it is time for critical social science to acknowledge the 'extra-geographies' that arise out of this. In this paper I reflect upon the methodological implications of this, and present a conceptual framework which might help us to articulate and represent the spatialities of these very enchanted spiritualities.

Understanding Consumer Enchantment via Paranormal Tourism: Part I—Conceptual Review

“…The preceding ideas and interpretations are corroborated by authors who have explained the allure of ghostly experiences and paranormal tourism as promoting feelings of enchantment (Herrmann, 2014;Holloway, 2006Holloway, , 2010Schneider, 1993). Truly, ghost and haunt narratives involve enactive processes (Drinkwater et al, 2019;Eaton, 2019;Hill et al, 2018Hill et al, , 2019 and can help people to develop otherworldly relationships (MacKian, 2011), or encounter a magical modernity involving stimuli outside their conventional experience (Houran et al, 2020;Jenkins, 2000). Thus, "sacred, enchanted, mystical, or supernatural" settings promote more than appeal, engagement, or attachment.…”

Animating the Sacred, Sentient and Spiritual in Post‐Humanist and Material Geographies

“…I use the term “sacred,” as the characteristic of a specific space, place, object, human, or nonhuman, to elicit awe and reverence . I use the term “spiritual” and “spirituality” to denote a specific orientation towards sacred space‐time, which is open to the manifestation of a known “divine or ultimate being” (Holloway :1962) or the “intangible, unknowable world of the spirit” (MacKian :69). I use the term “sentience” or “sentient” to specifically reference the indigenous belief in the quality of all life to think, feel, and act.…”

Constructing subjective spiritual geographies in everyday mobilities: the practice of prayer and meditation in corporeal travel

“…Adapting the distinction of strategy and tactics, Woodhead (2012a) applies de Certeau's approach to differentiate between the institutional narratives of religion (strategic religion) and individual everyday engagement in religion and spirituality (tactical religion). This resonates with work since 2000 by geographers to address the exercise of religious and spiritual beliefs and practices in everyday life and spaces over institutional narratives (Holloway, 1998;Knott, 2005a;MacKian, 2011;Philo et al, 2011;2015). Tactical religion manifests in the form of the mobile and informal, transforming this-worldly objects into spaces for reflection and manifestation of religion and spirituality (Woodhead, 2012a).…”