Freedom for the Tertium: On Conditions and Provisions for Comparison in the Study of Religion

Freiberger, Oliver

doi:10.1086/694676

Cited by 3 publications

(2 citation statements)

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“…Oliver Freiberger has recently argued for comparison as the foundation of the Study of Religion and for comparison as a method (Freiberger 2019: 1;2018b). He throws new light on how comparison works and on the methodological process and presents a theoretically informed discussion about the methodological frame of comparison including its goal, mode, scale, and scope (Freiberger 2018a;2018b). Freiberger shows the complexity of comparison and the need for theoretical awareness and refinement, not least in relation to the units, which are selected for comparison as well as in the choice of the tertium comparationis, the aspect in view of which two selected units are compared (Freiberger 2018a: 288).…”

Section: Phenomenology Philology and The History Of Religionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Learning from the Past

Gilhus

2022

Method Theory Study Relig.

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The Legacy, Life and Work of Geo Widengren and the Study of the History of Religions after World War II, editor Göran Larsson, illuminates the scholarly career of Geo Widengren and the development of the Study of Religion. We can learn from his example to pursue historical and comparative studies, develop philological competence, and create bold theories. However, Widengren’s philological approach sometimes led to what can be labelled the philological fallacy, too much faith in the importance of mastery of languages at the cost of more critical and self-critical views. Philological and historical skills should be supplemented with theoretical awareness and an adequate methodology. In The Legacy we learn about how academic culture was built in the last century, how it operated, and we also understand why it was altered. It had in addition been interesting to hear more about female scholars in Widengren’s milieu.

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Section: Phenomenology Philology and The History Of Religionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Learning from the Past

Gilhus

2022

Method Theory Study Relig.

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“…Considering parallel sociological discussions about how to define a "case" (Charles C. and Becker 1992), one may conclude that all items to be compared-the comparands-are, simultaneously, empirical units and theoretical constructs (see Freiberger 2018). 21 The degree to which they can be identified as one or the other places them on a spectrum ranging from most theoretical to most empirical.…”

Section: Descriptionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Elements of a Comparative Methodology in the Study of Religion

Freiberger

2018

Religions

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While comparison has been the subject of much theoretical debate in the study of religion, it has rarely been discussed in methodological terms. A large number of comparative studies have been produced in the course of the discipline's history, but the question of how comparison works as a method has rarely been addressed. This essay proposes, in the form of an outline, a methodological frame of comparison that addresses both the general configuration of a comparative study-its goal, mode, scale, and scope-and the comparative process, distinguishing operations of selection, description, juxtaposition, redescription, as well as rectification and theory formation. It argues that identifying and analyzing such elements of a comparative methodology helps, on the one hand, in evaluating existing comparative studies and, on the other, in producing new ones. While the article attempts to present the methodological frame in a concise form and thus offers limited illustrative material, the authors of the other essays in this collection discuss rich historical-empirical cases as they test the frame on their own comparative studies.

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Comparative Secularities: Tracing Social and Epistemic Structures beyond the Modern West

Kleine

Wohlrab-Sahr

2020

Method Theory Study Relig.

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In view of the questionability of the concept “religion” as an analytical category for the investigation of pre-modern, non-Western cultures, how can one still pursue the history of religion or historical sociology of religion? Roughly speaking, scholars of religion can be placed between two poles with regard to this question: (1) those who reject the cross-cultural use of “religion” as a comparative concept and (2) those who believe they cannot do without it. We propose an approach that acknowledges the cultural dependence and historicity of concepts such as “religion” and the “secular,” while still conducting historical research on pre-colonial non-Western societies relevant to the study of both. Our approach aims to investigate the emergence of social and epistemic structures in various cultures—forms of differentiation and distinction—that have enabled the reorganisation of socio-cultural formations into religions and thus facilitated the formation of “multiple secularities” in global modernity.

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Freedom for the Tertium: On Conditions and Provisions for Comparison in the Study of Religion

Cited by 3 publications

References 9 publications

Learning from the Past

Learning from the Past

Elements of a Comparative Methodology in the Study of Religion

Comparative Secularities: Tracing Social and Epistemic Structures beyond the Modern West

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