Material religion: An introduction

Plate, S. Brent

doi:10.5040/9781474280709.0005

Cited by 12 publications

(7 citation statements)

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“…In this article, we want to explore the possibility of using the images as data per se, which we propose to analyze beyond the words they trigger in elicitation meetings. By doing so, this study contributes to the growing field of religious materiality and practices engaging visual research methods (VRM), which have been rising in the last decades with works like those of McDannell (1995), Morgan (2010) Ammerman (2014), Plate (2015), and Williams (2015); projects like 'Lived Religion in a Digital Age' (https:// religioninplace.org/blog/), 'The Urban Sacred' (www.urban-sacred.org), and 'Religious Matters in an Entangled World' (https://religiousmatters.nl); and journals like Material Religion. The Journal of Objects, Art, and Belief.…”

Section: Visual Research Methods (Vrm)mentioning

confidence: 99%

Lived religion beyond words: A denotative analysis of participant-produced photos of meaningful objects

Bargain-Darrigues

Morello

2023

The Sociological Review

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Can visual data provide insights that words do not reveal? Meanings of objects in visual studies are usually captured through elicitation meetings. In this article, we propose to explore them from a purely visual standpoint and assess the methodological and substantive benefits of such denotative approach. We used a database of 660 photographs produced by 225 participants in a study of everyday religious practices in three Latin American cities. Following a ‘lived religion’ approach, respondents were asked to present an object (or photograph of it) that was ‘meaningful’ for them, in relation to their spiritual practices. Analyzing these pictures without resorting to the verbal content that accompanied them proved useful to operationalize such a large corpus of visual data, facilitate the transmission of the study’s results, and build a representative classification of the types of objects most commonly brought by participants. From a substantive perspective, our analysis contributes to enlarge the spectrum of what is considered religious or spiritual in Latin American cultures, and to question certain assumptions established by conventional theories of religion, such as class stereotypes and the overstated influence of religious institutions. We conclude that a denotative analysis of participant-produced visuals ‘beyond words’ represents an untapped opportunity to challenge existing representations and elicit new research directions, which, in turn, require returning to verbal data to be elucidated.

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Section: Visual Research Methods (Vrm)mentioning

confidence: 99%

Lived religion beyond words: A denotative analysis of participant-produced photos of meaningful objects

Bargain-Darrigues

Morello

2023

The Sociological Review

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“…Very little work among scholars of American religion focuses on infrastructure (Supp‐Montgomerie, 2021; Walker, 2019). 1 Important but scattered contributions to the field, ranging from studies of congregations and devotional objects to ostensibly secular sites, have demonstrated an ongoing effort to understand how built environments reflect and create religious change (Chidester, 2018; Chidester & Linenthal, 1995; Orsi, 1999; Osbourne, 2018; O’Neill, 2013; Plate, 2015; Promey, 1993). At the same time, new scholarship on migration, African American and Afro‐Caribbean religions, and Native American religions also sound the call for a new approach that interrogates the geographic and narrative boundaries of a field variously called “American Religious History,” “Religion in the United States,” “American Religion(s),” and “Religion in the Americas” (See for example Beliso‐de Jesús, 2015; Graber, 2018; Nwokocha, 2023; Peña, 2011, 2020; Sarat, 2013; Sostaita, 2020).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Infrastructure and American religion: Sites, methods, and theories for a changing field

Ellis

2023

Religion Compass

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This article reviews the literature on infrastructure in the study of American religions, examining its recent emergence as a topic of study and demonstrating its deeper role in the canons of the field. It argues that infrastructure has quickly become a multivalent conceptual term in the field, as well as a site for research. This latter point leads to a detailed summation of infrastructure's role in constructing and challenging the conventional boundaries of what “religion” is in America, what is “American” about American religion, and how scholars of religion might rethink “America” as a geographic and conceptual formation for our study. Infrastructure has an important role to play in creative theoretical and methodological engagements in the study of American religion and in fact has already staked its claim in the field's ongoing transformation.

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“…Drawing on the Spatial and the Material Turn, particularly New Materialism (Larkin 2013; Jones 2016), we engage with scholars who have used new materialism in recent years as a lens to explore religious space (Burchardt and Höhne 2015;Meyer et al 2010;Plate 2015;Hutchings and McKenzie 2017;Keane 2008;Howard 2018). Like them, we want to analyze the resilience of place by focusing on the processes of construction, destruction, and reconstruction.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Examining the interplay between materiality and immateriality in religion is essential for a holistic understanding of religious experiences and expressions. We explore the individual and collective dimensions of religion by focusing not only on how people touch but also observe, smell, and physically participate (Plate 2015).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Religious Materiality and Virtual Sainthood: The Case of Shna Ndou (St. Anthony) Pilgrimage in Laç

Bria,

Giorda

2023

Religions

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The interdisciplinary perspective, between history and anthropology, of our contribution has as its subject the pilgrimage at Kisha e Shna Ndout (Sanctuary of St. Anthony of Padua) in Laç, northern Albania, which is one of the most visited religious sites in southeastern Europe. The church, built there and ministered by Franciscans, is now an impressive place of worship frequented throughout the year by thousands of pilgrims. On the 12th and 13th of June of each year, an official pilgrimage is held, which reaches its climax on the night of the 12th, when thousands of Albanians sleep in the shrine seeking blessings and healing. The pilgrimage practices show how materiality is a privileged means of reaching out to a religious place. This materiality is grounded in the multilayered built environment, which has been built and rebuilt and especially reconstructed after the collapse of the socialist regime—a process that reveals the pivotal function of secular infrastructures in the case of religious places. Virtuality is also an important aspect of the pilgrimage, and so materiality and virtuality form a single milieu that reshapes perceptions. Through participation in this pilgrimage, virtuality is sacralized and promotes sanctity.

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Material religion: An introduction

Cited by 12 publications

References 0 publications

Lived religion beyond words: A denotative analysis of participant-produced photos of meaningful objects

Lived religion beyond words: A denotative analysis of participant-produced photos of meaningful objects

Infrastructure and American religion: Sites, methods, and theories for a changing field

Religious Materiality and Virtual Sainthood: The Case of Shna Ndou (St. Anthony) Pilgrimage in Laç

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