Religion in Meaning Making and Boundary Work: Theoretical Explorations

Abstract

Based on the articles brought together for this special issue, this article proposes a transversal analysis and theoretical elaboration of the question of the uses of religious elements for meaning making and boundary work. In order to do so, we will first propose a sociocultural psychological perspective to examine meaning making dynamics. Second, we will apply a boundary work perspective, as recently developed in the social sciences, on the organization of religious differences. The first considers religious elements as resources that can be used by people to orient themselves in time and the social space, to interpret and guide action, and to create new forms of life. The second approach proposes an analysis of uses of religious stuff in order to understand how boundaries between groups are created, transgressed or dissolved as well as to explore the link between religion and power. Our argument is that the articulation of these two approaches can itself offer a rich theoretical frame to apprehend religions in contemporary society.

Prejudice in interreligious context: The role of metaprejudice and majority–minority status

“…One symbolic way of defending one's status is by devaluing competing minorities as nicely seen in the present example. An alternative explanation could be that individuals suppress their prejudice according to group norms; that is, whether the expression of prejudice is considered appropriate or not (Crandall et al, 2002).…”

“…For example, when expressing prejudice toward black people is normatively acceptable, white individuals tend to support racial prejudice compared to those who consider prejudice as normatively unacceptable. Prejudice will be suppressed when explicit prejudice expression is considered as unacceptable (Crandall, Eshleman, & O'Brien, 2002).…”

“…Equally often, the status between subgroups differs according to their numerical dominance (e.g., Verkuyten & Yildiz, 2007;Zeromskyte & Wagner, 2016). Group status and dominance correlate with ethnic and religious characteristics that define the boundaries of subgroups (Dahinden & Zittoun, 2013;Holtz, Dahinden, & Wagner, 2013).…”

Family, Boundaries and Transformation. The International Mobility of Professionals and Their Families

“…These changes make the person not only move between different self positions (Hermans, 2001), but also re-define what in cultural sociology is called "symbolic boundaries", those conceptual distinctions created to make sense of the surrounding environment and of oneself in that environment, "to categorize objects, people, practices, and even time and space" (Lamont & Molnár, 2002, p. 168). Symbolic boundary work is an integral part of the process of defining who we are, emerges as "we constantly draw inferences concerning our similarities to, and differences from others" (Lamont, 1992, p. 11), and is inextricably linked to the process of meaning-making (Dahinden & Zittoun, 2013).…”

Ethnic and Religious Prejudices in the Turkish Social Landscape

“…Religiosity: Like ethnicity and nationalism, religion is 'a mode of identification, a mode of social organization and a way of framing political claims' (Brubaker, 2012: p. 4). Hence, as a basic source and form of social and cultural identification, religion is an important resource not only for individual and collective meaning making but also for social closure and boundary-making processes (Brubaker, 2012;Dahinden and Zittoun, 2013). As Brubaker (2012: p. 4) further notes, similar to ethnicity and nationalism, religion is a way of 'identifying oneself and others, of construing sameness and difference and of situating and placing oneself in relation to others'.…”