What Is Happening to Religious Studies? Six Narratives

Abstract

The starting point of this essay is the assumption that religious studies (or the study of religion\s, as I prefer to call it) are topically defined, that is, that our work somehow relates to religion or religions, to "religion" or "religious" features; religion establishes our "disciplinary horizon" (Smith 2004, 194). As scholars of religion/"religion," we are endlessly fascinated by it. There may be good theoretical and pragmatic reasons to abandon this key notion and opt for more promising onesmaybe spirituality (Hanegraaff 2020) or worldview (Taves 2020)-but until we have agreed on such proposals, our fate is tied to that of religion, or "religion." So, what is the fate of religion, or rather, how do we tell it? A while ago, Jim Spickard argued that "sociologists of religion are no longer arguing over a single account of religion's place in the contemporary world" (Spickard 2006, 14). Instead, he held that we can best "comprehend our current disciplinary conflict as a clash between six distinct stories about 'What is happening to religion?' today and in the years to come" (Spickard 2006, 14). In this essay, in a recursive move, I will reflect on "What is happening to religious studies" by using Spickard's six narratives as signposts. 1 Of course, as critical readers will not fail to observe, I will need to allow myself a good dose of hermeneutic liberty to make the exercise of analogous thinking work. Space does not allow me to unpack any of these six narratives or tropes, so I will need to allude to potential stories that could be told and leave the rest to the readers' imaginations. I hope the reader will forgive me for this conceit and for referring to some of my own earlier work as examples of some of the trends I mention in this essay.