Retheorizing the Postsecular Present: Embodiment, Spatial Transcendence, and Challenges to Authenticity Among Young Christians in Glasgow, Scotland

Author: Olson Elizabeth   Hopkins Peter   Pain Rachel   Vincett Giselle  

Publisher: Routledge Ltd

ISSN: 0004-5608

Source: Annals of the Association of American Geographers, Vol.103, Iss.6, 2013-11, pp. : 1421-1436

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Abstract

This article explores and extends the geographies of postsecular theory. Despite growing claims of secularization, religion continues to be a highly public and rapidly diversifying issue, and of growing interest to geographers. We identify the spatial elements of postsecular theory, and consider how spatial approaches, particularly feminist work, that emphasize lived religion and embodiment might provide an alternative to existing analyses. Increasingly present in recent geographical work on religion, these approaches challenge the discursive, political, and social constructions of secularization and its theoretical claims and, we argue, are essential for the continued development of interdisciplinary postsecular approaches and analyses. Drawing on recent empirical research, we apply this argument to the religious subject constructions of young Christian-affiliated people living in Glasgow, Scotland. Their conceptions of authentic faith are intimately bound up in ideas of authenticity and embodied transcendence, which are both reinforced and challenged by particular historical and contemporary meanings of Christian identities. In conclusion, we reflect on the broader empirical and theoretical implications of our research for postsecular approaches to the study of religion and society.