January 11, 2014
University of California, Santa Barbara
This workshop on the study of religious movements in a global context was part of a collaborative project between the Orfalea Center for Global and International Studies and the Danish Institute for International Studies.
The workshop, held at the Orfalea Center on the UC Santa Barbara campus, aimed to provide an informal platform for exchange of ideas on method and methodology in the study of religious movements in the context of a globalized world. The substance of the workshop consisted of participants’ recent scholarly work on religious movements and/or actors, which displays either:
– an attempt to integrate social science approaches and religious studies, and/or
– sensitivity to the particular epistemic worldview of the movement/actors under scrutiny and the particular social and cultural context in which they are embedded
Agenda
9:00-9:30 Welcome & Introductory Comments
Mark Juergensmeyer (Orfalea Center Director) & Mona K. Sheikh (DIIS, Orfalea Center Visiting Research Scholar):
Sociotheology & Epistemic Worldview Analysis
9:30-11:00 First Session
Julie Ingersoll (University of North Florida): Ethics, Worldviews, & Violence
Michael Jerryson (Youngstown State University): Perception, Trauma, & Narratives
Margo Kitts (Hawaii Pacific University): Persistence and Perversion in Ritual Performance
William M. Sullivan (Wabash College): Exploring Self, World, and Calling
11.00-11:15 Coffee
11:15-12:45 Second Session
John Sobaslai (UCSB): The Early Christian Martyr as Truth-Teller
Sara Kamali (UCSB): Epistemic Worldviews & Counterterrorism
Shawn Landres: Interstitial Religion
12:45-1:45 Lunch
1:45-3:15 Third Session
Richard Madsen (UC San Diego): Humanistic Buddhism in Taiwan: Fragile Transcendence in a Fragmented World
Ann Taves (UCSB): How to Study Eyes that See Things that are Not
Wade Clark Roof (UCSB): Religio-Political Ideology
3:15-3:30 Coffee
