Faith in citation

Abstract

A citation may be a gift or a curse, a clue or an erasure, a mode of argument or a piece of evidence. Or it might be all of these things, depending on who is writing and reading it. This essay engages with the varying ways that the articles in this special issue draw attention to the relational dynamics of citation – conversational, generous, aggressive, predatory or exclusionary – as the authors have experienced and analysed them within the study of religion and, more specifically, the anthropology of religion. Three primary questions are focused on: (1) how the form and mediation of a citation – for example, citing a book one read in a bricks-and-mortar library or online through an open-access pdf – change its purpose and possibility; (2) how different kinds of sources shape what citational practices are possible, with a comparative focus on norms of citation within anthropology and history; and (3) the liminality of religious studies as a field that is at once promiscuous and open-minded in its practices of citation. Across these questions, the author hopes to show that she has faith in citation as a necessary and adaptable tool in the ongoing work of scholarly creativity and critique.