Geography of Religion – Rediscovering a Subdiscipline

Abstract

Review Pregledni članakIn many parts of the world, the significance of religion has increased during the last years and decades. In the sociology of religion, the secularization thesis was the dominant framework for the interpretation of developments in the realm of religion for a long time. Meanwhile, other explanation patterns have become more prominent, such as the individualization thesis and economic theories. The so-called "spatial turn" does not seem to have reached sociology of religion yet. In history of religion (religious studies), however, questions of spatiality and locality are being studied intensively.Geography of religion has been regarded a diverse and incoherent field until recently. In the past years this has changed. Two directions of research have become apparent. One of them mainly considers social geographical problems and methods while the other has been influenced by the new cultural geography approach. Both should more frequently work with the above mentioned theoretical approaches of sociology of religion. Geography of religion must not, however, lose track of its main goal: it always has to point to the fact that all religious processes take place in space and have a spatial dimension.Key words: Geography of religion, spatial turn, sociology of religion, religious science Geografija religije -ponovno otkrivanje znanstvene subdisciplinePosljednjih desetljeća u mnogim dijelovima svijeta poraslo je značenje religije. U sociologiji religije sekularizacija je dugo vremena bila dominantno okvirno načelo za tumačenje razvoja religije. U međuvremenu dolaze do izražaja i drugi obrasci tumačenja, kao što su teza o individualizaciji i ekonomske teorije. Takozvani "prostorni obrat" ("spatial turn") izgleda da još nije zahvatio sociologiju religije. Međutim, pitanja prostornosti i mjesta vrlo se intenzivno proučavaju kroz povijest religije (religijski studiji).Geografija religije donedavno se smatrala raznolikim i nepovezanim područjem. Posljednjih godina to se izmijenilo. Uočavaju se dva smjera istraživanja. Jedan se, uglavnom, bavi socijalno-geografskim problemima i metodama, dok je drugi pod utjecajem novog pristupa kulturne geografije. Oba bi češće trebala koristiti gore spomenute teorijske pristupe sociologije religije. Međutim, geografija religije ne smije izgubiti iz vidokruga svoj glavni cilj: uvijek treba ukazivati na činjenicu da se svi religijski procesi odvijaju u prostoru i imaju prostornu dimenziju.

State–church relationships in Germany: past and present

“…What is certainly necessary, however, is that the German society accepts the fact that meanwhile it has become an immigration society. In a recent survey on new developments in the geography of religions (Henkel 2005a), it was found that there is relatively little geographical literature on issues of state-religion relationship so far. The process of Europe growing together is a field where geographers and others familiar with and interested in the national religious structures and developments in the context of political and social trends can find a fruitful study topic in the future.…”

Secular iconoclasm: purifying, privatizing, and profaning public faith

“…For one notable exception on the legal geography of religion in US and Canadian public schools, see Collins (2006Collins ( , 2007. On the geography of secularization, see Henkel (2005), Knippenberg (2005), and Knippenberg et al (2006). 5 I am inspired in part by Kenneth Foote's (1997) useful typology of sanctification, designation, rectification, and obliteration.…”

Religion and Place

“…1 The transformation in the signi fi cance of religion in practice as well as in theory is by now a familiar thesis and may be illustrated by the following events we witnessed. Henkel 2005 ) . Each proposal was to recognise and selectively incorporate from around 100 items of immigration policy of interest to government.…”