This book contributes to an understanding of the complex relationship of gender and language alongside religion and religious life as experienced by various religious groups around the world. The intention is to put forward current studies in the field of linguistics and explore how gender and various religions intersect with language use. The universal and diverse experience of religion provides for this unique collection of papers concerning the use of language in religious liturgy, in religious communities, and in interaction with identity. As such, the book will attract students and researchers in discourse, gender studies and religious studies.
This up-to-date and forward-looking collection of essays on gender and religion fills a crucial gap. Interdisciplinary and multi-traditional, this volume highlights the contributions that different disciplinary approaches make to feminist/gender studies and religion. Designed for the classroom, the Reader simultaneously assesses the state of the field and raises questions for further inquiry and investigation.
Exploring the intersection between religion, gender and sexuality within the context of everyday life, this volume examines contested identities, experiences, bodies and desires on the individual and collective levels. With rich case studies from the UK, USA, Europe, and Asia, Religion, Gender and Sexuality in Everyday Life sheds light on the manner in which individuals appropriate, negotiate, transgress, invert and challenge the norms and models of various religions in relation to gender and sexuality, and vice versa. Drawing on fascinating research from around the world, this book charts central features of the complexities involved in everyday life, examining the messiness, limits, transformations and possibilities that occur when subjectivities, religious and cultural traditions, and politics meet within the local as well as transnational contexts. As such, it will be of interest to scholars of sociology, anthropology, geography and cultural studies examining questions of religion and spirituality, gender and sexuality, and individual and collective identities in contemporary society.
This new volume offers enlightening new perspectives on the roles of love, sex, and gender in different faiths and covers issues from gender politics to religious ecstasy.
Patricia Crawford explores how the study of gender can enhance our understanding of religious history, in this study of women and their apprehensions of God in early modern England. The book has three broad themes: the role of women in the religious upheaval in the period from the Reformation to the Restoration; the significance of religion to contemporary women, focusing on the range of practices and beliefs; and the role of gender in the period. The author argues that religion in the early modern period cannot be understood without a perception of the gendered nature of its beliefs, institutions and language. Contemporary religious ideology reinforced women's inferior position, but, as the author shows, it was possible for some women to transcend these beliefs and profoundly influence history.
Media, Religion and Gender presents a selection of eminent current scholarship that explores the role gender plays when religion, media use and values in contemporary society interact. The book: surveys the development of research on media, religion and culture through the lens of key theoretical and methodological issues and debates within gender studies. includes case studies drawn from a variety of countries and contexts to illustrate the range of issues, theoretical perspectives and empirical material involved in current work outlines new areas and reflects on challenges for the future. Students of media, religion and gender at advanced level will find this a valuable resource, as will scholars and researchers working in this important and growing field.
Gender, Religion and Diversity provides an introduction to some of the most challenging perspectives in the contemporary study of gender and religion. In recent years, women's and gender studies have transformed the international study of religion through the use of interdisciplinary and cross-cultural methodologies, which have opened up new and highly controversial issues, challenging previous paradigms and creating fresh fields of study. As this book shows, gender studies in religion raises new and difficult questions about the gendered nature of religious phenomena, the relationship between power and knowledge, the authority of religious texts and institutions, and the involvement and responsibility of the researcher undertaking such studies as a gendered subject. This book is the outcome of an international collaboration between a wide range of researchers from different countries and fields of religious studies. The range and diversity of their contributions is the very strength of this book, for it shows how gendering works in studying different religious materials, whether foundational texts from the Bible or Koran, philosophical ideas about truth, essentialism, history or symbolism, the impact of French feminist thinkers such as Irigaray or Kristeva, or again critical perspectives dealing with the impact of race, gender, and class on religion, or by deconstructing religious data from a postcolonial critical standpoint or examining the impact of imperialism and orientalism on religion and gender.
In an era which many now recognise as ‘post-secular’, the role that religions play in shaping gender identities and relationships has been awarded a renewed status in the study of societies and social change. In both the Global South and the Global North, in the 21st century, religiosity is of continuing significance, not only in people’s private lives and in the family, but also in the public sphere and with respect to political and legal systems. The Routledge Handbook of Religion, Gender and Society is an outstanding reference source to these key topics, problems and debates in this exciting subject area. Comprising over 40 chapters by a team of international contributors, the Handbook is divided into 3 parts: Critical debates for religions, gender and society: theories, concepts and methodologies Issues and themes in religions, gender and society Contexts and locations Within these sections, central issues, debates and problems are examined, including activism, gender analysis, intersectionality and feminism, oppression and liberation, equality, bodies and embodiment, space and place, leadership and authority, diaspora and migration, marriage and the family, generation and aging, health and reproduction, education, violence and conflict, ecology and climate change and the role of social media. The Routledge Handbook of Religion, Gender and Society is essential reading for students and researchers in religious studies and gender studies. The Handbook will also be very useful for those in related fields, such as cultural studies, area studies, politics, sociology, anthropology and history.
