An activist religiosity? : exploring Christian support for the Occupy movement

Winter, Emily (2017) An activist religiosity? : exploring Christian support for the Occupy movement. Journal of Contemporary Religion, 32 (1). pp. 51-66. ISSN 1353-7903

[thumbnail of Emily Winter Contemporary Religion article]
Preview
PDF (Emily Winter Contemporary Religion article)
Emily_Winter_Contemporary_Religion_article.pdf - Accepted Version
Available under License Creative Commons Attribution.

Download (773kB)

Abstract

While Christian involvement in progressive social movements and activism is increasingly recognized, this literature has rarely gone beyond conceptualising religion as a resource to consider instead the ways in which individual activists may articulate their religious identity and how this intersects with the political. Based on ten in-depth interviews with Christian supporters of the London Occupy movement, this study offers an opportunity to respond to this gap by exploring the rich meaning-making processes of these activists. The article suggests that the location of the Occupy camp outside St Paul’s Cathedral was of central importance in bringing the Christian Occupiers’ religio-political identities to the foreground, their Christianity being defined in opposition to that represented by St Paul’s. The article then explores the religio-political meaning-making of the Christian Occupiers and introduces the term ‘activist religiosity’ as a way of understanding how religion and politics were articulated, and enacted, in similar ways. Indeed, religion and politics became considerably entangled and intertwined, rendering theoretical frameworks that conceptualise religion as a resource increasingly inappropriate. The features of this activist religiosity include post-institutional identities, a dislike of categorisation, and, centrally, the notion of ‘doings’—a predominant focus on engaged, active involvement.

Item Type:
Journal Article
Journal or Publication Title:
Journal of Contemporary Religion
Additional Information:
This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis Group in Journal of Contemporary Religion on 22/12/2016, available online: http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13537903.2016.1256648
Uncontrolled Keywords:
/dk/atira/pure/subjectarea/asjc/1200/1212
Subjects:
?? christianitysocial movementsoccupyactivismreligious identityreligious studiesphilosophycultural studies ??
ID Code:
82752
Deposited By:
Deposited On:
20 Jun 2017 09:44
Refereed?:
Yes
Published?:
Published
Last Modified:
31 Dec 2023 00:45