{"title":"Return of the “Cult”","authors":"A. Thomas, Edward Graham-Hyde","doi":"10.1558/imre.23573","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1558/imre.23573","url":null,"abstract":"Recent years have seen an apparent “return” of normative religious and cultic language in political and media discourses, often adopted in pejorative and confrontational contexts. Arguably driven by contemporary political divisions and debates surrounding COVID-19 restrictions, terms including “cult,” “brainwashing,” and “groupthink” have reignited discourses surrounding so-called “cultic” behaviour and beliefs. We argue, however, that the “cult debate” has not returned, but rather transitioned into new and implicit conversations surrounding “good” and “bad” religion. In this special issue of Implicit Religion, we seek to avoid re-treading old ground concerning definitions of “cults,” and instead adopt a renewed approach to the academic study of normative cultic language—placing an emphasis on the ways in which these terms are used, negotiated, and understood in contemporary discourses.","PeriodicalId":53963,"journal":{"name":"Implicit Religion","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-02-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45184163","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"“Cults,” Coercion, and Control","authors":"Erin Martine Sessions, Bernard Doherty","doi":"10.1558/imre.23218","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1558/imre.23218","url":null,"abstract":"In the face of what has been called an epidemic of domestic and family violence (DFV) in several countries, scholarly analysts, journalists, and policymakers have increasingly turned to the matrix of ideas around what Evan Stark has called coercive control, for insights into the dynamics of abusive relationships. In seeking to address this social problem, some commentators—in both the DFV research space and cultic studies— have begun to see a link between New Religions (“cults”) and coercive control, and use the language of coercive control to revive a problematic rhetoric linked to ideas about so-called “brainwashing.” This article highlights some of the commonalities between coercive control, as theorized by Stark and others, and the classic work on coercive persuasion as this was applied—sometimes disingenuously—to a wave of New Religions during the 1970s through to the 1990s. Secondly, this article analyses the rhetorical use of elements of the “cult stereotype” in contemporary popular and academic discussions of DFV and how the language of coercive control has been employed. We conclude that the use of coercive control language in cultic studies is largely superficial and engages in tactical ambiguities which seek to apply various “cultic brainwashing” ideas in a new context and suggest that this approach is unhelpful both to victim-survivors of DFV and those who have experienced abuse in particular New Religions or, indeed, within mainstream religion.","PeriodicalId":53963,"journal":{"name":"Implicit Religion","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-02-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49627203","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Cult/Art","authors":"[M] Dudeck","doi":"10.1558/imre.23203","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1558/imre.23203","url":null,"abstract":"The American presidency of Donald J. Trump has been notorious in its disregard for established norms, while his radical reformation of the American project have led many to equate his presidency to a work of “performance art.” The worship of his followers and the devotion of his Republican base have led to Trump being hailed as a “flawed redeemer,” and all those who worship him as a new form of “religious cult.” News and media anchors regularly refer to the former American president as a cult leader, a performance artist, or both; yet neither signifiers are ever contextualized within the history of religion, or western art by those who invoke them. Both the performance artist and the cult leader are contemporary media constructions that activate the religious imagination through intrigue and horror. As an artist inventing a religion as art, and a scholar of new religious movements, I present this article as an excavation of these signifiers and speculate upon their unique conflation around the unprecedented American presidency of Donald J. Trump.","PeriodicalId":53963,"journal":{"name":"Implicit Religion","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-02-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46823274","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Past the Pejorative","authors":"Philip Deslippe","doi":"10.1558/imre.23202","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1558/imre.23202","url":null,"abstract":"Within the academic study of New Religious Movements, it has become standard to understand “cult” as a pejorative term which is dismissive of minority religions and in some cases harms them. This article, through a quantitative content analysis conducted by the author of various uses of the word “cult” in twenty-five American newspapers through the 1990s, is an attempt to understand, in detail and supported by data, how “cult” was applied to particular religious groups and used more widely within popular discourse. It argues that the word “cult” was primarily used for subjects that were not religious groups, and when it was applied to religious groups, it was largely done so to a very small number that all shared several characteristics. It further argues that “cult” should be understood as a complex term with a range of meanings and applications.","PeriodicalId":53963,"journal":{"name":"Implicit Religion","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-02-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44286837","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Republicanism as Bad Religion","authors":"S. Crockford","doi":"10.1558/imre.23200","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1558/imre.23200","url":null,"abstract":"Since Donald Trump was elected president in 2016, it has become commonplace for his opponents to refer to him as a “cult leader.” The apparent fanaticism of his supporters inspires both awe and fear in observers. His propensity to disseminate conspiracy theories and alleged encouragement of the Jan 6 insurrection pushes Trump beyond the boundaries of political norms. In this article, I trace the elements of Trump’s rhetorical and political style that led to accusations of his being some sort of charismatic “cult leader.” The analysis broadens to discuss the complex interconnections between modern Republicanism in the US and Protestant Christianity, examining how a form of nationalist morality has come to uphold their claims to power. Both opponents and supporters of Donald Trump see him in a religious frame, either as a dangerous authoritarian leader or messianic saviour. What does this tell us about the definitions and boundaries of religion and politics? And why does Donald Trump seem to trouble those boundaries?","PeriodicalId":53963,"journal":{"name":"Implicit Religion","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-02-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46348494","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"From Bad to Worse","authors":"Edward Graham-Hyde","doi":"10.1558/imre.23330","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1558/imre.23330","url":null,"abstract":"The rhetoric “cult wars,” which began in the 1970s and 1980s, has stagnated in recent decades. Having empirically undermined the “brainwashing” hypothesis, academic research has progressed beyond the classic typologies and discussion of “dangerous cults.” Terms such as “New Religious Movement” became academized in a bid to recalibrate the discussion of religious phenomenon around the individual. However, “cult” rhetoric is still prevalent in popular vernacular, incipient in multiple discourses that redefine the terminology beyond an historic understanding of “religious.” In this article, I outline my initial intention to revisit the terminology currently used in the academy as a result of reflections from participants in my doctoral research. I designed a survey that sought out the thoughts of everyday people in how they perceive the key terms: “cult,” “brainwashing,” “new religious movement” and “minority religion.” Having used the Facebook Advert Centre to widen the reach of the survey, I quickly found that those commenting on the survey were engaging in a battle that is synonymous with the “cult wars” of old. I found that the discourse was predicated upon COVID-19 and a general distrust of “the establishment.” This article analyses the comments engaging with the advert and explores the usage of “cult” rhetoric in contemporary society.","PeriodicalId":53963,"journal":{"name":"Implicit Religion","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-02-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44691610","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Extraordinary Experiences In The Culture of the Supernatural","authors":"Kristel Kivari","doi":"10.1558/imre.19355","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1558/imre.19355","url":null,"abstract":"The article discusses supernatural experiences within the wider culture of the supernatural as a discourse in communication and performance in the liminal area between the credible and the incredible. The interviews analysed in the article were recorded within the context of research into the paranormal that includes several themes, for example apparitions of ghosts, humanoids, dowsing. The concept of belief pervades vernacular discussion and takes the form of the performance of truth in various forms. The teller’s position to the truth of the story can be seen from their narrative strategies, which present the teller as an expert in the supernatural, or on the contrary as an individual struggling in the face of the unknown. Paranormal enthusiasts give social legitimation to single experiences and to networks of thinking, along within the wider culture of the supernatural. Moreover, the places of these encounters can become experiential evidence for meeting the supernatural through dowsing practices that shape the spiritual worldview of those engaged. Thus, single experiences and stories will be woven into a wider story about the intervention of the supernatural in everyday life.","PeriodicalId":53963,"journal":{"name":"Implicit Religion","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-10-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41571987","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Exploring the Changing Contours of “Enchantment”","authors":"J. M. George","doi":"10.1558/imre.21392","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1558/imre.21392","url":null,"abstract":"By the phrase “disenchantment of the world” (Entzauberung der Welt), Max Weber meant: i) an understanding of the world increasingly by reference to natural forces, physical laws, and mechanical principles than to magical and supernatural powers; and ii) a development within religion from magic to rationalized paths to salvation devoid of magic. However, restricting exploration on enchantment, disenchantment, and re-enchantment to scholarly and historically specific meanings would exclude a large terrain of ordinary, non-religious human experience. The semantic flexibility of the terms enables one to explore a spectrum of so-called substitutive sources of re-enchantment: psyche, death, love, art, history, nature, and so on. To designate secular sources of enchantment exclusively as re-enchantments would restrict them to being substitutes to the religious. Further, not all religious imagination is enchanting; the nature of enchantment varies across the ideational spectrum of religious world views, and this article briefly examines the internal gradations. Based on its exploratory expansiveness vis-à-vis such diverse phenomena, the article argues that every object, entity, and experience is a potential source of enchantment, that enchantment and disenchantment in a larger sense have to do with the perspective one might bring to an otherwise inert world, and that enchantment occurs at the conjunction of the subject and the object.","PeriodicalId":53963,"journal":{"name":"Implicit Religion","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-10-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49292471","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Spiritual Warfare and Right-Wing Authoritarianism","authors":"G. Maltese","doi":"10.1558/imre.21739","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1558/imre.21739","url":null,"abstract":"This article focuses on contemporary spiritual warfare discourse and on the apparent affinity to right-wing authoritarianism of Christians related to it. Drawing on material from the Philippines, I investigate the role of scholarship in fostering said affinity by reading Christians, who seem to be connected to the spiritual warfare discourse, through the lens of prominent U.S.-American dominionists. I argue that the approach of global religious history helps to critique the Anglo-Eurocentric and elitist biases underlying current research about Christianity in the majority world.","PeriodicalId":53963,"journal":{"name":"Implicit Religion","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-10-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49458528","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Political Appeal of Religion","authors":"A. Doja","doi":"10.1558/imre.19085","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1558/imre.19085","url":null,"abstract":"Much of philosophical reflections about the relations between religion and politics fall within the liberal tradition of religious restraint, which generated both the backlash of a new traditionalism and the critical turn in the study of religion. Moving beyond the real or imagined isomorphism of religion and politics, I show how the political functions of religion are closely connected to the anthropological reflections about culture and politics. The aim is to provide political theory with a new “awareness of what is missing” by revealing the deeply political significance of religion, not merely as an instrument used in political contexts for political purposes but a total political fact, which remain hidden behind the moral discourses of religious advocates, political leaders, and academic scholars.","PeriodicalId":53963,"journal":{"name":"Implicit Religion","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-10-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42178503","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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