What Game Are We Playing?: A New Look at the Identity and Beginning of the Study of Religion

This article aims to analyze how scholars of religions have studied the history of the discipline itself, with particular emphasis on the question of its beginning. Although situating the beginning of the discipline in the late 19th century is prevalent, there are dissenting voices in this debate. I...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Numen
Main Author: Peedu, Indrek (Author)
Format: Electronic Article
Language:English
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Published: Brill 2018
In: Numen
Standardized Subjects / Keyword chains:B Science of Religion / Science / History
IxTheo Classification:AA Study of religion
AX Inter-religious relations
Further subjects:B study of religion history of religious studies history of science historiography methodology
Online Access: Volltext (Verlag)
Description
Summary:This article aims to analyze how scholars of religions have studied the history of the discipline itself, with particular emphasis on the question of its beginning. Although situating the beginning of the discipline in the late 19th century is prevalent, there are dissenting voices in this debate. Interestingly, a similar discussion exists in the history of science. There, Andrew Cunningham has argued in favor of understanding scientific practice as a human activity and thus writing histories of science as histories of an activity. The latter part of this article explains how implementing Cunningham’s approach can be useful for the study of the history of religious studies, making it possible to study the intellectual and institutional aspects as parts of one whole. I will draw attention to how this approach can help us analyze the question of the beginnings of the discipline.
ISSN:1568-5276
Contains:In: Numen
Persistent identifiers:DOI: 10.1163/15685276-12341488