Hidden presence: race and/in the history, construct, and study of western esotericism
Except for a few studies that explore the intersections between esoteric ideas/practices and white supremacy, race has largely been ignored in the field of Western esotericism. This article seeks to partake in remedying this lacuna. To do so, it provides a deconstructive analysis of the way race has...
| Main Author: | |
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| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Journals Online & Print: | Drawer...
|
| Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
| Published: |
Routledge
[2020]
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| In: |
Religion
Year: 2020, Volume: 50, Issue: 4, Pages: 479-503 |
| Standardized Subjects / Keyword chains: | B
Western world
/ Esotericism
/ Whites
/ Hegemony
/ Implication
|
| IxTheo Classification: | AD Sociology of religion; religious policy AZ New religious movements ZC Politics in general |
| Further subjects: | B
Modernity
B racialization / Race B Colonialism B the West / Western film B Spiritualism B Whiteness |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (Resolving-System) |
| Summary: | Except for a few studies that explore the intersections between esoteric ideas/practices and white supremacy, race has largely been ignored in the field of Western esotericism. This article seeks to partake in remedying this lacuna. To do so, it provides a deconstructive analysis of the way race has operated in the field. I argue that race, although consistently overlooked, has functioned as a ‘hidden presence’ that has shaped both the historical formation of the field and the construct of Western esotericism - so much so, in fact, that we may conceive it as a subtext in and for the dominant ‘grand narrative’ of Western esotericism. In conclusion, I investigate recent attempts to omit ‘Western’ as a definitive adjective in the study of esotericism, thereby proposing that, even as we move ‘beyond the West,’ we must also continue to investigate the entanglements of ‘Western’ and whiteness. |
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| ISSN: | 1096-1151 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: Religion
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1080/0048721X.2019.1642262 |