Religion, spirituality and the social sciences: Challenging marginalisation
Basia Spalek and Alia Imtoual
Abstract
A growing number of people are claiming or reclaiming a religious or spiritual identity for themselves. Yet, in contemporary Western societies, the frameworks of understanding that have developed within the social science disciplines, and which are used to analyse data, are secular in nature, and so may be inappropriate for investigating some aspects of religion, spirituality and faith and how these intersect with individuals' lives. This book addresses important theoretical and methodological issues to explore ways of engaging with religion and spirituality when carrying out social science re ... More
A growing number of people are claiming or reclaiming a religious or spiritual identity for themselves. Yet, in contemporary Western societies, the frameworks of understanding that have developed within the social science disciplines, and which are used to analyse data, are secular in nature, and so may be inappropriate for investigating some aspects of religion, spirituality and faith and how these intersect with individuals' lives. This book addresses important theoretical and methodological issues to explore ways of engaging with religion and spirituality when carrying out social science research. Divided into three sections, the book examines the notion of secularism in relation to contemporary western society, including a focus upon secularisation; explores how the values underpinning social scientific enquiry might serve to marginalise religion and spirituality; and reflects on social science research methodologies when researching religion and spirituality.
Keywords:
religious identity,
spiritual identity,
faith,
secularism,
secularisation,
social science research
Bibliographic Information
| Print publication date: 2008 |
Print ISBN-13: 9781847420411 |
| Published to Policy Press Scholarship Online: March 2012 |
DOI:10.1332/policypress/9781847420411.001.0001 |
