Negotiating Cultures and Identities: Education and Adaptation Among Young North Korean Settlers in South Korea

This paper examines the formation of diverse identities and the emergence of dynamic changes in cultural forms in the power structures of both newcomers and hosts in the case of North Koreans settling in South Korea. Since the end of the Korean War in 1953, the formerly homogeneous nation of Korea has been politically divided under two separate regimes: a communist society in the North and a capitalist democracy in the South. In the end of 1990s, the number of North Koreans immigrating to South Korea began to rapidly increase due to severe famine in the North; by 2014, the number of North Korean settlers in South Korea had reached more than 27,000. This qualitative study explores the resulting cultural gaps and issues of conflict, power, and resistance and emphasizes the strategies that young North Korean settlers employ as they shape and position themselves in capitalist society.     

National Identities in Transition

Studies in East European Thought -     

宗教伦理学与当代社会--兼答万俊人教授《普世伦理如何可能》

这是一篇回应性的文章。作者在简要介绍了文章的由来以后,首先借用万俊人教授《现代西方伦理学史》一书中的材料阐述了西方宗教伦理思潮与西方社会的关系;然后指出在中国学界展开宗教伦理学研究的必要性,并论述了作者对建构中国宗教伦理学的一些想法;在文章的最后一部分,作者对万俊人教授《普世伦理如何可能》中的三个问题作出了回应：第一,关于“强伦理模式”;第二,有关世界宗教信仰现状的问题;第三,关于普世伦理以什么为基础的问题。     

Islamic Post-Traditionalism: Postcolonial and Postmodern Religious Discourse in Indonesia

Taking a critical view of the dominance of postcolonial studies by South Asian and Latin American scholars and intellectuals, this article presents a newly emerging discourse among young Indonesian Muslim intellectuals, known as ‘Islamic Post-Traditionalism’. The specific question addressed in the present investigation is to establish to what extent this strand of Muslim thought can be considered a contribution to the engagement with postcoloniality and an application of deconstructionist discourse critique developed by postmodern philosophers within the context of rethinking religion, and Islam in particular, in Indonesia. Identifying a vivid interest among Indonesian Muslim intellectuals in the work of pioneering and controversial contemporary Arab-Islamic thinkers such as Nasr Hamid Abu Zayd, Muhammad Abid al-Jabiri, and Mohammed Arkoun, this article will interrogate the influences exercised by these Arabophone and Francophone Muslim intellectuals on the formation of Indonesia's Islamic Post-Traditionalism and how this is reflected in this discourse. An illustration will be provided by a précis of the writings of a key exponent of the Islamic Post-Traditionalist discourse and an examination of a number of other contributors.     

Spaces of the Religious Economy: Negotiating the Regulation of Religious Space in Singapore

Over the past three decades, the theory of religious economy has been established, applied, debated, developed, and rejected. It has proven to be as divisive as any "general theory" of religion should be, and yet its core tenets continue to engage and unite scholars around the world. In response to broader shifts within the sociology of religion, this article reframes religious economy by advancing a spatial approach to its theorization. A spatial approach can help develop new perspectives on the regulation of religion, and the resistant agency of religious groups. With a focus on the "secular monopoly" of Singapore, it demonstrates how the restricted supply of land for religious purposes increases competition between religious groups. To overcome restrictions, religious groups pursue strategies of spatial and organizational boundary crossing. This has led to the closer regulation of space, and highlights the recursive interplay between the regulation and praxis of religion in Singapore.     

Delineating Ethnic and Religious Identities in Research with British South Asians

The present essay presents a rationale for delineating ethnic and religious identities in empirical research into self-identification among British South Asians. It is argued that the delineation of these identities is important in order to (i) predict and explain the identificatory possibilities available to these individuals; (ii) explore the differential values attributed to these identities; (iii) the level of psychological ‘connectedness’ between the identities; and (iv) the inter-relations between these identities, particularly in relation to psychological coherence. It is argued that a systematic delineation of these identities may have favourable theoretical, empirical and practical outcomes.     

Intergenerational Religious Mobility in Contemporary China

This study illustrates intergenerational religious mobility with the case of Chinese society. Using the quasi‐symmetric log‐linear model to separate structure mobility from exchange mobility, we examine the variation in religious identities between the reform era generation and their parents. Structure mobility results suggest that the encompassing social reform over the past decades in China has encouraged the structural growth of Islam and Christianity across generations, but traditional Chinese religions bear remarkable intergenerational disadvantages. Moreover, religious nones are growing across generations, at least relative to traditional Chinese religions. Exchange mobility findings indicate that individuals whose parents follow traditional Chinese religions are very likely to “convert” to Christianity. However, children of religious nones do not necessarily remain irreligious, possibly undermining the structural advantages of religious nones in the future. Finally, a comparison between cohort and period effects drives us to conclude that the major social force underpinning the revival of Chinese religion in the reform era is generational replacement instead of an increasingly religious transition of “old” generations.     

Ethnodoxy: How Popular Ideologies Fuse Religious and Ethnic Identities

Popular beliefs conflating ethnic identities with particular faiths can lead to marginalization of religiously and ethnically “other” and fuel ethnoreligious conflict even in secularized societies. Despite their importance to ethnoreligious conflict and coexistence, ideological conflations of faith and ethnos have previously received little scholarly attention. We fill the gap by introducing the concept of ethnodoxy: a collectively held belief system that rigidly links a group's ethnic identity to its dominant faith. We theorize this phenomenon at three levels: macro (the interplay between religion and ethnonational identities), micro (construction of ethnoreligious identities and imagined communities viewed from a social identity theory perspective), and meso (the nature and functions of popular ideologies and religiosities). Subsequently, ethnodoxy is conceptualized as an ideal‐typical syndrome of six component beliefs. We further operationalize and verify the concept using representative national survey data from Russia. Findings show ethnodoxy's extent, coherence, dimensionality, and associations with religious and ethnic intolerance.     

伊斯兰伦理道德的当代价值

本文从三方面对伊斯兰伦理道德和伊斯兰伦理道德的基本范畴以及基本内容作了较为详细的论述,认为在多元文化并存的当今社会,伊斯兰伦理道德无疑也是建构各文明体系和谐相处的有机组成部分,对文明之间的对话和交流亦有重要的现实意义。     

Negotiating Religious Differences: The Strategies of Interfaith Chaplains in Healthcare

Chaplains in healthcare increasingly work in interfaith roles with patients and families from a range of religious and spiritual backgrounds. Some move with ease between their own religious backgrounds and those of the individuals with whom they work. Others encounter tensions as their status as a person of faith comes into conflict with their status as an interfaith chaplain. We explore the two main strategies—neutralizing and code‐switching—chaplains at one large academic medical center use when working with patients and families whose religious and spiritual backgrounds are different from their own. Through training in clinical pastoral education and experiences on the job, chaplains learn to neutralize (use a broad language of spirituality that emphasizes commonalities rather than differences) and to code‐switch (use the languages, rituals, and practices of the people with whom they work). To the extent that the strategies evident here are present among chaplains in a broader range of institutional settings, they suggest a kind of spiritual secularism or broad approach to meaning makings that may be facilitated by interfaith chaplains in a range of settings.     

论民族道德与宗教道德

民族和宗教虽然没有必然联系,但二者之间却又联系得非常密切。这看起来很矛盾,却是事实。脱离开民族实体去看待宗教是不对的;完全从民族的角度去看待宗教亦是不对的。就民族道德与宗教道德的相互关系而言,民族道德与宗教道德不仅相互联系,也相互作用;就民族道德与宗教道德各自的特点而言,民族道德重在自律,宗教道德重在他律。     

Religious Practices Among Islamic Immigrants: Moroccan and Turkish Men in Belgium

This study examines the religious participation of Islamic immigrants in Belgium using data from the Migration History and Social Mobility Survey collected in 1994–1996 from 2,200 men who had immigrated from Turkey and Morocco. Religious participation is measured as mosque attendance, fasting during Ramadan, and sacrificing a sheep at the Festival of Sacrifice. Results show that the religious participation of Islamic immigrants depends on both premigration and postmigration characteristics. Religious participation is higher among immigrants who: (1) attended a Koranic school in their country of origin, (2) were socialized in a religious region of their home country, (3) received little schooling, (4) currently live in an area of Belgium with a greater number of mosques, and (5) associate with a high number of co‐ethnics. These results suggest that the religious participation of Islamic immigrants in Belgium is an outcome of characteristics unique to immigrants as well as processes common among the general population.     

Negotiating Health-Related Uncertainties: Biomedical and Religious Sources of Information and Support

This article explores how people experience health-related uncertainties and how they look to biomedical and religious sources of information in response. Data were gathered in a larger project focused on spirituality in everyday life. Respondents were not asked any direct questions about their health or health care, but almost all of the 95 participants brought up the topics in response to other questions. About one-third spoke of being uncertain about some aspect of their health or healthcare. We explore the health-related topics about which people were uncertain and how they looked to biomedical and religious sources of information, most often seeing the religious as a support for the biomedical. We outline the range of ways they experienced God in this process pointing to the multiple complex ways they make sense of health-related uncertainties.