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Asad, T. (2005) Formations of the
Secular: Christianity, Islam, Modernity (Stanford University
Press)
Introduction: Thinking About Secularism
"...a straightforward narrative of progress from the religious to the secular is
no longer acceptable." (p.1) Critique of Charles Taylor
Taylor: Secularism - "closely connected to the rise of the nation state ...
lowest common denominator among the doctrines of conflicting religious sects ...
define a political ethic..." Direct access: public sphere, market principle,
citizenship.
Critique: "The distinctive feature of modern liberal governance ... is
neither compulsion (force) nor negotiation (consent) but the
statecraft that uses "self-discipline" and "participation" , "law" and "economy"
as elements of political strategy." (p.3)
"Most politicians are aware that 'the system is in danger' when the general
population cease to enjoy any sense of prosperity." (p.3)
"Policing techniques and an economy that avoids disappointing too many in the
general population too seriously are more important than self-discipline as an
autonomous factor." (p.4)
Argues that today there is less and less contact between electorate and
parliamentary representatives - minority interests e.g. pressure groups, media,
plus opinion polls which help governments to manage the electorate.
"The ordinary citizen does not participate in the process of formulating policy
options as the elites do - his or her participation in periodic elections does
not even guarantee that the policies voted for will be adhered to." (p.4) "The
modern nation as an imagined community is always mediated through constructed
images." (p.4) "When Taylor says that the modern nation state has made
citizenship the primary principle of identity, he refers to the way it must
transcend the different identities built on class, gender and religion,
replacing conflicting perspectives by unifying experience. In an important
sense, this transcending mediation is secularism. Secularism is not
simply an intellectual answer to a question about enduring social peace and
toleration. It is an enactment by which a political medium
(representations of citizenship) redefines and transcends particular and
differentiating practices of the self that are articulated through class, gender
and religion." (p.5) Secularism is not simply an "absence" of religion in the
public life of modern nation states - religion's role varies in this regard.
What makes a discourse or an action "religious" or "secular"?
Uses example of The Bible Designed to Be Read as Literature.
Throws up issues of whether a religious text is readerly or whether it is
'religious' because of its subject matter, plus the influence of emerging
academic disciplines on how a text is read. Concludes that "...there can be no
authorized allocation of what belongs to private reason and what to 'a political
ethic independent of religious belief'" (p.9) given such complexities. Media
notion of the Islamic roots of violence - emphasises that "the way people
engage with such complex and multifaceted texts [such as The Qur'an] ... is a
complicated business involving disciplines and traditions of reading, personal
habit, and temperament, as well as the perceived demands of particular social
situations." (p.10) Contradiction between active and passive view of text
pervades arguments by Orientalists etc who assume a "magical quality" to islamic
texts such that "they are said to be both essentially univocal ... and
infectious (except in relation to the Orientalist, who is, fortunately for him,
immune to their dangerous powers" (p.11) Problem of the "religious motive" -
can it be unequivocally identified in modern society? "In short, to identify a
(religious) motive for violence one must have a theory of motives that deals
with concepts of character and disposition, inwardness and visibility, the
thought and the unthought." (p.11) Agency also complex, eg in the creation of
the Taliban. "But beyond the recognition of agentive complexity we can press the
question further: When do we look for a clear motive?" (p.12) "...the
identification of intentions as such is especially important in what
scholars call modernity for allocating moral and legal accountability." (p.12)
The reality of modernity
'The West' may not be an integrated totality, but it is a project people aim
at and expect others (especially in the non-West) to aim at. "The important
question ... is not to determine why the idea of "modernity" ... is a
misdescription, but why it has become hegemonic as a political goal, what
practical consequences follow from that hegemony, and what social conditions
maintain it." (p.13) Modernity - interlinked projects which aim at
institutionalising various principles, some not static, some conflicting:
- constitutionalism
- moral autonomy
- democracy
- human rights
- civil equality
- industry
- consumerism
- freedom of the market
- secularism
Modernity employs as it tools "...proliferating technologies (of
production, warfare, travel, entertainment, medicine) that generate new
experiences of space and time, of cruelty and health, of consumption and of
knowledge. The notion that these experiences constitute "disenchantment" -
implying a direct access to reality, a stripping away of myth, magic and the
sacred - is a salient feature of the modern epoch." (p.13)
Post-Cold War: "'Seldom,' observes Serge Halimi, 'has the development of
the whole of humanity been conceived in terms so closely identical and so
largely inspired by the American model.'" (pg 15) Model includes moral and
political dimensions, including secularism. "We should look, therefore, at
the politics of national progress - including the politics of secularism -
that flow from the multifaceted concept of modernity exemplified by 'The West'"
(and especially by America as its leader and its most advanced exemplar). (p.15)
The politics that comes from not assuming a modern/nonmodern binary
helping to unpack the various assumptions on which secularism is based.
The process by which such binaries are establish or subverted is indicative
of how the secular is lived. "It is a major premise of this study that 'the
secular' is conceptually prior to the political doctrine of 'secularism'."
(p.16) Founded on a concept of anthropology recognised by Mary Douglas and
beginning with Marcel Mauss, who pioneered systematic enquiry into cultural
concepts. "What is distinctive about modern anthropology is the comparison of
embedded concepts (representations) between societies differently located in
time and space. The important thing in this comparative analysis is not their
origin (Western or non-Western, but the forms that articulate them, the powers
they release or disable. Secularism - like religion - is such a concept." (p.17)
Chapter 1
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