Tag Archives: religion

space by movement

Posted on by November 22, 2012
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My physical inbox today was graced by the presence of the newest issue (60/2012) of the ‘Berliner Blätter: Ethnographische und ethnologische Beiträge’ [Berlin leafs: Ethnographic and Anthropological Contributions], a German language anthropology journal. It bears the title: ‘Räume durch Bewegung: Ethnographische Perspektiven auf eine vernetzte Welt’ [Space by Movement: Ethnographic Perspectives upon a Networked World]. The editors of said issue, ↑Beatrix Hoffmann and ↑Hansjörg Dilger—who did a truly fine job—sent me the specimen, because it contains a short contribution by yours truly. Here’s the abstract, taken from the issue’s introduction: Alexander Knorr erläutert in seinem Beitrag Möglichkiten ethnografischer Forschung unter … Continue reading →

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evolution of creationism

Posted on by November 5, 2012
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I sincerely urge everyone to read David Montgomery’s article ‘↓The evolution of creationism‘—it’s just about five pages long and absolutely concise and clear. Abstract For centuries, natural philosophers, their scientific successors, and theologians alike sought to explain the physical and natural world. The now common cultural narrative of perpetual conflict between science and religion simplifies the arguments and struggles of the past and overlooks cross-pollination between those who embraced faith and reason as the keys to understanding earth history. When geologists unequivocally dismissed the idea of a global flood and recognized Earth’s antiquity, many conservative theologians acknowledged that there was … Continue reading →

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magic kingdom pilgrimage

Posted on by March 30, 2012
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[abstract:] This essay explores the proposition that Walt Disney World is an amusement park whose form is borrowed from the pilgrimage center. Bateson, Norbeck, and Turner have shown that play and ritual together comprise a metaprocess of expressive behavior rooted in our mammalian past. Substantively both traditional pilgrimage centers, especially Mecca, and Walt Disney World are analyzed in terms of shared activities, symbols displayed, myths evoked, and tripartite time-space processes of rites of passage. The Magic Kingdom is shown to be a giant limen ritual threshold, which symbolically replicates the baroque capital. To go there is to engage in transcendent … Continue reading →

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colossus

Posted on by February 26, 2012
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But—and it was a very large but—his had been the guiding brain, the one with the big overall concept, the vision. And that was the one that counted. (Jones 1966: chpt. 1)     Briefly he considered his future, but the idea of life without the Project lacked reality. (Jones 1966: chpt. 1)     They were both roughly the same age, in their very early fifties, though a hundred years earlier they would have appeared much younger. (Jones 1966: chpt. 1)     Now it’s all over, and in the last few weeks, I’ve begun to realize what it … Continue reading →

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church of kopimism

Posted on by January 15, 2012
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Oh, how I do like this—first ↑The Pirate Bay was a website tracking torrents, then a ↑political party sprouted from it, now there’s a religion. In Sweden ‘Det Missionerande Kopimistsamfundet’ (‘↑Missionary Church of Kopimism‘) is officially recognized as a religion since late December 2011. Especially I do embrace the reference to ↑Aleister Crowley via the slogan ‘Copy and Paste what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law.’ [all in all there are five chapters on Crowley [rhymes on holy] in my old book ‘↓Metatrickster‘ (2004)]     At last year’s biannual conference (14-17 September in Vienna, Austria) of … Continue reading →

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the unholy trinity—compulsory reading

Posted on by October 3, 2012
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↑DAWKINS, RICHARD. 2006. The god delusion. New York City: Bantam Books. ↑HARRIS, SAM. 2004. The end of faith: Religion, terror, and the future of reason. New York City: W. W. Norton. ↑HITCHENS, CHRISTOPHER. 2007. God is not great: How religion poisons everything. New York City: Twelve Books. … Continue reading →

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computergames, Islam, and politics

Posted on by October 1, 2012
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Vít Šisler is one of the interesting people I learned to know at the ↑Cyberspace 2005 conference and with whom I will stay in close contact on every account. Vít is a young Prague-based lawyer whose primary research interests are Islam and Islamic law in cyberspace. Exotic bricolage already, isn’t it? According to his own testimony he woke up one morning and realized that he spoke Arabic. Not by means of a miracle, but as an after-effect of his long-time sojourns in the Middle East. So he decided to enlarge his wisdom by studying again—Arabic Studies. When I had talked … Continue reading →

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