Everyday Religion
What view of religion underlies (or is assumed by)
the approach of “Everyday Religion”?
The view of religion in the approach of Everyday Religion
is about the role of of religion in society. everyday religion make the
distance with what called by official religion, therefore it implies the
activities that occur outside of organized religious events and instititutionalized,
although that does not mean nothing with them. The issues that discussed on
everyday religion is around how by those viwe, Everyday Religion locate and
define religion, or propably religion is no where in this term. It refer to
about where religion happen and how it
mingles with other aspcet of social life (Ammerman, pp. 9). In certain cases,
everyiday religion formed as a result of negotiations by the minority
institutions to their daily activities. It will show how religious and
spiritual meaning in it remain useful beyond the boundaries of the institution.
How do those two things collectively identified and recognized. Negotiations
between the authorities and religious offocial everyday practices religion will
always happen and competing.
In light of our
discussions on definition (and construction) of religion, how does “everyday
religion” approach help in overcoming the difficulties in defining religion?
The
approach of everyday religion meets
some problems on its research. Most of the terms, categories and assessment of the
research object can not be separated from the influence of institutions and
scholars. As well as looking at everyday life of Ahmadiyya as community of religious
minority. It is not simply released them without comparing with other major
Islamic groups, which have greater authority, especially in Indonesia. The
difficulty of this approach is caused by differences in the definition of
'religious' and the right to use something called a religious or
"religious properly". Official religious biased Everyday Religion become
difficult to avoid. For example the veil and its function, the veil is not only
the symbol of religion, there many thing that rise up from the veil. The
function of veil can be political issues, fashion, and other goals.
Another
difficulty is found in Indonesia for everyday approach to religion is the same object;
different terms are used, about religion and culture. Sometimes, the object of
the research activities related to religious issues instead categorized in the
local culture. It is one of effect the process of ‘religionization’ by defining the term of ‘ religion’ in Indonesia
by the government, that are also included in citizen education thus construct
their epistemology on religious studies.
The
insider/outsider perspectives with
an alternative methodological basis, which is “a dialogical and reflexive engagement between scholars and the
religious people they study” (see p. 255) Diana Eck also speaks about the
“dialogical method”. Please briefly discuss the main characteristics of the
“dialogical method”. Do you think this would compromise the aspiration to
objectivity?
The
character of dialogical method is a way to check our own subjectivities. Diana
criticized the method that is used by orientalists
in conducting research and interacting with objects. They understand the object
only as "the others" like inanimate objects to be formed and
constructed. With the methods of dialogue, Diana tried to fix it. Object of
research has to be confirmed, they have rights to any understanding of the
research results. By listening to the "object" and dialogue, the
researcher was able to confirm and to check their subjectivity. Thus this
method is called by "the dialogue for understanding". In academic
religious studies, dialogue is not necessarily about interreligious dialogue.
Diana only tries to insist that dialogue is important on the research as long
as the technique or its method. That opinion is different from what is
expressed by Dunbar, who explained that interreligious dialogue is an important
part of academic religious studies.
The
researchers seek to constantly improve their research by various methods for
achieving the goal of objectivity. However, the objectivity will be difficulty
when the biases affect the research process. Besides, researcher’s subjectivity
and the object itself had negotiated. Therefore, the dialogue becomes important
in this method. Researchers with the status of insider and outsider have the
right to place their self as an observer and participant based Knott’s
perspective. So, it can be helped to do by using the method of dialogue for
continuing reflection amongst scholars and religious people they study.
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