Emotion, Identity, and Religion

Hope, Reciprocity, and Otherness

Douglas J Davies author

Format:Hardback

Publisher:Oxford University Press

Published:10th Mar '11

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Emotion, Identity, and Religion cover

Deep emotions pervade our human lives and ongoing moods echo them. Religious traditions often shape these and give devotees a sense of identity in a hopeful and meaningful life despite the conflicts, confusion, pain and grief of existence. Driven by anthropological and sociological perspectives, Douglas J. Davies describes and analyses these dynamic tensions and life opportunities as they are worked out in ritual, music, theology, and the allure of sacred places. Davies brings some newer concepts to these familiar ideas, such as 'the humility response' and 'moral-somatic' processes, revealing how our sense of ourselves responds to how we are treated by others as when injustice makes us 'feel sick' or religious ideas of grace prompt joyfulness. This sense of embodied identity is shown to be influenced not only by 'reciprocity' in the many forms of exchange, gifts, merit, and actions of others, but also by a certain sense of 'otherness, whether in God, ancestors, supernatural forces or even a certain awareness of ourselves. Drawing from psychological studies of how our thinking processes engage with the worlds around us we see how difficult it is to separate out 'religious' activity from many other aspects of human response to our environment. Throughout these pages many examples are taken from the well-known religions of the world as well as from local and secular traditions.

Using a thoroughly interdisciplinary approach-one that draws on sociology, theology, psychology, anthropology and philosophy-Davis crafts an engaging and timely analysis of the cultural importance of emotions in shaping the human quest for religious meaning and salvation. * Susan Raine, Religion *

ISBN: 9780199551521

Dimensions: 240mm x 164mm x 25mm

Weight: 654g

334 pages