Making Places Sacred

Places are made sacred in creative and novel ways, countering the expectation that sacred space must have an ancient past.

This Element highlights how sacred space is newly made, often associated with blood, death, and geographic anomalies, yet no single feature determines sacred associations. It also examines the multidimensional and multisensory dimensions of sacred space, which can be made almost anywhere, including online, but can also be unmade.Although claims to sacredness are often linked to the power of a distant past, the work of making places sacred is creative, novel, renewable, and reversible. This Element highlights how sacred space is newly made. It is often associated with blood, death, and geographic anomalies, yet no single feature determines sacred associations. People make space sacred by connecting with 'extrahuman' figures – the ancestors, spirits, and gods that people attempt to interact with in every society. These connections can be concentrated in people's bodies, yet bodies are particularly vulnerable to loss. The Element also examines the multidimensional and multisensory dimensions of sacred space, which can be made almost anywhere, including online, but can also be unmade. Unmaking sacred space can entail new sacralization. New and minority religions in particular provide excellent sites for studying sacredness as a value, raising the reliably productive question: sacred for whom?