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- Convenors:
-
Marcus Moberg
(Åbo Akademi University)
Alana Vincent (Umeå Universitet)
Send message to Convenors
- Chairs:
-
Alana Vincent
(Umeå Universitet)
Joshua Edelman (Manchester Metropolitan University)
- Format:
- Panel
- Location:
- Gamma room
- Sessions:
- Tuesday 5 September, -, -
Time zone: Europe/Vilnius
Short Abstract:
This panel presents the preliminary results of the project Recovira: Religious Communities in the Virtual Age, funded by the Collaboration of Humanities and Social Sciences in Europe consortium (Chanse)
Long Abstract:
While, historically, religious life has been something of a refuge from the digitisation of society, the COVID-19 pandemic changed that. The social restrictions imposed by the pandemic rapidly accelerated religious communities' embrace of digital tools and structures in order to continue their essential social and psychological work during this crisis. These developments have opened up new and productive possibilities for how European religion is lived out, and these developments are likely to persist long after the pandemic has ended. But exactly what the consequences of this rapid digitisation of religious life in Europe will be, for majority and minority traditions, requires further research. How will issues such as religious authority, community belonging and membership, the (digital) sense of sacred place, the making of meaningful and affectively potent rituals and the relationship of religious communities to the wider public sphere change when those communities exist primarily, or even completely, in the digital realm?
Recovira explores these issued in seven European countries on the basis of ethnographic research on mainstream, long-established minority and emergent or newly-built religious communities. In addition the project also a) reviews and analyses large-scale social surveys of European experience of and engagement with religion and the digital; (b) conducts a social and broadcast media analysis of changing coverage of religion in response to the pandemic; and (c) conducts an aesthetic analysis of online and hybrid rituals with the tools of performance studies. This panel presents preliminary results from participating countries including Finland, Germany, Poland, Slovenia, Sweden, and the UK.
Accepted papers:
Session 1 Tuesday 5 September, 2023, -Paper short abstract:
An overview of the methods, aims, and preliminary findings of the project Religious Communities in the Virtual Age (Recovira).
Paper long abstract:
This paper provides an overview of the methods, aims, and preliminary findings of a seven-country research project entitled Religious Communities in the Virtual Age. In each country, research teams are conducting research with three religious communities that fall into the following categories: 1) mainstream/established, 2) established minority, and 3) new/unestablished. For each community, we are interested in understanding what happened during the pandemic, and what survived after the pandemic. More specifically, guiding questions for the project as a whole relate concepts of community, authority, place-making, and the relationship between religious communities and public life, with particular focus on the changes that have happened in these areas. In addition to ethnographic fieldwork, the project is engaged aesthetic analysis, and social media analysis via the social listening platform, PULSAR. The use of Pulsar is particularly novel for this field, and our aim is to use the social media data in conjunction with the on-the-ground ethnography to help us understand not only what people are saying about certain topics, but also why they are saying what they are saying, and how these topics of discussion were shaped and influenced by conversations that extend beyond their specific geographic locations.
Paper short abstract:
The paper will show the initial results of qualitative research conducted at a few religious organizations in Poland. The aforementioned research is undertaken in the international project which concerns the digitalization of European religious communities (Recovira).
Paper long abstract:
Digital technologies are having an increasingly noticeable effect on individual and collective life. Their influence is visible in various aspects of life, including the political, economic, cultural and also the religious one. The aim of this paper is to present the role of digital technologies for religious organizations in Poland. During the lockdown and the COVID-19 pandemic religious organizations had to move their religious activity, contact with believers to the Internet or refer to other media in order to propagate their message. Gradual abatement of the pandemic has made it possible to return to traditional forms of spreading the message, contact with believers. However, the question remains to what extent the pandemic effect of digitalizing religion and contact with believers is currently present in religious organizations? Also, whether and to what degree the pandemic pressure to digitalize religion has contributed to changes in the religious field? The paper will show the initial results of qualitative research conducted at a few religious organizations in Poland. The analysis of the qualitative research results will allow us to present the extent of the presence of digitalization in the activity of religious organizations in Poland. The aforementioned research is undertaken in the international project which concerns the digitalization of European religious communities (Recovira).
Paper short abstract:
This paper reports on the initial findings of the ReCoVirA-project in Finland, focusing on the respective strategies employed by three Finnish religious communities for devising digital solutions to counter the restrictions and disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Paper long abstract:
This paper reports on the initial findings of the ReCoVirA-project in Finland. It focuses on the main strategies that three different and varyingly established religious communities in Finland employed as part of their respective efforts to create digital solutions to the disruptions and restrictions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. These religious communities include the institutional Evangelical Lutheran Church of Finland, the firmly established Jehovah’s Witnesses in Finland, and the smaller, locally grounded Liên Tâm Buddhist monastery in Turku. In light of the Religious-Social Shaping of Technology-approach, this paper provides a comparative analysis of the “communal framing” that these religious communities respectively engaged in when devising their own digital solutions to counter the effects of the pandemic. The analysis therefore focuses on 1) the particular ways in which these communities perceived their digital solutions to be supportive of their established values and practices; 2) the particular ways in which they strove to define and delineate the boundaries and potential long-term effects of these solutions; and 3) the main ways in which the solutions devised were argued to be supportive of the preservation of their own respective understandings of religious community.
Paper short abstract:
Using ethnographic data collected from Christian and Buddhist groups in Greater Manchester, this paper considers changes in four aspects of religion in Britain, namely: sense of community, authority and decision-making, placemaking, and the relationship between religious communities and public life.
Paper long abstract:
The COVID-19-driven restriction of movements and public activities in Britain from early 2020 triggered an increased application of digital technology. Prior research suggests that British religious life has been affected by this rise in digitization. Although the digitization-motivated changes in religion in Britain began before the pandemic, recent research suggests that COVID-19 and the resultant rise in digitization have had an additional impact on religious communities. As Britain settles into a “post-pandemic” era, earlier observed “changes” in British religious life should be reconsidered to understand whether they are short-lived or more permanent. This paper presents the findings of a hybrid ethnographic study conducted from February to September 2023 – over two years after the first COVID-19 restrictive measures were imposed in Britain, and more than one year after most or all the restrictive measures obstructing physical religious gatherings were lifted. Using data collected from Christian and Buddhist groups in Greater Manchester, the paper considers changes in four aspects of religion in Britain, namely: sense of community, authority and decision-making, placemaking, and the relationship between religious communities and public life. Among other things, the paper will highlight visible and less visible long-term changes in British religious life that have emerged from the pandemic and the attendant rise in digitization.
Paper short abstract:
The paper discusses preliminary results of three in-depth case studies in a Roman-Catholic Diocese, a Muslim and a Hindu community in Germany with insights to the engagement with digital technology in religious communities since the pandemics and its affects on the structures of religious life.
Paper long abstract:
This conference paper will present preliminary results of studies on the engagement of religious communities in Germany with dynamics of digital communication and representation since the covid-19-pandemic.
The digitization has led to processes of refiguration of religion (Knoblauch 2020). Structures of authority, decision-making and ritual order are challenged by new transformations of the structure of the public sphere (Habermas 2022). The social and political response to the pandemic forced religious communities to consider digital forms of religious gatherings and served as a catalyst for ongoing transformations. Religious communities that used to engage with technology on their own terms (Campbell 2010) had to decide between locking down, defying restrictions or adapting (to) digital technology.
The German sub-project conducted three in-depth case studies in the Roman-Catholic Diocese of Limburg (Hesse), a Muslim and a Hindu community in the region of Rhine-Main. Drawing from the preliminary results from these case studies this paper presents insights on how the social conditions brought on by the pandemic changed the structures of religious life and influenced the engagement with digital technology of these religious communities. These insights will inform a methodological reflection on the RSST approach by Heidi Campbell and hybrid ethnography.
Project ReCoVirA is supported by BMBF, Germany, under the CHANSE ERA-NET Co-fund programme, which has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Programme, under Grand Agreement No 101004509.
Campbell, Heidi (2010): When religion meets new media: Routledge.
Habermas, Jürgen (2022): Ein neuer Strukturwandel der Öffentlichkeit und die deliberative Politik: Suhrkamp.
Knoblauch, Hubert (2020): Einleitung: Die Refiguration der Religion. In: Hubert Knoblauch (Hg.): Die Refiguration der Religion : Perspektiven der Religionssoziologie und Religionswissenschaft: Beltz Juventa, 7-28.
Paper short abstract:
The paper will discuss recent adoption of digital technologies by different types of religious communities in Slovenia. Three case studies will be presented: traditionally dominant Roman Catholic Church, long-established minority Islamic Community, and less established newer minority Hare Krishna.
Paper long abstract:
The paper will present the initial findings of the Slovenian part of the Recovira project, which aims to comprehend the complex changes in religion since the pandemic, with a particular focus on the adoption of digital methods of communication. Three case studies have been constructed to examine different types of religious communities in Slovenia. The first case study looks at the traditionally dominant Roman Catholic Church, the second examines the long-established minority Islamic Community, and the third looks at the less established newer minority of the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (Hare Krishna). Using a combination of netnography, field observations, and interviews with different categories of members of the selected communities, the project systematically examines how believers are adopting new modes of digital communication, the relationship between official guidelines (national and international) of each researched community, and how they are adopted by regular members in their everyday religious life. The initial results show that for the leaderships of religious institutions, digital media has become a bridge to their communities during the pandemic, but after Covid, it is predominantly understood as a threat to lead the believers away from genuine religious and community life. However, some digital practices remain in use, and this paper will examine what they are and how to understand their consequences on religious life.