Paper short abstract:

I will analyze the discourses of converted Tamangs about their preferences for one religion over another, by putting them back into the context of transformations in Nepal.In the process, I will show the reflexivity of their approach when they make comparisons between their new and former religions.

Paper long abstract:

In this paper, I will examine the individual trajectories of a number of Tamangs, an ethnic group living in Central Nepal (and speaking a language of Tibeto-Burman origin), who have undergone in recent years a process of religious conversion: in most cases, Buddhists either converted to Christianity or non-practicing Buddhists rediscovered their religion. In doing so, I will focus not on narratives about the conversion itself, but on the comparisons that the actors establish between their former religious practices, their new ones and the practices they could possibly have had, had they chosen another religion. It is indeed in this comparison between the religions that are available to them, in the meaning they give to the various possible practices and in the explanations of their preferences that their reflexivity is the most perceptible. I shall try to put these discourses into perspective in the relatively new context of confrontation, interaction and competition between different traditions available to this group, which is in a process of profound economic, social and political transformations.