Beyond a God's Eyeview: Alternative Perspectives in the Study of Religion

Abstract

When speculating about the future of religious studies, one encounters considerations whose long term influence is difficult to calculate.... Charles Long's views about the ways in which a prevailing colonial, social, political, and cultural structure bestows privileges on selected religious perspectives, and positions is ... [a] significant example in point. Similarly, if taken seriously, Luce Irigaray's analyses of differ ences between men's and women's discourse, together with her sugges tions about seemingly impartial rules of gender and grammar being deeply rooted in phallocratie assumptions about the world, carry a thor oughly reformative (although still underrecognized and articulated) con ceptual capacity. And the same powers lie inherent in Renato Rosaldo's plea that astute reflection on culture cannot be properly achieved by detached, 'objective' observers who mistakenly believe it virtuous to avoid dealing with subjectivity.... It goes without saying that, at this writing, the field is only partially cognizant of the authority of some of these intellectual events, but will be influenced accordingly as they be come better known. (1995: 338-9)