Decolonising Studies of Religion in So-Called Australia: Truth-Telling, Collective Reflections and Future Trajectories

Abstract

ABSTRACT Studies of religion in the lands now called (by some) Australia have thus far focused mainly on so-called Abrahamic traditions of Christianity, Judaism and Islam, the southern states of New South Wales and Victoria and on theories from the global North. This is despite the fact that Australia is a religiously and spiritually diverse nation, and that diverse worldviews in Australia have long been and continue to be shaped by First Peoples, and South–South flows of migration across the Pacific and Indian oceans, particularly in Australia’s far northern regions. This article begins with truth-telling of the historical and contemporary reality of the religious and spiritual composition of Australia, challenging the myth of a White Christian nation. It then includes a series of scholarly and personal reflections, by the paper’s authors, on why and how there is a need to decolonise studies of religion in Australia. These author narratives, recounting lived experiences from their diverse positionalities including their First Peoples, Indonesian, Chinese, African, and/or European backgrounds, further reflect Australia’s multifaith and ‘multicultural Real’ (Hage 1998). The paper concludes with an analysis of these narratives and posits ways forward to dislocate coloniality in the study of religion across the Asia-Pacific region.