Modern Subjectivities, Religious Belief and Irony in Everyday Life

Abstract

This chapter analyzes the religious individual as a “religious modern subject” arguing that religious identity, belief and practice involve technologies of the self that are revealing and even critical of the modern subject given the location of sovereignty in modern society. The chapter analyzes the discourse and interaction rituals (technologies of the self) through which religious people enact modern subjectivities in everyday life. It explores belief and irony as useful for bridging religious and modern subjectivities, contrasting different conceptualizations of irony by Kierkegaard and by Richard Rorty and their practical implications for religions and religious people. The paper concludes by considering belief as a political category.