Religious Hegemony Research Articles

A language of Their Own: Deconstructing Patriarchal Language and Religious Oppression in Miriam Toews’ Women Talking

This essay explores the depiction of linguistic and religious oppression of women in Miriam Toews' Women Talking, while focusing on their efforts to deconstruct patriarchal structures and reclaim agency. Set within a patriarchal Mennonite community, the novel illustrates the lives of women and their endeavors to find a solution to the systemic sexual violence perpetrated by men within the community. This essay argues that the women’s journey toward self-discovery and liberation hinges on their ability to deconstruct patriarchal language and reconstruct a new, emancipatory form of expression. Since language is central to the novel, the analysis of the women’s dialogues and interpretive acts brings their journey of challenging oppressive structures into sharper focus. In this context, Kristeva’s theory of symbolic and semiotic modalities, which transcend phallogocentrism, and Derrida’s theory of deconstruction, which challenges fixed meanings and centralized authority in language offer significant insight into how these women navigate the journey of deconstructing oppressive language and religion while attempting to reconstruct new ones. Building on these theoretical perspectives, the essay situates the novel within discussions of feminism, religious hegemony, and gender-based violence, exploring how language and religion, as tools of patriarchal oppression, intersect to shape the women's experiences. Finally, it demonstrates how Women Talking challenges and redefines narratives of power and agency in contemporary literature.

Why Do We Wear What We Wear?: Female Schoolteachers’ Activism Against Hegemonic Saree-Only Dress Policy in Sri Lanka

The longstanding expectation for female schoolteachers in Sri Lanka to wear sarees is primarily influenced by cultural norms and religious traditions. In November 2022, an organized movement of female activists began opposing this social imperative by wearing casual attires at school, making it the first organized movement of its kind. This paper analyses the island-wide protest led by female schoolteachers as a case through a case study interview with one of the leaders of the activist movement. A document analysis is utilized to examine the background of the saree-only policy. By doing so, a broader understanding of the movement against the saree-only policy and its impetus were gained focusing on how it influenced teacher identity development. The paper offers a critical overview of the control exerted over female schoolteachers, shaped by cultural, religious, and political influences, and how the movement in 2022 reimagined their identities through changes in attire. Findings indicate that female teacher activism challenges longstanding traditions and calls for a redefinition of "Sri Lankan female teacher" exercising individual and collective agency against cultural and religious hegemony despite resistance to change at many levels.

Ruminant Relations

Java offers exciting opportunities to trace human–cattle relations in a Southeast Asian context. By foregrounding inscriptions, court poems (kakavin), and other textual and iconographic sources, we aim to unearth some historical and cultural aspects of pre-Islamic cattle management and milk consumption, paying special attention to the words used for different breeds, dairy products, and other bovine terminology. Contacts with the Indian subcontinent heralded the introduction of larger cows and eventually milk-based economies, despite the conventional wisdom that the early Javanese avoided dairy products. When read critically and comparatively, Old Javanese texts reveal that locally domesticated cattle (sapi) had a relatively low status and were often used for heavy work. South Asian zebus (lǝmbu), by contrast, enjoyed more prestige and were valued for their holy profile and superior lactation. The consumption and ritual use of dairy products was especially prevalent in Hindu circles, but appears to have had an impact on rural village life more broadly. When the religious hegemony of Brahmins decreased, the production of milk and butter generally ceased to be seen as a worthwhile investment. As a result, the bovine landscapes reconstructed in this article gradually changed beyond recognition in Islamic, colonial, and postcolonial times.

Blasphemy: Subverting the Colonial Legacy of Domesticated Patriarchy, Hegemonic Masculinity and Religious Politics

Aim of the Study: This study examines how Durrani portrays the subjugation of women and the imposition of patriarchal dictates in the name of religion. Methodology: The study is qualitative in nature and based on “Tehmina Durrani’s novel Blasphemy (1991)”. The study examined the data under the light of “Hegemney Theory”. The theory of hegemony developed by Antonio Gramsci is used to study Tehmina Durrani’s novel, Blasphemy (1991). This theory explains how a dominant class can maintain its power and control over a subordinate class through the use of cultural tactics. Hegemony, according to Gramsci, is a process of domination and subordination that does not necessarily involve physical force. Rather, it involves the social and cultural domination of one group by another. Findings: Tehmina Durrani’s Blasphemy is an excellent example of how Gramsci’s theory of hegemony works in practice. The novel has highlighted the religious hegemony of the colonial master in the subcontinent and its effects on the Muslim community. Durrani has not only exposed the hegemonic schemes of the British colonial masters, but she has also delineated the repercussions of such hegemonic colonial legacy on the society in general, and on women in particular. Furthermore, this paper investigates how Durrani’s critique of patriarchy and hegemonic can be used to inform contemporary feminist critiques of gender inequality and patriarchy. Durrani has used her writing to criticize the oppressive force of male domination and the use of traditional religious beliefs to justify it. She questions the inequalities and injustices that women face, and the ways in which religious teachings are manipulated to uphold this system. Conclusion: Her work provides an insight into the damaging effects that this type of oppression can have on society, and encourages readers to think critically about the ways in which religion is exploited to perpetuate gender inequality.

The Oppression and Subversion of Annie: A Postcolonial Feminist Interpretation of A Wilderness Station

<p>“A Wilderness Station” is Alice Munro’s short story revolving around the mystery of the insanity of the female protagonist Annie Herron. Based on postcolonial feminist theory, this paper demonstrates that the oppression and subversion of Annie are closely related with her insane behavior in “A Wilderness Station”. It finds that Annie suffers double oppression, namely, the colonial religious hegemony and the patriarchal domination, showcasing the female predicaments in Canada in the nineteenth century. It also explores that Annie subverts the colonial and patriarchal oppression through her insanity and feminine writing, thereby providing possible exploration for the female endeavors to transform from being the silent “Other” to the subjective “Other”.</p>

Navigating Religious Hegemony and Human Rights Based on KUHP: Al-Zaytun's Controversial Case

The Al-Zaytun issue has ignited a heated debate in Indonesia about religious pluralism, religious freedom, and human rights. This quandary, reminiscent of the Indonesian Ahmadiyya Muslim Congregation's situation classified as "heretical," demonstrates the historical tendency to pigeonhole alternative ideas. This highlights the hidden presence of takfiri ideology, a potentially divisive force despite its relative obscurity. In this context, this article examines the contentious Al-Zaytun case, in which the rejection of non-traditional Islamic teachings prompts a broader examination of the conflict between entrenched traditional practices, which represent the majority of Indonesian Muslims, and fundamental human rights principles, particularly religious freedom. Using an analytical method, it dissects media portrayals and examines the legal framework established by KUHP 2023, addressing religious violations and belief-based areas. The essay explores the case's potential under the prior KUHP 2021 through comparative research, revealing the various issues of interpreting and applying legislation in cases of blasphemy and religious disagreements. The study says that varied Sharia interpretations within Islam should not be used to justify restricting religious freedoms, mirroring Boaventura's interpretation of Talal Asad's discoveries, which confirm Islam's diversity of religious experiences and adaptive Sharia interpretations. Indonesia faces the challenge of cultivating a nuanced perspective that preserves individual liberty and communal harmony while balancing the intricate interaction of religious dynamics, legal systems, and human rights.

Violation of human rights to access to cultural heritage during the Russian aggression against Ukraine

The article is devoted to the study of the right of a person and a citizen to use the cultural heritage of his people, to access cultural values. During the armed attack of the Russian Federation on Ukraine, from the first days of the active phase of the war, the world saw cultural genocide, intentions to destroy the Ukrainian nation, which, according to the aggressor, has no right to exist. The whole world witnessed the destruction by the aggressor country of our historical memory, which is represented in objects, traditions, crafts, etc. Cultural heritage is a living tradition that connects generations, forms the identity of the Ukrainian nation, and is the property of all mankind. The denial of the Ukrainian people's ownership of their cultural heritage, its destruction, the theft and appropriation of cultural values, the eradication of historical memory is a component of the Russian policy of destroying the identity of the Ukrainian people. Therefore, cultural heritage occupies a central place in the strategy of Russian aggression against Ukraine to establish historical, cultural and religious hegemony. It is the cultural heritage of Ukraine, in which our Ukrainian cultural code is reflected, that influences the formation of us as a nation, inspiring the defense of our country against the racists. This once again emphasizes that the preservation of cultural heritage sites during war or armed conflict is extremely important when there is a great threat of their damage, destruction or theft of cultural values by the enemy. The article analyzes international and national legislation regarding the preservation of the cultural heritage of the people and responsibility for its destruction during hostilities. Ukraine and, first of all, the international community should apply all instruments of international law in order to bring to justice both the aggressor state and individuals guilty of the destruction, damage and theft of cultural values of Ukraine, because, as noted at the beginning of the article, cultural heritage is property of all mankind.

In Search of a Utopian Society: Situating ‘Dalit’ Conversions in Contemporary India

Religious conversions, particularly those originating from marginalized communities, have been a subject of scholarly investigation in colonial and post-colonial India. Dalit conversions, in particular, have been examined not only as an attempt in exercising freedom of conscience but also as an act encompassing various dimensions. The existing body of literature on Dalit conversions has recognized them as instances of social protest, group assertion, a direct challenge to caste-based dominance, the pursuit of egalitarianism, and the quest for self-respect. Although discussions surrounding Dalit conversions to different religions have intensified in post-independence India, conversions to Islam and Christianity have received notable attention. It is widely acknowledged that Dalit conversions stand in opposition to the principles of caste system, religious hegemony, and homogenization. This article by examining the instances of Dalit conversions that have taken place in independent India, delves into three significant aspects: first, comprehending the acquired religious identity of Dalits; second, exploring the aspirations of Dalit converts; and third, examining the construction of a utopia within the context of the adopted religion. Additionally, the article argues that Dalit conversions should not be regarded as an endpoint but rather as a transformative journey into an envisioned utopia.

Church advertising and the marketization of religious hegemony

This paper contributes to the research on the symbiotic relationship between religion and the market by examining the nature and implications of the marketization of religion in a contemporary Christendom in which religion and the market are hegemonic. Based on our analysis of 3741 church advertisements in Ghana over a 6-year period, we conceptualize three symbiotic relationships that coexist between the market and religion—commensalism, mutualism, and competition. We argue that these symbiotic relationships mirror how religion hegemonizes popular imagination and members’ consumption through marketization in contemporary Christendom. This study extends our understanding of the dialectical relationship between religion and the market by showing that religion can use marketization to perpetuate its hegemony within and beyond the market.

Religious Hegemony and Vernacular Mosque Architecture: Investigating Authority Differentials, Intra group Dissonance and Acculturation among Chinese Muslims

This article engages with the role of sacred architecture as an embodiment of the conflicts, within a Chinese Muslim ethnic minority group, determined by the dispute upon religious hegemony. Vernacular architecture of a minority group has significant socio-cultural implications and can serve as a tool to measure its integration in the mainstream society. Through an ethnographic study focusing upon the Hui, a Muslim minority community of Xi’an, in Communist China and their sacred architecture, it indicates that the architectural archetype of a mosque quite precisely concretizes the religious hegemony, intra group dissonance and acculturative or retentionist trends of Hui community. It demonstrates that certain architectural features, such as the presence or absence of minaret and dome or a Chinese styled roof with carved animals, in the mosque clearly mirror the loci of religious authority of its adherents. It proposes that architectural characteristics can play the role of preservers and charters of cultural identity of a minority group and can equivocally serve as symbols of retention or acculturation in the mainstream society. By applying a socio-architectural approach, it is meant to explore that how mosques architecture in today’s China reflects the intra group dissonance of the Hui community and how shifting paradigms of religiously oriented hegemony are working to eradicate the Sino-Muslim historical architectural relics.

Wonders and Healings at the Crossroads of Manichaeism, Buddhism and Zoroastrianism in Eastern Iran and Central Asia

The early Sasanian period witnessed a variety of religious beliefs in competition. The clash between Kirdīr and Mani represents just an episode of the triumph the Mazdean church over Manichaeism, as well as over the other religious formations listed in Kirdīr’s inscriptions. Persian Zoroastrianism constituted a stronghold of power and religious hegemony at the heart of the Sasanian Empire. Yet, the peripheral Zoroastrianism of Eastern Iran and Central Asia featured aspects of regional Mazdeism, such as a wide variety of interactions between the Iranian and Indian cultures, and overt religious exchanges with Manichaeism, Buddhism and Islam. This article first examines the connotations of the word indicating ‘wonder’ and ‘miracle’ (Middle Persian *warz*, Parthian *warž*), and explores its thematic correspondences both within the shared Iranian language heritage (Avestan, Pahlavi, Middle Persian, Sogdian) and religious contexts (Zoroastrianism, Manichaeism, Buddhism). Its second aim is to extend this investigation into different Central Asian contexts of Sogdian Buddhism, taking into account specific Buddhist features. A close textual analysis finds that the interest in miracles is connected to healing. Thus, in the religious literature under analysis, miracles represent the medium of persuasion and conversion *par excellence*, but are also regarded as medical means to cure and save those in need, often through redeeming knowledge. The connections between medical healing and spiritual wisdom were generally associated with important religious personalities of the larger Indo-Mediterranean area, such as Buddha, Jesus and Mani, and with their messages of redemption. This article advances that ‘wonders’ and ‘healings’ represented efficacious notions employed to meet both primary needs of solace against suffering and angst and ardent searches for salvation. The article also highlights the link between the above binomial relation of wonders/healing and the political role of prophetical leaders, allegedly endowed with supernatural powers. As a case-study of this perspective, the article reviews the ideological and social developments of revolts, such as the Khurramiya movements in Islamic times, which exploited precisely this cultural baggage of practices of amazement and trickery for their own messianic propaganda.

Advocacy for Religious Plurality in Vivekananda’s Speech

This research examines Swami Vivekananda’s speech delivered in the World Parliament of Religions in Chicago in 1893 AD. It has been evaluated in the light of Mortimer Jerome Alders’s Truth in Religion: Plurality of Religion and Unity of Truth. While evaluating Vivekanand’s advocacy for plurality of religions for the global peace and order, the researchers concerns on his resistance to religious fanaticism and orthodoxy. For the study of his resistance to the exploitation and extermination adopted by the westerners in the shield of religion calling it “Civilizing Mission”, the researcher takes his essay The East and the West as the major reference. The study argues that Vivekananda’s appeal for the celebration of religious plurality counters the bigotry and fanaticism in the name of religion. It is assumed that this article has a deep substance to understand Vivekanada’s advocacy for plurality of religions, emphasizing on the tenets of pluralism in Hinduism and historical repercussions of religious hegemony.

Doing Knowledge through Knowing Women

Doing Knowledge through Knowing Women

Religious Hegemony and "Muslim" Horror Movies

The present paper examines horror films originating in Muslim contexts and available on U.S. streaming services. Using Gramsci's concept of hegemony, the paper examines how such films negotiate and articulate with the dominant Hollywood mainstream horror genre with particular attention to the hegemonic power of the mainstream with its Christian iconography and assumptions.

Sacralization Religion, Power Elite And Leadership: Female Regents In East Java

The involvement of the local Islamic boarding school (Pesantren) elite in a regional head election in East Java becomes the winning determiner. In a direct local election, elite religious roles significantly influence the constituent's vote. The elite utilizes religious hegemony in increasing society's political participation during an election. The era of new religious movement changes the tendencies of the thinking paradigm that, for the first time, women emerge as regional heads. This paper was aimed to analyze the hegemony of the religious elite based on Pesantren in the postmodernism era in regional head elections, especially in East Java. This research used qualitative research with a descriptive perspective and content analysis of qualitative data, which revealed that there is hegemony and patron-client movement of Islamic boarding school (Pesantren) among kyai, students, alumni, sympathizers, and Pesantren communities as a strategy to win regional head. The researcher used the elite theory approach and political participation theory—research data obtained from the library and document analysis from the affiliated institution. The formulation of this problem is how the religious elite hegemony the societies by increasing public participation and convincing voters to vote for women's candidates as governor. The analysis result remarks the hegemony of the religious elite becomes a tool to obtain power in a regional head election because there are significant influences of religious elite functioning giving dogmatize to society through religious routines ritual such as religion speech

Membongkar Egosentrisme, Eksklusivisme dan Fiksasi Agama dalam Ruang Publik

The problem that has yet to find a boundary for resolution in Indonesia is how to reconcile religious pluralism. This paper focuses on the problems of religion which are often destructive, reductive and asymmetrical. Religious hegemony that dominates the public sphere is more aggressive, confrontational and egocentric than altruistic and cooperative. The tendency of religious actors to affirm their own religion better than others has triggered the emergence of various kinds of conflict. The face of religion seems to undermine Pancasila as the spirit and breath of the Indonesian people. Start- ing from this problem, the method used in this paper is the literature method. With this method the author grapples with a wealth of knowledge to restore religious life. So, as the findings of this paper, the writer presents a new paradigm that the Indonesian nation needs to be purified and restored. The Indonesian nation must receive the sacrament of reconciliation and this must become a collective consciousness of the Indonesian people. Reconciliation means being able to open oneself to forgive others and create conducive and harmonious spaces for togetherness.

“The knife needs the intention of the heart” The construction of ethnic and moral boundaries in Israeli slaughterhouses

This study examines aspects of ethnic, religious, and moral boundary work among Jewish-Israeli kosher slaughterers based, on 35 in-depth interviews, four ethnographic observations, informal conversations, and other secondary sources such as video footage of the slaughter sites gathered between 2014 and 2019. In Israel, the self-proclaimed sovereign homeland of the Jewish people, being Jewish means being part of the political, ethnic, and religious hegemony. While being stigmatized for doing dirty work, the Jewish slaughterers’ workplace setting groups them with menial laborers from a minority ethnic group, both physically and organizationally. The stigma associated with animal killing in Israel encourages the slaughterers to distinguish themselves from other workers by engaging in boundary work. Within the workplace setting, this boundary work occurs around various aspects of intersecting identities: racio-ethnic, national, religious, and professional. Furthermore, this boundary work is fueled by various organizational mechanisms such as the slaughter site’s spatial architecture, differential wage structure, and the use of tools and technologies. While these workplace conditions are determined by the employers, they are constantly restructured and reinforced by the slaughterers to assert their moral superiority vis-a-vis other workers. While exploring these organizational mechanisms, I conceptualize the Jewish slaughter knife as a boundary-maintaining object. I claim that the slaughterers constantly leverage these material, symbolic, and discursive resources to morally segregate the two workers’ groups and the morally tainted aspects of slaughter, such as violence and cruelty, to the ‘Arab’ others. Meanwhile, the prevailing Jew–Arab tensions and the popular symbolic representation of the Arabs ensures that these behaviors are treated as an inherent racio-ethnic trait, thereby reinforcing these boundaries.

Imaginative Reflexivity in Decolonizing Expert–Client Relationships. A Response to J. Vink: Designing for Plurality in Democracy by Building Reflexivity

Imaginative Reflexivity in Decolonizing Expert–Client Relationships. A Response to J. Vink: Designing for Plurality in Democracy by Building Reflexivity

Interconnections Between Religious Hegemony, Socio-Political Processes, & The Mental Wellbeing of Pious LGBT Citizens

Interconnections Between Religious Hegemony, Socio-Political Processes, & The Mental Wellbeing of Pious LGBT Citizens

The Legacy of an Accommodative Secularism: Religions and Taiwan’s Responses to COVID-19

AbstractThroughout the two years of this pandemic, Taiwanese public authorities have obtained cooperation from religious organisations in limiting and mitigating the contagion, and the population was largely spared the influence of conspiracy theories about the virus’ origins. I have found no trace of any significant doomsday theologies among the major religions practiced in Taiwan emerging in the public health emergency caused by COVID-19. What explains this largely cooperative relationship? From the perspective of public policy, why has the government obtained the compliance of most religious actors to its directive and faced little or no opposition coming from them? I use a historical institutionalist approach to argue that decades of toleration from political leaders of all trends towards religions have generated a path dependency of mutual trust and that legacy predates the period of democratisation. The article explores the extent to which this outcome results from three factors: Taiwan’s religious diversity, or the absence of a religious hegemony opposed to the state; pragmatic and flexible theologies; and/or convergence between successive Taiwanese governments’ social policies and the social teachings of religions.