Religion, the sacred and changing cultures of everyday life

近几十年来，由于消费文化的兴起以及现有和新媒体形式的扩大，发达社会发生了变化。人们日常生活面貌的这些变化也对当代宗教形式产生了重大影响。现在，人们通过购买书籍、CD、图片、实物和其他具有宗教或精神意义的服务来追求宗教身份和生活方式。电影和电视节目越来越多地提供了一种词汇，人们通过它来表达他们的宗教信仰和身份。与此同时，从塑料玩具、t恤到电视喜剧节目，宗教形象成为讽刺恶搞的对象(而这本身也可能成为宗教抗议的热点)。宗教团体本身更多地参与各种形式的媒体。宗教网站和有线电视节目提供娱乐和从特定宗教意识形态的角度讨论时事。主流的商业媒体也被宗教团体以创新的方式挪用--从在基督教礼拜活动中使用电影《黑客帝国》中的片段，到使用说唱音乐作为传达伊斯兰信仰和关切的手段。各种媒体的作用不断扩大，也影响着人们参与的宗教社区和仪式的种类。互联网使新一代全球宗教网络成为可能，一些信徒对这些网络的认同感比他们当地的社会或宗教社区要强得多。随着宗教保守派和不同传统的进步人士在一系列社会、神学和文化问题上相互对抗，这种新媒体使具有相似宗教意识形态的人能够组织起来并共同行动的能力，也给传统宗教机构带来了新的压力。了解这些新兴宗教形式与不断变化的日常生活格局之间的关系是一项紧迫的任务。许多对宗教的既定理论理解早在这些当代文化变化之前，重新思考宗教和神圣在当代社会中的作用是很重要的。了解宗教如何适应后现代性的文化条件，不仅学术研究人员感兴趣，媒体专业人士、政策制定者和更广泛的公众也感兴趣，因为他们试图理解宗教在当代公共生活中的复兴。宗教团体在这一研究领域也有重要的利益关系，因为它可以成为帮助他们反思自己与当代文化背景的关系的宝贵资源。这个拟议的研究网络将汇集来自英国和美国各地的宗教和当代文化专家，因此反映了AHRC当前国际战略的优先事项。它将为在这一领域进行领先研究的人提供一个独特的机会，让他们在一个小组中讨论他们的想法，并提出新的问题和见解，了解我们如何在不断变化的日常生活中理解宗教。这个网络的目的是将这一领域的一些关键辩论放在一起，以产生对当代宗教形式的更复杂的理论分析。它还需要时间来审查重要的伦理问题，即我们如何处理与媒体和流行文化有关的宗教和神圣问题，以有助于促进健康、多样化和尊重社会的方式。

In recent decades, developed societies have been transformed by the rise of consumer culture and the expansion of existing and new forms of media. These changes to the landscapes of people's everyday lives have also had a significant effect on contemporary forms of religion. Religious identities and lifestyles are now pursued through buying books, CD's, pictures, material objects and other services that have some religious or spiritual meaning. Films and TV shows increasingly provide a vocabulary through which people express their religious beliefs and identities. At the same time, religious images become the subject of ironic spoofs from plastic toys and t-shirts to TV comedy shows (and this itself can become a heated focus for religious protest). Religious groups are themselves more engaged in various forms of media. Religious websites and cable TV shows offer entertainment and discussion of current affairs from the perspective of particular religious ideologies. Mainstream, commercial media has also been appropriated in innovative ways by religious groups - from the use of clips from the film 'The Matrix' in Christian worship services to the use of rap music as a means of communicating Islamic beliefs and concerns. The expanding role of various media is also affecting the kinds of religious communities and rituals that people engage in. The internet has made possible a new generation of global religious networks with which some believers have a much stronger sense of identification than their own local social or religious communities. The ability of such new media to enable people with similar religious ideologies to organise and act together is also putting new strain on traditional religious institutions, as religious conservatives and progressives across different traditions face each other down over a range of social, theological and cultural issues.Understanding these emerging forms of religion in relation to the changing landscape of everyday life is an urgent task. Many established theoretical understandings of religion pre-date these contemporary cultural changes, and it is important to think again about how religion and the sacred function in contemporary societies. Learning about how religion is adapting to the cultural conditions of late modernity is of interest not only to academic researchers, but to media professionals, policy-makers and the wider public as they try to make sense of the resurgence of religion in contemporary public life. Faith communities also have an important stake in this area of study as it can be an invaluable resource for helping them to reflect on their relationship with their contemporary cultural context.This proposed research network will bring together experts in religion and contemporary culture from across Britain and the United States, and as such reflects the priorities of the AHRC's current international strategy. It will provide a unique opportunity for people who have undertaken leading research in this field to discuss their ideas in a small group, and to develop new questions and insights into how we can understand religion in the changing landscape of everyday life. The aim of this network is to layer together some of the key debates in this field to generate more complex theoretical analysis of contemporary forms of religion. It will also take time to examine important ethical questions about how we approach issues of religion and the sacred in relation to media and popular culture, in ways that can help to promote healthy, diverse and respectful societies.