Do People Misunderstand their Own Religion?
Fabricating Authenticity - Jason W.M. Ellsworth
Craig Martin [+]
St. Thomas Aquinas College
Craig Martin, Ph.D., is Professor of Religious Studies at St. Thomas Aquinas College. He writes on discourse analysis and ideology critique; his most recent books include Capitalizing Religion: Ideology and the Opiate of the Bourgeoisie (Bloomsbury, 2014) and A Critical Introduction to the Study of Religion, 2nd Edition (Routledge, 2017).
Description
In this chapter, Martin draws on two examples to explore whose claims and understandings of religion are authenticated or legitimated and in what ways. Martin highlights that “authentic” understandings of religion are often applied to white, male-led, institutional practices, while marking practices of women and ethnic minorities as “inauthentic” and argues that the role of the scholar is to consider how religions are defined, by whom, and for what purposes.