Between Secularity and Post-Secularity: Critical Appraisal of Charles Taylor's Account (original) (raw)
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process that we call secularization, and his intention is to demonstrate the inadequacy of mainstream secularization theory (MST). The MST generally states that 1) in the modern period, beginning in the 17th century and increasingly in the 19 th , the place of religion in public life declined and religious belief and practice substantially decreased; 2) these changes are the result of something like industrialization, urbanization, the differentiation of value spheres, or the progress of the natural sciences; and 3) that this decline and decrease should be seen as a linear progression, was all but inevitable, and will almost certainly continue. The MST is an example of what Taylor calls "subtraction stories," the chief culprits in Taylor's account.
Can Secularism be Other-wise? (A Critique of Charles Taylor's A Secular Age)
Given the extensive commentary and discussion that has followed the publication of A Secular Age, any further re flection on this work seems to risk repetition and redundancy. To avoid this, I will focus for the most part on three issues that I think have received little attention so far. These are: (1) the normative thrust of Taylor's account of secularism in Euro-Atlantic Christian so ci e ties; (2) the relationship of this largely subjectivist account to political secularism; and (3) the place accorded to religious difference in Taylor's vision for reshaping contemporary Christianity in Western liberal so ci e ties.
Varieties of Secularism in a Secular Age
Journal of Contemporary Religion, 2012
Debates about secularism refuse to go away just because some have declared that we live in a post-secular world. Indeed, it is only now when a high-decibel monologue about the importance of saving secularism has quietened down that certain conversations about secularism are possible. Efforts to come to a more fine-grained understanding of the different facets of secularism are underway in academia and this book is a valuable addition to that project. The original impetus for this collection was Charles Taylor's A Secular Age. This poses the challenge of placing the collection: is it to be read with and/or after Taylor's book or separately from it, as a book in its own right? In their introduction to this collection, the editors provide a helpful overview of Taylor's book and place it within his larger body of work. It would, of course, be helpful to have read the 896 pages of A Secular Age to engage fully with the ideas which the contributors to this collection present, but, equally, the collection can serve as a guide to reading Taylor's work with a more critical eye. To my mind, however, the collection can stand alone-largely because of the strength of some of the chapters which make a wider contribution to debates about secularism. At the very least, the collection of responses to Taylor's work moves beyond his arguments, with most authors bringing their distinctive disciplinary and critical perspectives into the discussion. Jon Butler's contribution, for instance, is a much-needed corrective to the lack of historical specificity, not just in Taylor's book but in most theory-driven investigations of secularism and secularisation. (Another recent contribution in this regard is the volume edited by Ira Katznelson and Gareth Stedman Jones on Religion and the Political Imagination.) Butler rightly points out that there is significant historical material which goes against the assumption that belief was axiomatic prior to the Reformation. Acknowledging the presence of indifference if not outright lack of belief in the pre-Reformation period dislodges the singularity of contemporary developments and ''secularization theory's impulse towards inevitability'' (211). Butler contends that Taylor ignores this literature not for lack of learning but due to epistemological bias. Jonathan Sheehan's contribution may initially seem to be orthogonal to Butler's when he asks if questions of historical specificity, including those raised by Butler, ''irritate or otherwise deflect the 'secular age' concept in any way'' (224) and answers in the negative. Yet, Sheehan, too, suggests a fundamental alternative to Taylor's reading of history by arguing for a deeper exploration of the non-religious outside the concept of 'secular'. Similarly, Wendy Brown's contribution is an excellent example of an interlocutor who engages generously but critically with Taylor's arguments and in the process opens doors for thinking about secularism more deeply. Brown tackles Taylor's dismissal of historical materialism and attempts to show why and how a nuanced historical materialism may yield results in furthering our understanding of secularism within a neo-liberal context. In a Book Reviews 147
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My lecture this evening focuses on the latest book by Canadian philosopher Charles Taylor entitled, A Secular Age (2007). 1 The book has been attracting wide attention in the scholarly community and, I think, justly so. He offers valuable insights into the complex factors that have given rise to secularism in the West. Taylor also offers insight into the continuing strength of religious faith in our day and explains why many secularization theorists, who prophesied the demise of religion, have been wrong. It is in a spirit of respect and appreciation that I offer my reading of Taylor's new book.
Charles Taylor on Secularization: Introduction and Interview
According to Charles Taylor secularization is not so much a process that has developed on neutral epistemic grounds, but rather on moral and spiritual grounds. One aspect of this process is the turn to 'personal religion' mediated by the Reformation. This shift fits a broad cultural pattern that arose during modernity and that he refers to as the ethics of authenticity. This led not only to a rise in new kinds of religion and spirituality, but also in the number of people who are declaring themselves to be atheist or agnostic. In the interview, Taylor explains how this process can be interpreted in terms of a gradual shift from a hierarchical social imaginary, where God is present in the sacred, to a horizontal social imaginary in the form of a providential design. He also discusses how the backlash against multiculturalism might be related to the process of secularization.
soc.qc.cuny.edu
The most profound question to be asked of a civilization is in what form it experiences its tragedies.