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In the Intersection of Social

Sciences and Theology, a Research

Group turns into an Academic

Program

Isabel Corpas de Posada

Universidad de San Buenaventura, Bogot (Colombia)

Annual Meeting of the American Academy of Religion

Atlanta, November 1st, 2010

RELIGION AND SOCIAL SCIENCES GROUP


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Once upon a time five blind men wanted to know how anelephant looked like. One of them touched its leg and said: It is

like a pillar of a temple. Another man, touching the tail, thought

the elephant was like a hose. The third one touched the

elephants belly and thought an elephant was like a great wall.

The fourth blind man, when he touched the ears, said: An

elephant is like a carpet. Similarly, the last one thought that the

elephant was like the moving branch of a tree because he was

touching its trunk. And they began to discuss who was right in the

perception of the elephant.


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The blind men of this well-known

Eastern parable describe the

elephant from their differentpoints of view or their where

from each one of them sees the

elephant. Just as the blind men,

different disciplinary approaches

for studying religion, as well as the

different approaches from each

discipline, assume different ways

of delimiting their object of study

and different methods for theirapproaches, given each ones

horizons and perspectives for

conducting the analyses and

interpretations of religion.


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The

purpose

of the paper

Interdisciplinary approach and different

discipline approaches of a research group

and academic program, its methodologies

and achievements for an interdisciplinary

study of religion as a fact

Point of departure

Remote and immediate backgrounds

of a Colombian Interdisciplinary

Group of Studies in Religion, Society

and Politics

An example of interdisciplinary

approach to religion

Next step

An Interdisciplinary research network

The paper registers

How a research group turned into a

Master Degree Program


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Remote and Immediate Backgrounds

An Example of Interdisciplinary Approach

to Religion

Different Disciplinary Approaches to

Religion

A Research Group turns into an Academic

ProgramOur next Step: An Interdisciplinary

Research Network


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to Religion


Religion



Research Network


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Kant(1724 - 1804)

Remote Backgrounds

The origins of the study of religions

Filosofa de la

religin

Tillich(1778 - 1831)

Schleiermacher(1768 - 1834)

Dogmtica (1821)

Crtica de la raznpuraCrtica de la razn

prctica

Hegel(1724 - 1804)

Curso sobrefilosofa de lareligin

The philosophers of religion

Feuerbach(1804 - 1872)

Marx(1818 - 1883)


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The study of religion as a fact

anthropological fact, sociological

fact, historical fact began with the

origins of the social studies by theend of 19th Century and the

beginnings of the 20th.

At this time, the descriptions of the

anthropologists, the explanations ofsociologists and new interpretations

of philosophers entered in the

academic stage moved by the

interest of western colonists in the

exotic cultures of faraway countries.

Anyhow, theology did not show up

in this debate.

Remote Backgrounds



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Edward Burnett Tylor

(1832 1917)

The founders of anthropology were

interested in the origins of religion

Cultura primitiva (1871)

James George Frazer

(1854 1941)

La rama dorada

Bronislaw Malinowski

(1884 1942)

Los argonautas del PacficoOccidental (1922)

Magia, ciencia, religin (1948)

Remeote Backgrounds

http://search.barnesandnoble.com/La-Modernidad-Religiosa/Jean-Pierre-Bastian/e/9789681673024/?itm=2http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/ricoeur/notes.html


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Emile Durkheim

(1858 1917)

Las formaselementales de lavida religiosa (1912)

The founders of sociology were interested

in the function of religion

Remote Backgrounds


Marcel Mauss

(1872 1950)

Lo sagrado y lo profano

Max Weber(1864 1920)

La tica protestante y elespritu del capitalismo
mailto:www.usbbog.edu.co/ohralmailto:www.usbbog.edu.co/ohralhttp://frazer.rice.edu/~erkan/blog/archives/paul_ricoeur1.jpg


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Rudolf Otto

(1869 - 1937)

First scholars of religious studies

Remote Backgrounds


William James

(1842 1910)

Las variedades de laexperiencia religiosa: estudiode la naturaleza humana

(1902)

Totem y tab (1913)Moiss y el monotesmo

(1939) Lo santo (1917)

Sigmund Freud

(1856 - 1939)
http://www.usbbog.edu.co/ohral


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Mircea Eliade

(1907 1986)

Tratado de historia de las

religiones (1949)Lo sagrado y lo profano(1956)Mito y realidad (1963)Historia de las creencias y de

las ideas religiosas (1967)

The founder of the comparative study of

religion

Remote Backgrounds



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Claude Lvi-Strauss

(1908 2009)

Las estructuraselementales del parentesco(1949)Tristes trpicos (1955)

Antropologa estructural(1958)El pensamiento salvaje

(1962)Totemismo hoy (1962)Mitolgicas 1: Lo crudo y

lo cocido (1964)

Contemporary anthropologists

Intermediate Backgrounds


Edward Evan Evans-Pritchard

(1902 1973)

Clifford Geertz

(1923 2006)

Las teoras de la religin

primitiva (1977)

La interpretacin

de las culturas(1973)


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Peter Berger

(n. 1929)

El dosel sagrado

Contemporary sociologists


Pierre Bourdieu

(1930-2002)

Gnesis yestructura delcampo religioso

Danile Hervieu-Lger

La religin, hilo de lamemoria

Intermediate Backgrounds


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Ana Mara Bidegain

Immediate Backgrounds

Michel De Certeau(1925 1986)

Emile Poulat(n. 1920)


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Jean Pierre Bastian

Rodolfo De Roux

studies theexpansion ofprotestantism andpentecostalisms inLatin-America

Marcel Gauchet

(n. 1946)

Le dsenchantement dumonde. Une histoire politiquede la religion (1985)

member of CEHILA

historicalinterpretation ofRoman Catholicism


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Paul Ricoeur

(1913 2005)

studies

hermeneutics

of religious

language and

phenomenology

of the sacred Immediate Backgrounds

Raimon Pannikar

(1918 - 2010 )

Jacques Dupuis

(1923 - 2004)

Hans Kung

(n. 1928 )

Torres Queiruga

(n. 1940)


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Faustino Teixeira

(n. 1954)

Jos Mara Vigil

(n. 1946)

Miembros de la Asociacin Ecumnica de

Telogos y Telogas del Tercer Mundo ASETT


Jos Mara Mardones

(n. 1940)

Juan Antonio Estrada(n. 1940)

Severino Croatto

(n. 1930)

Juan Martn Velasco(n. 1940)

Francisco Garca Bazn(n. 1940)


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The characteristics of the group echo

remote and immediate backgrounds:

European influences, politically involvedTheories about religion from North-

American authors in the social sciences

domain

Influences from Latin-American

theologians, politically involved

Backgrounds


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to Religion


Religion



Research Network


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An example of interdisciplinary Approach to Religion

Theological interpretation of religiousrecomposition in the contemporary process

of reenchantment or resacralization

Encuesta de permanencia y cambios de la

identidad poltica y religiosa en Bogot


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to Religion


Religion



Research Network


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a prefigurative and flexible

representation , one and universal, that

presupposing multiplicity of religious

tendencies and behaviors encloses thepossibility of setting up as a special object

of study.

a theoretical object of sufficient

ampleness and foundations which may

outline as the common ground where

religionreligious experiences as well as

religions can be studied: religious

experience as an irreducible human

experience such as the German scholars

(Kant, Hegel, Schelling) acknowledged and

religions as differentiated objects of

historical examination.

Francisco Garca Bazn

The object of the

study of religion as

a fact:

Interdisciplinary and Disciplinary Approaches to Religion

f h l l h f l


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the purpose of sociology of religion: to understand, explain, analyze, catalogue and

make expressive religious experiences, practices, beliefs and institutions

for the sociological approach of religion,

the purpose of antropology of religion: analysis of the evolution, functioning and

meaning of religious experiences, practices, beliefs and institutions

for the anthropological approach of religion,

its purpose, nowadays, is using social scientific methods for sudying the past,

emphasizing on the relationships of religionn and politicis, economics, culture, etc.

for the historical approach of religion,

philosophy approaches religion from the ontological, the ethical and the

anthropological perspective

for the philosophical approach of religion,

contextual hermeneutical theology following Gadamer, Schillebeeckx and

Colombian Alberto Parras proposal to approach texts in their context with a pretext

which defines the intentionality of the interpretation

for the theological approach of religion,

and for the psychological approach of religion?

Interdisciplinary and Disciplinary Approaches to Religion


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to Religion


Religion



Research Network


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A Research Group:

Grupo Interdisciplinario de

Estudios de Religin, Sociedad yPoltica, GIERSP

turns into an Academic

Program:

Maestra en Estudios del

Hecho Religioso

A Research Group turns into an Academic Program


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to Religion


Religion



Research Network


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Red Latinoamericana de Investigacin delHecho Religioso

Observatorio en Red de Universidades Catlicaspara el Estudio de la Diversidad Religiosa en

Amrica Latina

Proyecto sobre interculturalidad e interreligiosidad del

Centro Coordinador de la Investigacin de la Federacin

Internacional de Universidades Catlicas CCI-FIUC

Our next step


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Observatorio en Red de Universidades Catlicas para elEstudio de la Diversidad Religiosa en Amrica Latina

www.usbbog.edu.co/ohral

Our next step


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