This book is open access and available on www.bloomsburycollections.com. It is funded by Utrecht University andthe Max Planck Society. Understanding religion from a material and corporeal angle, this book addresses the ways in which refugees practice their religions and convert or develop new faiths. It also evaluates how secular institutions in Europe frame and determine what is classified as religion according to the law, and delineate the limits of religious authority, religious practice, and religious speech.
The question of nationalism and migration has been shaping the political landscape in Europe for more than a decade, resulting in a nationalist upsurge. This volume places the current trajectories of people from Asia and Africa who flee from conditions such as oppression and conflict, and who are seeking refuge in Europe in a broader historical and comparative perspective. In so doing, it addresses past experiences in Europe with the role of religion in both producing and accommodating refugees, in the aftermath of the Peace of Westphalia, World War II, and in the context of the Cold War.
About the Author
Birgit Meyer is Professor of Religious Studies at the University of Utrecht, The Netherlands. She is co-editor of Figurations and Sensations of the Unseen in Judaism, Christianity and Islam (Bloomsbury 2019) and co-editor of Bloomsbury Studies in Material Religion. Peter van der Veer is Director of the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Religion, Gottingen, Germany.
