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*Atheism and Anthropology: Researching Atheism and Self-searching Belief and
Experience*
Workshop

University College London,
Daryll Forde seminar room, 2nd floor, Taviton Street 14
21 September, 2011
Sponsored by the European Association of Social Anthropologists and EASA
Anthropology of Religion Network

*Convenors:* Ruy Llera Blanes (Institute of Social Sciences, University of
Lisbon), Galina Oustinova-Stjepanovic (University College London)

Headline clashes between ‘new atheists’ such as Daniel Dennett and Richard
Dawkins and various religious leaders have shown that strong convictions
inform atheist and religious discourses, searching to convey their own
propositional ‘truths’. Some people argue that atheism has turned militant;
others suggest religious education is a menace. Yet, what is atheism? How
are subjectivities, ideas, embodied practices and material environments
inflected with atheism? These matters are often neglected in anthropology
for the simple reason that the discipline itself is an offspring of
methodological atheism caught in an awkward relationship with theology and
religious performances.

This workshop adopts a two-pronged approach to the research of atheism. We
have invited scholars who research *atheism* as historical, political, and
cultural articulations of non-belief, atheistic critique, political and
practical disinterestedness in matters of religions. Through our workshop,
we will explore the definitions and manifestations of atheism through the
comparison and analysis of a number of ethnographic case studies.
Furthermore, we will address the questions of specifically religious
reflexivity in anthropology by considering the ethical and methodological
implications of conducting research as atheist anthropologists and
representing religious traditions and ontologies in the secular language of
anthropology. A few questions worth considering:

- Is an ‘anthropology of atheism’ possible, or necessary?

- Are atheism and religiosity competing, opposed ‘regimes of truth’? Can
atheism be researched as a form of belief? What are the additional
dimensions of ‘atheism’ that are not covered by the concept of ‘belief’?
- What does secularism tell us about atheism?
- Is atheism as awkward as theology for anthropology? Is anthropology an
inevitably non-theistic discipline? Can you teach anthropological theories
of religion to students of anthropology who take witchcraft seriously?*

Keynote Lecture by** **Matthew Engelke (London School of Economics)* *
*

*
*

*PROGRAMME:*



9:45 Welcome words by convenors



10:00: *Keynote Lecture*

*Matthew Engelke*: The Anthropology of *After *Religion



11:15: Break



11:30: *Session 1: Researching Atheism*

*Jacob Copeman: *Death and Atheism in India*  *

*Lorna Mumford: *Discourses of Atheist and Humanist Identity in Britain



12:30: Lunch



13:45 *Session 2: Atheism and Secularism*

*Sindre Bangstad: *Which Road to Enlightenment? On The Impasses of
Secularist Absolutism In Relation to Anthropology in Contemporary
Norway

*Ashley Lebner: *Marxism, Christian eschatology and the secular in Brazil

*Vlad Naumescu: *Secular missionaries or phonies?  Old Believers’
moral dilemmas in (post)socialist Romania

*Chair/discussant:* *Charles Stewart*



15:30 Break



16:00 *Session 3: Anthropological Atheism*

*Sonja Luehrmann: *Antagonistic Insights: Evolving Soviet atheist
critiques of religion and why they might matter for anthropology*
**Tim Jenkins: *The ‘language ideologies’ of a positivist sociological
study and
Evangelical Christianity compared*Galina Oustinova-Stjepanovic:
*Confessional Anthropology



17:45 Final discussion and farewell






[image: Atheism poster 3.png]

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