Search results

Philosophers and political theorists have long warned of the “perils of dogmatism” for public discourse and identified intellectual humility as a necessary corrective. Sufficient intellectual humility encompasses at least four elements: openness to error, recognition of bias, recognition of intellectual parity in interlocutors, and avoidance of recourse to authority. Religions seem to present obstacles on all four fronts, particularly when actors embody more conservative renderings of a given religion’s repertoire. As such, a case involving different groups of religious exclusivists engaging one another on topics that directly interact their deepest faith commitments and political visions presents a useful test case for our theories of intellectual humility. This chapter considers conservative protestants engaging in public discourse with Muslims about whether or not Muslim and Christian understandings of “loving God” and “loving neighbor” have sufficient overlap to support political cooperation. The results of the dialogue effort were a mixture of controversy and cooperation. For evangelicals, the engagement produced sharp conflict and yet helped to shift the community’s plausibility structures, opening further the possibility of fruitful public discourse and strategic action in cooperation with Muslims. The analysis suggests a conceptualization of practical intellectual humility that emphasizes recognition of the other.

When Trump entered the presidential race in 2015, many white evangelicals turned up their noses at his candidacy. By 2020, Trump had garnered such commitment from white evangelicals that not only did 80% vote for him, but 60% also refused to accept the election results after his loss. How did this transformation occur, and with what lasting results for the evangelical vote and US politics more broadly? This chapter shows that in the “new culture wars” of the Trump era, race has played an even more central and explicit role in religion and politics than it did in the past. Christian nationalism and the intersection of religion and race help explain the strong bond between Trump and many white evangelicals. COVID-19 vaccine refusal and critical race theory bans provide examples of the continuing significance of that bond. These cases demonstrate the likelihood that Trumpian politics will maintain influence over white evangelicals in the near future.

Religious institutions can affect organizational practices when employees bring their religious commitments and practices into the workplace. But those religious commitments function in the midst of other organizational factors that influence the working out of employees’ religious commitments. This process can generate varying outcomes in organizational contexts, ranging from a heightened effect of religious commitment on employee behavior to a negligible or nonexistent influence of religion on employee behavior. Relying on social identity theory and schematic social cognition as unifying frameworks for the study of religious behavior, we develop a theoretically informed approach to understanding how and why the religious beliefs, commitments and practices employees bring to work have varying behavioral impacts.

Scholars who study humility tend to think of it in highly individualized terms, such as an absence of vanity or an accurate self-assessment. Individuating definitions can lead to such jarring concepts as the “humble white supremacist” (Roberts & Wood, 2007). Qualitative sociological research in the (predominantly North American) evangelical movement to accept and affirm lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, queer, and intersex (LGBTQI) identities, same-sex marriage, and sex/gender transition reveals that humility is not simply the awareness that “I could be wrong.” That awareness is rooted in what we have found to be humility’s defining element, concern to foster relationship. These findings prompt us to define humility as a fundamentally social disposition, as concern to protect the kinds of intimate connection with others that can transform the self. Recognizing the social nature of humility reveals why humility is incompatible with injustice.

This paper aims to offer a cultural understanding of investor faith in stock picking despite overwhelming evidence questioning its efficacy. Why, in the face of very widely communicated findings calling into question the advice and assistance offered by financial professionals to help them pick stocks or manage their mutual funds, do so many people persist in these practices? The authors believe that the best way to understand investor faith in the efficacy of stock picking is through teleinvestmentevangelists such as Jim Cramer, whose fusion of celebrity and religion taps into the ritualistic elements of investment that usually lie hidden. Drawing from media, religious and cultural studies theory, the authors flesh out the dynamics of the teleinvestmentevangelist as a powerful character, the understanding of which provides insights on the pre-modern meanings that inhere in mediated global capital.

This conceptual work draws on theoretical perspectives and qualitative experiences of everyday investors to explain why the entire field of stock picking remains so robust and captivating in the face of ample evidence that calls into question the validity of the entire phenomenon.

This paper derives and introduces the hypothetical figure of the “Teleinvestmentevangelist” in an attempt to weave dimensions of celebrity, ritual and religion together to explain investors undeterred faith in the ability to pick individual stocks and “beat the market”.

The primary research implication of this paper is that it exhibits the continued value of integrating interdisciplinary perspectives for understanding investing experience beyond more limited views undergirded by neoclassical economics. One challenge of the paper is that it attempts to merge three disparate perspectives that have not typically been integrated and applied to financial phenomena.

One practical implication of this paper is that it provides a perspective and vocabulary that enables us to understand financial experiences more fully and reflect on these understandings more critically.

Armed with a richer understanding of financial and investing experience, individual investors can better appreciate fundamental cultural misrecognitions that potentially culminate in symbolic violence whereby certain groups of investors are systematically disadvantaged.

The originality of this paper lies in its synthesis of disparate literature bases and application of this synthesis to the financial and investing world. Not only are the individual theoretical perspectives rarely consulted vis-à-vis investing experience but also is their synthesis particularly unique and original in the context of financial and investing phenomena.

It is difficult today, after a decade which has seen the introduction of the 35 hour week, when people spend more time at recreation than at work; and when as a result of these developments there has been a substantial growth in interest in leisure and its uses, to realise the difficulties which must have faced the pioneers of nineteenth century public library service in establishing a service which was accessible to its intended clientele, the working class; in particular the difficulty of establishing adequate opening hours. Today because of changing economic and social circumstances there has been a tendency to curtail the opening hours of libraries. While this has been done with some reluctance in most cases, it has been accompanied by very little discussion of its impact on library services and the users of those services. Historically the problem of opening hours for public libraries has been very little discussed. The general tendency has been to dismiss the matter as a very minor problem. Allred for example writes These libraries were soon opened at hours convenient to the working man.

This chapter provides a cross-cultural look at the intersection of religion and the state with a focus on social control, social movements, political authority, and legitimacy. To better understand the complexities of governance, this chapter examines state social control of religion with a specific focus on the effects of that control on society. State leaders often seek to control and use the power of religion to gain legitimacy, authority, and control over citizens. Conversely, religious leaders sometimes seek to engage and even control the power of the state. This chapter highlights some of what happens when religious leaders directly engage in politics and challenge the social control mechanisms of political authority.

At times religious majorities seek not only to participate in the public square, to make policy, but also to exercise complete control of political and cultural institutions. In many nations, from Christians in the United States to Buddhists in Myanmar, some religious and government leaders share the goal of complete religious control over their societies. What happens to the religions and to the society when these religious and government leaders are successful? What happens to the religion when a state controls, supports, and promotes that religion? This chapter uses the case histories of the repression of the Muslim minority by the Buddhists nationalists in Myanmar and the desires of the United States Christian Dominionists goals to illustrate and highlight the way that the twin powers of the state and religion serve as direct agents of social control by transmitting values of each institution through law, policy, and by punishing those who deviate.