Essays

The Immanent Frame publishes essays reflecting on current events, debates in the field, and other public matters relevant to scholarship in secularism and religion.

The Immanent Frame typically publishes essays by invitation only. To see our open calls for content, click here.

To read essays from our archive that are written by scholars introducing or reviewing a recently published book, click here and here.

Essays

Sonic controversy: “Hinduistic music” in Pakistan

Shaheer Afaqi·

October 21, 2020

I argue that shifting assumptions about “authentic Islam” have catalyzed the scandalization of mystical music in Pakistan. The emergence of Arabization, with its emphasis on rediscovering true Islam in Arab culture, has…

October 21, 2020

Essays

President Trump visits St. John’s Church

Winnifred Fallers Sullivan·

June 4, 2020

The important story here is not about the president’s religion. Indeed, talk of the church is in many ways a distraction. While there are real reasons to be concerned about the abuse…

June 4, 2020

Essays

Social activism and rooted liberationist religion in Brazil

Travis Knoll·

May 8, 2020

Religious leftists in Brazil—of all faiths, with Catholics most prominent among them—already lean on established institutions in combination with the popular culture and traditions of their country.

May 8, 2020

Essays

“Citizen science,” environmental action, and religious pluralism

Ryan Juskus·

April 10, 2020

I joined Restoring Eden as a participant observer in 2016, soon after they carried out a series of citizen science projects in the rural, white coalfields of Central Appalachia. As a religion…

April 10, 2020

Essays

Climate strikes as rites of mourning the future

Sarah M. Pike·

February 24, 2020

Climate strikes are rites of mourning the future, lamenting current catastrophes, and demanding world leaders to radically reduce carbon emissions. The bodies of young people acting together on rural lands, city streets,…

February 24, 2020

Essays

The necropolitical law of assassination

Jothie Rajah·

October 31, 2019

With extraterritorial, extrajudicial assassination normalized, and law’s foundational protection of human life selectively discarded, we are witnessing the unfolding of a new law.

October 31, 2019

Essays

On disciplines and non-knowing: A reply to Agnes Callard

Joy Brennan·

April 19, 2019

In religious studies . . . our students learn non-knowing not by thinking their way to it, but by actually not knowing, up to and including a profound unknowing about the conditions…

April 19, 2019

Essays

Before anything, above all: No decision

Maria José de Abreu·

April 9, 2019

While phrases such as “Brazil first,” “America first,” or “Brexit is Brexit” may suggest a will to restore sovereignty around the logic of positionality—of what stands before and above—they operate in a…

April 9, 2019

Essays

Silencing the monks

Thomas Borchert·

March 21, 2019

Elections do many things, but one thing they are supposed to do is make a people’s opinion known. One group of important actors within Thailand who cannot express their sovereign will is…

March 21, 2019

Book introductions

The Gods of Indian Country: An introduction

Jennifer Graber·

November 6, 2018

Throughout my research, I encountered many stories like Cûifā́gàui’s, in which Native people struggled as traditional formats for accessing sacred power were foreclosed by ecological disaster and colonial violence.

November 6, 2018

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