The Hermeneutics of (Neo)Fascism in the Study of Religion

This roundtable considers the reuptake, reinterpretation, and returns of religious studies concepts and frameworks aligned with historical fascist and authoritarian projects. Scholars recognize these undercurrents in canonical theories that posit religion as irreducible sacred essence, esoteric knowledge, other-than-human presence, or animate sovereign force. And yet, simultaneously, scholarship dedicated to the critique of secular, Eurocentric knowledge formations have gravitated toward many of these formulations in their work to posit resistant, revolutionary, and/or restorative possibilities beyond the strictures of colonial and humanist rationality. Panelists reflect on this apparent contradiction: where it comes from, what attachments it may reveal, what is at stake in the work of revaluation, and what these patterns teach us about our relationships to histories that we otherwise disavow.