Dr. ANGELA C. SUtton - the 2024 Implicit Religion US Keynote

Dr. Angela C. Sutton, Research Assistant Professor Communication of Science and Technology and Assistant Dean for Graduate Education and Academic Affairs, Vanderbilt University  will be the 2025 Implicit Religion US Keynote

Extensive Effects: The Implicit Religion US 2025 Theme

Implicit Religion observes human behaviour through commitment, integrating foci &intensive concerns with extensive effects. The conference this year takes as its theme Extensive Effects, the second part of the third axiom.

Extensive Effects are actions, impacts and consequences that arise from the intensive concerns to which an individual, community, organisation or nation have committed to (Bailey, 1997; Stewart, 2017; Stewart, 2022). Extensive effects can be inclusive, positivistic, benign, exclusive, aspirational, negative, excluding, or dangerous. Due to the intensity of the concerns underpinning the actions the effects are commonly far reaching and comprehensive, often impacting on others beyond those who partake of them.

For those of us who study ‘religion’ in its various forms and “experiences deemed special” (Taves, 2009) the consideration of extensive effects enables us to consider religion as a facet of human behaviour and experience that is linked with broader social structures, concerns, movements and processes. In Pirates of the Slave Trade, Sutton (2023) details how a pivotal battle fought off the coast of present-day Gabon between the British navy and an infamous pirate crew had devastating extensive effects that are still felt today. The largely forgotten role of pirates in thwarting Britain’s intense desire to dominate the trade of enslaved persons combined with the defeat of Black Bart had the extensive effect of enabling the brutal system of chattel slavery to take root in the Americas. Thus by detailing the extensive effects of the battle of Cape Lopez, Sutton reveals how we can track the larger social construction of white supremacy.

The prompt of “extensive effects” within research design and analysis of data can help us do improve our ability to observe and analyze the role of religion or things deemed special in phenomena such as: moral panics (Cohen 1972) and other fixations on regulating transgender bodies; fashion and clothing as identity; restrictive reproductive rights; and the rise of veganism. Wheeler notes how reporters covering Muslim women’s fashion seem to have the notion that Islam and fashion are incompatible, which she details as an extensive effect of a prevailing notion within fashion media of ignoring the influence Black people have had on fashion (2019). Drawing upon the example of the Nation of Islam, Wheeler details how they held fashion shows that highlighted the creative ways women could dress modestly and maintain the unique aesthetic, while still looking beautiful. She argues that clothing became a way of building a self-sustaining Black Muslim community.

Presenters are invited to submit abstracts for consideration on the theme of “Extensive Effects”.   These might include but are not limited to:

• Extensive effects and social construction(s), eg racism, white supremacy, nationalism, migration, refugee experiences, indigeneity, human animal interaction, and reproductive rights.
• Extensive effects in relation to Trans rights, LGBTQAI+ identities and rights, and their impact or importance to religious communities and / or communities shaped by experience(s) deemed special.
• The extensive effect of war and / or genocide on religious communities and / or communities shaped by experience(s) deemed special.
• Extensive effects and the role of religion or experiences deemed special on the lives and bodies of disabled people.
• The use of everyday objects and patterns to shape, express, explain or enforce extensive effects (eg, food based rituals, consumption, commerce, tattooing, clothing, shrines, etc).
• The role of popular culture in creating, sustaining or resisting extensive effects within religious communities and / or communities shaped by experience(s) deemed special
• Climate change / crisis focused extensive effects.
• The role of extensive effects in teaching and educating about religion and / or communities shaped by experience(s) deemed special.

References

Bailey, Edward, (1997) Implicit Religion in Contemporary Society. Leuven: Peeters
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Cohen, Stanley, (1972) Folk Devils and Moral Panics: the creation of the mods and rockers. Routledge
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Stewart, Francis, (2022) Implicit religion: reshaping the boundary between the religious and the secular? Journal of Beliefs & Values, 43:1, 1-14
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Stewart, Francis, (2017) Punk Rock is my Religion: Straight Edge Punk and ‘Religious’ Identity. Routledge
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Sutton, Angela C., (2023) Pirates of the Slave Trade: The Battle of Cape Lopez and the Birth of an American Institution. Prometheus.
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Taves, Ann, (2009) Religious Experience Reconsidered: A Building-Block Approach to the Study of Religion and Other Special Things. Princeton University Press

Wheeler, Kayla Renée, (2019)”The Black Muslim female fashion trailblazers who came before model Halima Aden." The Conversation, May 10th, 2019.
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