Jason A. Josephson Storm, "The Myth of Disenchantment: Magic, Modernity, and the Birth of the Human Sciences" (U Chicago Press, 2017)
A great many theorists have argued that the defining feature of modernity is that people no longer believe in spirits, myths, or magic. Jason Ā. Josephson-Storm argues that as broad cultural history g...
23 Sep 20241h 4min
Neil Van Leeuwen, "Religion As Make-Believe: A Theory of Belief, Imagination, and Group Identity" (Harvard UP, 2023)
It is an intuitive truth that religious beliefs are different from ordinary factual beliefs. We understand that a belief in God or the sacredness of scripture is not the same as believing that the sun...
17 Sep 20241h 15min
Victoria Smolkin, "A Sacred Space Is Never Empty: A History of Soviet Atheism" (Princeton UP, 2018)
The specter of the “Godless” Soviet Union haunted the United States and continental Western Europe throughout the Cold War, but what did atheism mean in the Soviet Union? What was its relationship wit...
18 Aug 20241h 2min
Rachel M. Scott, "Recasting Islamic Law: Religion and the Nation State in Egyptian Constitution Making" (Cornell UP, 2021)
By examining the intersection of Islamic law, state law, religion, and culture in the Egyptian nation-building process, Recasting Islamic Law: Religion and the Nation State in Egyptian Constitution Ma...
3 Aug 20241h 2min
Secularism, the State, and Islam
An interview with Dr. Nadia Fadil who speaks about secularism the state and Islam. We delve into questions such as what it means to call Islam a lived and embodied reality and what the relationship is...
10 Jul 202422min
Todd H. Weir, "Red Secularism: Socialism and Secularist Culture in Germany 1890 to 1933" (Cambridge UP, 2023)
Red Secularism: Socialism and Secularist Culture in Germany 1890 to 1933 (Cambridge UP, 2023) is the first substantive investigation into one of the key sources of radicalism in modern German, the sub...
16 Jun 202438min
Nivedita Menon, "Secularism As Misdirection: Critical Thought from the Global South" (Duke UP, 2024)
In this episode, we speak to Nivedita Menon about her new book, Secularism as Misdirection: Critical Thought from the Global South (Duke University Press, 2024; Permanent Black, 2023). Secularism as M...
13 Jun 20241h 9min
Christopher Cameron, "Black Freethinkers: A History of African American Secularism" (Northwestern UP, 2019)
Black Freethinkers: A History of African American Secularism (Northwestern University Press, 2019) by Christopher Cameron, an Associate Professor of history at the University of North Carolina, Charlo...
29 Apr 202445min
