Whose Belief is it Anyway?

• In Event: 341 - Section on Sociology of Religion Refereed Roundtable Session and Business Meeting
  In Refereed Roundtable 60min: Table 08. Islam and Buddhism

Abstract

This paper aims to discuss Turkish Alevi identity and its legal recognition in Turkey by focusing on metamorphoses thereof. What is, on first sight, astonishing about this transformation, is the growing tendency among Alevis to conceptualize Alevism in distinctively religious terms. The paper will situate this re-conceptualization and objectify Alevism as religion along the lines of an implicit “world religion” model. The comparison unveils how especially the religio-political sphere of Turkey is discursive in a very Foucauld’ian sense: religious hegemonies are established by means of lingual codes enshrined in the power preserving institutions of the country. Thus, Focusing on the Alevi case, this paper targets to contribute to our understanding of how indigenous people, objectively subjected to the coercive persuasiveness of the globalized religion discourse, appropriate varieties of this discourse for their own specific agendas. While scholarship on the genealogy of the religion (Asad) and world-religion discourses (Masuzawa) has increased our understanding of the evolution of the religion paradigm, more attention needs to be directed to the consequences of its successful globalization. While the coercive power of the religion concept as a tool for imperialist and colonialist politics has been well established, less attention has been directed to cases in which socio-cultural communities have adopted the language of religion as a means of emancipation. The Alevi case offers a compelling example of just such a case.

Author

• Istar Gozaydin Savasir, Gediz University-Izmir