Globalization and Orthodox Christianity: The Transformations of a Religious Tradition (Routledge Studies in Religion) - Hardcover

Roudometof, Victor

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0415843731 ISBN 13: 9780415843737

Publisher: Routledge, 2013

Synopsis

With approximately 200 to 300 million adherents worldwide, Orthodox Christianity is among the largest branches of Christianity, yet it remains relatively understudied. This book examines the rich and complex entanglements between Orthodox Christianity and globalization, offering a substantive contribution to the relationship between religion and globalization, as well as the relationship between Orthodox Christianity and the sociology of religion – and more broadly, the interdisciplinary field of Religious Studies.

While deeply engaged with history, this book does not simply narrate the history of Orthodox Christianity as a world religion, nor does it address theological issues or cover all the individual trajectories of each subgroup or subdivision of the faith. Orthodox Christianity is the object of the analysis, but author Victor Roudometof speaks to a broader audience interested in culture, religion, and globalization. Roudometof argues in favor of using globalization instead of modernization as the main theoretical vehicle for analyzing religion, displacing secularization in order to argue for multiple hybridizations of religion as a suitable strategy for analyzing religious phenomena. It offers Orthodox Christianity as a test case that illustrates the presence of historically specific but theoretically distinct glocalizations, applicable to all faiths.

About this title

About the Author:

Victor Roudometof is Associate Professor of Sociology in the Department of Social and Political Sciences at the University of Cyprus.

Review:

"In this book Roudometof offers a brilliant examination of the manifold entanglements between Orthodox Christianity and globalization processes across history. Broad in scope and rich in material, this book fills a gap concerning a Christian tradition that remained, until recently, mostly untheorized. This is an indispensable book for all those interested not only in the relations between globalization and religion, but also in Eastern Orthodox Christianity and its historical transformations." – Vasilios N. Makrides, University of Erfurt, Germany

"This is an immensely learned book. The notes and bibliography of works in many languages themselves offer a praiseworthy contribution." - J. T. Flynn, emeritus, College of the Holy Cross in CHOICE

"On the whole, Globalization and Orthodox Christianity is a publication that is bound to attract the interest of a variety of audiences. Although historians and sociologists of religion appear as if they are the main scholarly category this book can appeal to, every social scientist with an interest in religion, globalization, and the intersection between the two will find it theoretically and analytically stimulating." - Eugenia Roussou, International Sociology Reviews

About this edition

• Publisher: Routledge
• Publication date: 2013
• ISBN 10: 0415843731
• ISBN 13: 9780415843737
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 246