Hume,Bishop Butler,and the Revival of Ritual in Anglophone Protestantism

A sweeping reassessment of the role of ritual, ceremony, and aesthetics took place in anglophone Protestantism between the late eighteenth and the late nineteenth centuries. While the nineteenth‐century developments themselves have been extensively studied, little scholarly attention has been paid to the importance of the earlier emergence of philosophical language capable of explaining and justifying, in a Protestant context, the ritual and aesthetic dimensions of religious practice. I argue that this language, paradoxically, grew out of a symbiosis of sceptical modernity, traditional religious apologetics, and the religious “enthusiasm” of the early eighteenth century. I approach the topic through the interconnected oeuvres (and careers) of David Hume and Joseph Butler, presenting the first synoptic account of their ideas about the psychological underpinnings of religious worship, and the use made of their ideas by later generations of anglophone Protestants. As mainstream Anglicans, Episcopalians, and Presbyterians confronted the challenges presented by Methodism and Evangelicalism, they found support in a synthesis of Butler's and Hume's ideas. Eventually, the beneficial role of ritual and aesthetics in religious worship came to be widely accepted throughout the anglophone Protestant world.     

‘Lived bodies’ and the neoliberal city – a case study of vulnerability in London

This article explores the ‘more-than-work’ aspects of the lives of vulnerable women who street-sex work. Particularly, we are interested in the differences between the women’s experiences, within the broader context of power structures as manifested in neoliberal cities. Few studies have explored this aspect of street-sex workers’ lives and theorisations of the co-creation of environments tend to elide the experiences of the most vulnerable people. Specifically, we explore the relationships that these women have with two environments: the quotidian (where they undertake routine everyday activities), and the gentrified (relating to changes in the spaces in which they live and work). We find that their experiences are extremely local, and heavily contingent on the services made available to them (or not) by the statutory and third sectors, and the emotional contacts they make, particularly in third sector support services. This challenges some of the literature which suggests a separation of ‘home’ and ‘work’, and which finds close associations between women who street-sex work. While places designed by the third sector are more responsive to these women, they are also more vulnerable to closure through lack of funding. This contributes to a significant degree of ontological non-linearity and ontological insecurity in these women’s lives.     

Becoming ‘enchanted’ in agro-food spaces: engaging relational frameworks and photo elicitation with farm tour experiences

Abstract

Ecofeminists maintain that seemingly diverse and naturalized socio-ecological issues are in fact rooted within a particular cultural framework that perpetuates inequality and severs relationships among human and more-than-human communities. This important yet perhaps abstract understanding can be made tangible via examination of the ‘conventional’ food system, in which human and more-than-human communities are simultaneously otherized, marginalized, and exploited, realities largely hidden in a global industrial food system that disconnects production from consumption and obscures embedded relationships. Yet as consumer awareness rises, more people wish to know and move closer to the sources of their food, fueling community-based agro-food alternatives. When endowed with an ethic of care, such alternatives can be transformative for individuals and communities across scales.

This article situates conventional and alternative agro-food systems within relational frameworks of ecofeminism and care ethics and uses participant-driven photo elicitation (PDPE) to engage with experiences of consumers participating in a community farm tour. Findings suggest that such ‘enchanting’ experiences can begin to (re)embed food ‘products’ within contexts of place, people, and process, contributing to a relational consciousness that is central to an ethic of care. Findings also illustrate that PDPE can serve as a valuable window into experiences of reconnection, particularly useful for feminist researchers interested in learning more about enchantment and the transformational potential it holds.