Description

This workshop is jointly organised by the Centre for Asian Legal Studies, and the Asia Research Institute, National University of Singapore.

As part of the pilot project LaPIDoR (Legal and Political Implications of the Digitalization of Religion) and generously sponsored by the NUS HSS (Humanities and Social Sciences) Seed Fund, the NUS Centre for Asian Legal Studies (CALS), in conjunction with the Asia Research Institute (ARI), brings together speakers representing diverse disciplines and sub-disciplines from within the social sciences and humanities. Following the first workshop dedicated to various methodological approaches to the study of digital religion, this second workshop brings together scholars based in Singapore and internationally to present empirical case studies which speak to varied aspects of digital religion across different religious communities in Southeast Asia and beyond. In doing so, we aim to get at some of the seemingly contradictory tendencies of the digitalization of religion: at times challenging and at times reinforcing authority; at times providing possibilities for inter-religious dialogue and at times facilitating a politics of exclusion. We hope to understand the social, political, and legal ramifications of these potentialities of digital religion and the possible exacerbation or acceleration of existing social trends. The workshop features several panels in which scholars of digital religion are invited to present their current research and provide feedback on each other’s work. The workshop also includes a presentation of preliminary results from a survey on digitalisation of religion in Singapore and a discussion about future avenues for research on this topic.