Item Details

Bracketing Beelzebub: Introducing the Academic Study of Satanism

Issue: Vol 4 No. 2 (2013)

Journal: International Journal for the Study of New Religions

Subject Areas: Religious Studies

DOI: 10.1558/ijsnr.v4i2.161

Abstract:

What Satanism is and is not occupies both scholars and informants. Through a discussion of three stages of academic reinterpretation, the boundary-work of the academic study of Satanism is uncovered. The first stage of de-demonization is dividing the cultural narratives of evil from self-ascribed Satanism. The second stage of sanitization is positing the organized and non-threatening aspects of Satanism adopted from specific satanic groups as Satanism as such. The third stage of heterogenization is returning to an understanding of the subject based on plurality and fluidity to better examine the polyvocality of Satanism today. By showing the blind spots of Satanism studies, we can address the field in novel ways.

Author: Jesper Aagaard Petersen

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