The Christianity of culture
Subtitle: conversion, ethnic citizenship, and the matter of religion in Malaysian Borneo
By: Liana Chua
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
Published: 2011
Place of publication: New York
Language: eng
Number of pages: 258
ISBN-13: 9780230120464
Subjects: Politics and government; Christianity and culture; Dayak (Indonesian people); Ethnic relations; Religious life and customs; Religion; Rites and ceremonies; Anthropology of religion
Description: In this richly contextualized study, Liana Chua explores how a largely Christian Bidayuh community has been reconfiguring its relationship to its old animist rituals through the trope and politics of "culture." Placing her ethnography in dialogue with developments in the nascent anthropology of Christianity, Chua argues that such efforts at "continuity speaking" are the product not only of Malaysian cultural politics, but also of conversion and Christianity itself. This book invites scholars to rethink the nature and scope of conversion, as well as the multifarious, yet distinctive, forms that Christianity can take.