The Secular in South, East, and Southeast Asia

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-xvii

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2. Introduction

   • Kenneth Dean, Peter van der Veer

   Pages 1-12

3. Asian Catholicism, Interreligious Colonial Encounters and Dynamics of Secularism in Asia

   • José Casanova

   Pages 13-35

4. The Secular in India and China

   • Peter van der Veer

   Pages 37-50

5. Spirit Mediums and Secular–Religious Divides in Singapore

   • Kenneth Dean

   Pages 51-81

6. Secularization, Sacralization and Subject Formation in Modern China

   • David A. Palmer, Fabian Winiger

   Pages 83-105

7. The Third Globalization of Catholicism in Greater China

   • Richard Madsen

   Pages 107-135

8. “Folk Belief,” Cultural Turn of Secular Governance and Shifting Religious Landscape in Contemporary China

   • Xiaoxuan Wang

   Pages 137-164

9. The Roles of Secular States in the Development of Contemporary Chinese Buddhism: A Cross-Strait Perspective on Buddhist Nunneries

   • Tzu-Lung Chiu

   Pages 165-189

10. Communist Ideology, Secularity, and Reenchantment: Challenges for the Catholic Church in Vietnam, 1954–2015

    • Peter C. Phan

    Pages 191-213

11. The Uncle Hồ Religion in Vietnam

    • Tam T. T. Ngo

    Pages 215-237

12. From Secularism to Popular Progressiveness: Popular Religion and the Creation of Telangana Regionalism

    • Stefan Binder

    Pages 239-260

13. Adjudicating the Sacred: The Fates of “Native” Religious Endowments in India and Hong Kong

    • Leilah Vevaina

    Pages 261-285

14. Secularism and Religious Modernity in Sri Lanka and Singapore: Trans-regional Revivalism Considered

    • Neena Mahadev

    Pages 287-311

15. Erratum to: The Secular in South, East, and Southeast Asia

    • Kenneth Dean, Peter van der Veer

    Pages E1-E1

16. Back Matter

    Pages 313-325

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This innovative edited collection provides a comprehensive analysis of modern secularism across Asia which contests and expands prevailing accounts that have predominantly focused on the West. Its authors highlight that terms like ‘secular’, ‘secularization’, and ‘secularism’ do not carry the same meanings in the very different historical and cultural contexts of Asia. Critiquing Charles Taylor’s account of secularism, this book examines what travelled and what not in ‘the imperial encounter’ between Western secular modernity and other traditions outside of the West. Throughout the book, state responses to religion at different points in Chinese and South-East Asian history are carefully considered, providing a nuanced and in-depth understanding of post-secular strategies and relations in these areas. Particular attention is given to Catholicism in the Philippines, Vietnam, and Singapore, and Hinduism and Chinese religion in Malaysia, Singapore, and India. This theoretically engaged work will appeal to students and scholars of Asian studies, anthropology, religious studies, history, sociology, and political science.

• secularization
• post-secular
• Asian Catholicism
• Chinese Buddhism
• Charles Taylor
• re-enchantment
• confessional state
• communism
• Jesuit accommodation
• colonialism
• religious nationalism
• sacralisation
• popular religion
• religious freedom
• folk belief
• Chinese communal religion
• secular governance
• Ethnography
• religious networks
• secularism
• religion and society

“An ambitious engagement with Charles Taylor’s magnum opus: A Secular Age, taking issue with his Eurocentrism. Several essays counter Taylor’s vision of uni-directional development of secularism with examples of the re-enchantment of contemporary Asian nation-states, capitalist institutions, and popular religion. The communal nature of Asian popular religions problematize Taylor’s narrative that secularization occurs through the “buffered self.” This book is an indispensable companion or corrective to Taylor – it tells the story of secularism in Asia, from where a huge chunk of human population and capital now hails.” (Mayfair Yang, Religious Studies Department, University of California, Santa Barbara, USA)

• Department of Chinese Studies, National University of Singapore, Singapore, Singapore

  Kenneth Dean

• Religious Diversity, Max Planck Institute for the Study of Religious and Ethnic Diversity, Göttingen, Germany

  Peter van der Veer

Kenneth Dean is Professor and Director of Chinese Studies at National University Singapore.

Peter van der Veer is Director at the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Religious and Ethnic Diversity, Germany, and Distinguished University Professor at Utrecht University, the Netherlands.

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