2011/12/01 by Adam Yuet Chau · 2 citations
Social Sciences · Arts and Humanities · #Religion and Society Interactions #Chinese history and philosophy #Religious Studies and Spiritual Practices #Perspective (graphical) #Modalities #Sociology #History of religions #Religious studies #Aesthetics #Social science #Philosophy #Art #Visual arts
paper · doi:10.1080/0048721x.2011.624691
openalex publication_date 2011/12/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/29
This article examines the Chinese religious landscape through the lenses of ‘modalities of doing religion’ and ‘ritual polytropy’ and explores the implications such different conceptualisations might bring to the religious-market model. It argues that in Chinese religious culture one can identify five modalities of doing religion (the scriptural/discursive, the self-cultivational, the liturgical, the immediate-practical and the relational), each cutting across broader, conceptually aggregated religious traditions such as Buddhism, Daoism and Confucianism. Instead of competition between membership-based churches, there is more typically competition within each modality, especially the liturgical modality. Religious pluralism in China is not manifested as the co-existence of, and competition between, confession- and membership-based denominations and churches, but rather as the co-existence of, and competition between, various ritual-service providers with different (though sometimes convergent) liturgical programmes.