Religion, Public Institutions and Culture Research Group
Research area lead: Professor Sylvia Collins-Mayo
The Religion, Public Institutions and Culture Research Group brings together colleagues in the Criminology, Politics and Sociology Department. The group has interests across a range of vibrant and contested fields including: religion, nonreligion, Covid-19, nationalism and national identity, gender and religion, migration and religion, religion and youth, sociology of urban religion, religion and families, animals and spirituality, religious imagery and language, religion and spirituality in healthcare settings. Whether we look at individual or group dynamics, religion has emerged as one of the most contested aspects of contemporary societies across the world in the 21st century.
Current research
- The faith and spirituality of young people, with a focus on how young people relate to Christianity. The social and spiritual impact of street pastors and the faith and spirituality of Generation Y
- The effects of social practices, geographies and cultural histories of a variety of religious communities in London for the nature of attachment to particular places and groups
- London's Buddhist communities and their response to the particular transformations of the late modern city
- Intersections of religion with gender, race and class, and how these interact with social location, power relations and lived experience with a focus on the role of religion in families and healthcare
- Gender relations and feminism in the Muslim-majority world
- Religion and animals - focusing on the ways in which religious belief conceptualises nonhuman animals and has direct consequences for them
- Gender and religion amongst different faith groups
- Understanding Unbelief: Reaching for a new sense of Connection? Towards a deeper understanding of the sociality of generation Y non-believers in Northern and Central Europe
- Modelling threat causation for religiosity and nationalism in Europe
- Religion and vaccine hesitancy
Links and affiliations
Publications
- Herbert, David and Bullock, Josh (2020) Reaching for a new sense of connection : soft atheism and 'patch and make do' spirituality amongst nonreligious European millennials. Culture and Religion, ISSN (print) 1475-5610 (Epub Ahead of Print)
- Bullock, Josh, Lane, Justin.E, Miklouši?, Igor and Shults, LeRon (2020) Modelling threat causation for religiosity and Nationalism in Europe. arXiv,
- Aune, Kristin , Sharma, Sonya and Vincett, Giselle, eds. (2008) Women and religion in the west: challenging secularization. Aldershot, U.K. : Ashgate. 242p. ISBN 9780754658702
- Reimer-Kirkham, Sheryl, Sharma, Sonya, Grypma, Sonya, Pesut, Barbara, Sawatzky, Richard and Wolfs, Dorolen (2019) The elephant on the table' : religious and ethnic diversity in home health services. Journal of Religion and Health, 58(3), pp. 908-925. ISSN (print) 0022-4197
- Sharma, Sonya (2016) A lateral reading of religion : Christianity in sister relationships. Journal of Contemporary Religion, 31(1), pp. 51-65. ISSN (print) 1353-7903
- Reimer-Kirkham, Sheryl, Sharma, Sonya, Brown, Rachel and Calestani, Melania (2020) Prayer as transgression? The social relations of prayer in healthcare settings. Montreal, Quebec : McGill-Queen's University Press. 240p. (Advancing Studies in Religion, 9) ISBN 9780228001645
- Llewellyn, Dawn and Sharma, Sonya, eds. (2016) Religion, equalities and inequalities. London, U.K. : Routledge. 230p. (Theology and Religion in Interdisciplinary Perspective Series in Association with the BSA Sociology of Religion Study Group) ISBN 9781472439963
- Guest, Mathew, Aune, Kristin, Sharma, Sonya and Warner, Rob (2013) Christianity and the university experience: Understanding student faith. London, U.K. : Bloomsbury. 256p. ISBN 9781780936017
- Dodsworth, Francis, Vacchelli, Elena and Watson, Sophie (2013) Shifting religions and cultures in London's East End. Material Religion, 9(1), pp. 86-112. ISSN (print) 1743-2200
- Dodsworth, Francis and Watson, Sophie (2012) Into unorthodox London: the religious ethnography of Charles Maurice Davies. Victorian Literature and Culture, 40(2), pp. 487-508. ISSN (print) 1060-1503
- Dodsworth, Francis and Watson, Sophie (2011) Constituting religious publics: the tale of two non-conformist churches in London. Culture and Religion, 12(1), pp. 1-19. ISSN (print) 1475-5610
- Collins-Mayo, Sylvia (2012) Youth and religion: an international perspective. Theo-Web. Zeitschrift fuer Religionpaedagogik [Academic Journal of Religious Education], 11(1), pp. 80-94. ISSN (online) 1863-0502
- Collins-Mayo, Sylvia and Dandelion, Pink, eds. (2010) Religion and youth. Farnham, U.K. : Ashgate. 278p. (Theology and religion in interdisciplinary perspective series) ISBN 9780754667681
- Collins-Mayo, Sylvia, Mayo, Bob, Nash, Sally and Cocksworth, Christopher (2010) The faith of Generation Y. London, U.K. : Church House Publishing. 153p. ISBN 9780715142066
- Savage, Sara, Collins-Mayo, Sylvia, Mayo, Bob and Cray, Graham (2006) Making sense of Generation Y: the world view of 15- to 25-year-olds. London : Church House. 209p. (Explorations) ISBN 9780715140512
- Collins-Mayo, Sylvia (2019) Dissent by default : 'believing without belonging' in twenty-first-century England. In: Hanciles, Jehu J., (ed.) The twentieth century : traditions in a global context. Oxford, U.K. : Oxford University Press. pp. 292-311. (The Oxford history of Protestant dissenting traditions, (IV)) ISBN 9780199684045 (In Press)
- Collins-Mayo, Sylvia (2016) The meaning and inheritance of Anglican identity amongst young people. In: Day, Abby, (ed.) Contemporary Issues in the Worldwide Anglican Communion: Powers and Pieties. Abingdon, U.K. : Routledge. pp. 21-38. (Ashgate Contemporary Ecclesiology Series) ISBN 9781472444134
- Collins-Mayo, Sylvia (2015) Evangelicals and gender. In: Smith, Greg, (ed.) 21st Century evangelicals: reflections on research by the Evangelical Alliance. Watford, U.K. : Instant Apostle. ISBN 9781909728257
- Collins-Mayo, Sylvia (2015) Young people and residual Christian culture. In: Day, Abby and Lovheim, Mia, (eds.) Modernities, memory, mutations: Grace Davie and the study of religion. Abingdon, U.K. : Routledge. pp. 179-194. ISBN 9781472436177
- Collins-Mayo, Sylvia (2013) Street Prayer: A case study of the use of prayer by Street Pastors. In: Giordan, Giuseppe and Woodhead, Linda, (eds.) Prayer in Religion and Spirituality. Leiden, The Netherlands : Brill. pp. 173-188. (Annual Review of the Sociology of Religion, 4) ISSN (print) 1877-5233 ISBN 9789004260481
- Collins-Mayo, Sylvia (2012) Choosing my religion: young people's personal Christian knowledge. In: Guest, Matthew and Arweck, Elisabeth, (eds.) Religion and knowledge: sociological perspectives. Aldershot, U.K. : Ashgate. pp. 149-163. (Theology and religion in interdisciplinary perspective) ISBN 9781409427070
- Cerella, Antonio (2013) Religion and political form : Carl Schmitt's genealogy of politics as critique of Jurgen Habermas's post-secular discourse. Review of International Studies, 38(5), pp. 975-994. ISSN (print) 0260-2105
- Cerella, Antonio (2016) The myth of origin : archaeology and history in the work of Agamben and Girard. In: Brighi, Elisabetta and Cerella, Antonio, (eds.) The sacred and the political : explorations on Mimesis, violence and religion. London, U.K. : Bloomsbury Academic. pp. 213-236. (Political Theory and Contemporary Philosophy) ISBN 9781628925968
- Ichijo, Atsuko (2019) Political modernity in East Asia : religion, nationalism and subversion of imperialism. In: Shani, Georgio and Kibe, Takashi, (eds.) Religion and nationalism in Asia. Abingdon, U.K. : Routledge. pp. 108-123. (Political Theories in East Asian Context) ISBN 9780367183424
- Ichijo, Atsuko (2014) Religion in education: the faith school debates in contemporary Britain. In: Topic, Martina and Sremac, Srdjan, (eds.) Europe as a multiple modernity: multiplicity of religious identities and belonging. Newcastle, U.K. : Cambridge Scholars Publishing. pp. 92-108. ISBN 9781443856331
- Ichijo, Atsuko (2009) Nationalism and religion: the case of Japanese nationalism and state Shinto. In: Hvithamar, Annika , Warburg, Margit and Jacobsen, Brian Arly, (eds.) Holy nations and global identities: civil religion, nationalism, and globalisation. Leiden, Netherlands : Brill. pp. 121-136. ISBN 9789004178281
