The Sacrifice of Others
What I intend to discuss is an issue that has strongly marked the attempts to define religion as a comparative notion in the early modern age, at the beginning of the great encounter between the European conquerors, merchants, and travellers and the inhabitants of the faraway lands. In order to disc...
Main Author: | |
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Format: | Electronic Article |
Language: | English |
Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
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Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
Published: |
Morcelliana
2016
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In: |
Studi e materiali di storia delle religioni
Year: 2016, Volume: 82, Issue: 2, Pages: 607-628 |
Further subjects: | B
colonial discourse in early modern age
B History of religion B letteratura odeporica B Sacrificio B History B Stereotypes B De Varthema, Lodovico B Travel writing; History B Travel writing B discorso coloniale in Età moderna B Idolatria B Sacrifice B Idolatry B Ludovico de Varthema |
Summary: | What I intend to discuss is an issue that has strongly marked the attempts to define religion as a comparative notion in the early modern age, at the beginning of the great encounter between the European conquerors, merchants, and travellers and the inhabitants of the faraway lands. In order to discuss the construction of religion as a colonial concept, I will focus on the use of 'sacrifice' as a semantically efficient term in various attempts made, from 15th c. onwards, by Christian Europeans to describe India and the Indian people, rites, and laws for their audience. I will suggest that 'sacrifice', strictly connected with idolatry, has served as a category that is 'good to think with' for the understanding of Others. It served, at the same time, as a cultural instrument to visualise the features of false religions when the discourse and the narratives on 'otherness' have definitively shifted from simple description to obsessive stereotypisation. (English) |
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ISSN: | 2611-8742 |
Contains: | Enthalten in: Studi e materiali di storia delle religioni
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