Young People And The Diversity Of Non Religious Identities In International Perspective

This volume brings together current research on young people, (non)religion, and diversity, documenting the forms young people’s stances may take and the social or spatial contexts in which these may be formed. The social contexts studied include the family, school, and faith communities. The spatial contexts include (sub)urban and rural geographies and places of worship and pilgrimage.Youth and (non)religion are an area of academic interest that has been gaining increasing attention, especially as it pertains to youthful expressions of (non)religion and identities. As research on religion and young people spans and expands across academic disciplines and across geographic areas, comparative approaches and perspectives, such as presented in this volume, offer important spaces for reflecting about the experience of religiosity among young people and the ways they are learning about, and developing, (non)religious identities. Building bridges geographically and methodologically, this volume provides an international perspective on religion and nonreligion among young people, offering a diversity of religious and nonreligious perspectives.

This volume brings together current research on young people, (non)religion, and diversity, documenting the forms young people's stances may take and the social or spatial contexts in which these may be formed. The social contexts studied include the family, school, and faith communities. The spatial contexts include (sub)urban and rural geographies and places of worship and pilgrimage. Youth and (non)religion are an area of academic interest that has been gaining increasing attention, especially as it pertains to youthful expressions of (non)religion and identities. As research on religion and young people spans and expands across academic disciplines and across geographic areas, comparative approaches and perspectives, such as presented in this volume, offer important spaces for reflecting about the experience of religiosity among young people and the ways they are learning about, and developing, (non)religious identities. Building bridges geographically and methodologically, this volume provides an international perspective on religion and nonreligion among young people, offering a diversity of religious and nonreligious perspectives.

Youth, Religion, and Identity in a Globalizing Context investigates how young people navigate the intersections of religion and identity, exploring the different experiences of youth, the impact of community and processes of recognition, and the reality of ambivalence as agency.

Globalisation has led to increasing cultural and religious diversity in cities around the world. What are the implications for young people growing up in these settings? How do they develop their religious identities, and what roles do families, friends and peers, teachers, religious leaders and wider cultural influences play in the process? Furthermore, how do members of similar and different cultural and faith backgrounds get on together, and what can young people tell us about reducing conflict and promoting social solidarity amid diversity? Youth On Religion outlines the findings from a unique large-scale project investigating the meaning of religion to young people in three multi-faith locations. Drawing on survey data from over 10,000 young people with a range of faith positions, as well as a series of fascinating interviews, discussion groups and diary reports involving 160 adolescents, this book examines myriad aspects of their daily lives. It provides the most comprehensive account yet of the role of religion for young people growing up in contemporary, multicultural urban contexts. Youth On Religion is a rigorous and engaging account of developing religiosity in a changing society. It presents young people’s own perspectives on their attitudes and experiences and how they negotiate their identities. The book will be an instructive and valuable resource for psychologists, sociologists, criminologists, educationalists and anthropologists, as well as youth workers, social workers and anyone working with young people today. It will also provide essential understanding for policy makers tackling issues of multiculturalism in advanced societies.

Investigating the hitherto unexplored topic of how young people understand and relate to religious diversity in the social context in which they are growing up, this book makes a significant contribution to the existing body of literature on religious diversity and multiculturalism. It closes a gap in knowledge about young people’s attitudes to religious diversity, and reports data gathered across the whole of the UK as well as comparative chapters on Canada, USA and continental Europe. Reporting findings from both qualitative and quantitative research which reveal, for example, the importance of the particular social and geographical context within which young people are embedded, the volume addresses young people’s attitudes towards the range of 'world religions’ as well as non-religious stances and offers an interdisciplinary approach through the different analytical perspectives of the contributors.

This open access volume features a data-rich portrait of what young adults think about the world. It collects the views of students in higher education from various cultural regions, religious traditions, linguistic groups, and political systems. This will help readers better understand a generation that will soon rise to power and influence. The analysis focuses on 12 countries. These include Canada, China, Finland, Ghana, India, Israel, Peru, Poland, Russia, Sweden, Turkey, and the USA. It employs a mixed-methods approach, invested in the study of an individual's views and values using state-of-the-art methodology, including the innovative Faith Q-sort. This instrument is new to the field and developed for assessing the entanglement of subjective views and personal beliefs. The study also incorporates a comprehensive values survey as well as other survey tools that look into people's social capital, media use, social values alignment, and subjective well-being. Each chapter is co-authored by an international team of scholars with research interest in the particular topic. The rationale for this principle is the need to engage individuals from different cultural backgrounds, scholarly disciplines, and methodological and substantive competences. In the end, this innovative approach presents an informed, empirically grounded analysis of the values and worldviews of the future generation. It sheds an important light on how changes in the religious landscape are intertwined with broad and diffuse processes of socio-economic and global cultural change.

Growing numbers of young adults are either nonreligious or "spiritual but not religious," but this does not signal a lack of interest in religion and meaning-making. Though the lexicon describing sexuality and gender is quickly evolving, young people do not yet have satisfactory language to describe their fluid religious and spiritual identities. In Identities Under Construction Pamela Dickey Young and Heather Shipley undertake a focused study of youth sexual, religious, and gender identity construction. Drawing from survey responses and interviews with nearly five hundred participants, they reveal that youth today consider their identities fluid and open to change. Young people do not limit themselves to singular identity categories, experiencing the choice of one religion, of maleness or femaleness, or of a fixed sexuality as confining. Although they recognize various forces at work in identity construction - parents, peers, the internet - they regard themselves as the authors of their own identities. For most of the young adults in the study, even those who are most traditionally religious, religious opinions and values should adapt to changing social mores to ensure that people are not judged for their sexual choices or identities. Further, they are not judgmental of others' choices, even if they would not make these choices for themselves. Engaging religion and sexuality studies in new ways, Identities Under Construction calls for a new grammar of religion that better captures lived realities at a time when religious choice has broadened beyond choosing a single organized religious tradition.

The world is confronted with multiple intersecting crises including exploitation, inequality, political polarization and climate change. World-repairing work is vitally needed. But just at a time when humans most obviously require robust moral imaginaries on which to draw, it is no longer clear what kinds of beliefs, meanings, stories and encounters inspire them to act. We know that nonreligious identities are on the rise in numerous countries throughout the world. But with so much focus on the “non” part of nonreligion, what we don’t know is what nonreligious imaginaries actually look, sound and feel like. What do nonreligious people believe in? What stories inspire them? In what moments do they find meaning? This book seeks to answer these questions through a series of short essays exploring the nonreligious imaginaries that emerge in a range of world-repairing practices, including ethical consumption, community organizing, eating habits, and environmental activism. In so doing, the book provides a crucial contribution to two areas of increasing social and political concern: First, the need to understand not only what nonreligious people are rejecting but also their sources of meaning and action. Second, the urgent need for cultural tools for mobilizing people towards more compassionate and sustainable practices.