Publication Type
Journal Article
Version
acceptedVersion
Publication Date
3-2019
Abstract
This paper explores the recursive relationship between religious praxisand urban environments. It advances the concept of “religious urbanism” to showhow urban environments play an active role in shaping the praxis of religion,and how religious groups adopt secular logics in response to the pressures ofurban environments. Such logics have given rise to new, more pragmatic forms ofspatial reproduction that lead to the desecularisation of space. Desecularisationinvolves religious groups diminishing the secular properties of space, ratherthan attempting to achieve any lasting notion of sacredness. Drawing on therestrictive religio-spatial context of Singapore, I demonstrate howfast-growing religious groups are forced to compete, commercialise, andcompromise in order to acquire space. Combined, these factors have come to definereligious urbanism in Singapore, and highlight the gulf between the planningand praxis of religion in urban environments.
Keywords
Religious urbanism, space, desecularisation, Singapore, Christianity, competition
Discipline
Asian Studies | Religion | Urban Studies and Planning
Research Areas
Humanities
Publication
Social Compass
Volume
66
Issue
1
First Page
24
Last Page
34
ISSN
0037-7686
Identifier
10.1177/0037768618805871
Publisher
SAGE Publications (UK and US)
Citation
WOODS, Orlando.(2019). Religious urbanism in Singapore: Competition, commercialism and compromise in the search for space. Social Compass, 66(1), 24-34.
Available at: https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/soss_research/2703
Copyright Owner and License
Author
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 International License.
Additional URL
https://doi.org/10.1177/0037768618805871