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Lewis (2003) identifies three strategies of legitimation used by New Religions: rationality-tradition-charisma. Using the case of Jediism and the uk Censuses of 2001 and 2011, this article refutes the argument that the invented-ness, or self-conscious creation, of some New Religious Movements prevents their strategic reference to tradition for legitimation. Instead, this article explores a more contemporary understanding of tradition that takes into account how it can work online. Virtual ethnographic methods are used to examine the e-mail campaigns prior to the Censuses, as well as subsequent discussions about Jediism on Twitter and forum boards. This research shows how social media provides new sources of “tradition” that individuals and groups can reference to “prove” that Jediism is a really real religion. More formal, external, mechanisms of legitimation such as the uk and usa tax laws, charitable status and the uk Racial and Religious Hatred Act are explored as providers of “tradition” and authority – even when it is shown that they are negatively commenting on Jediism’s status as a legitimate religion. The “snowball” -like accumulation of legitimacy through interactions between informal and formal mechanisms shows that tradition is still referred to, even by “Invented Religions”.
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Baym Nancy, & Markham Annette, , “Introduction: Making Smart Choices on Shifting Ground’, in Baym Nancy, and Markham Annette (eds.), Internet Inquiry (London: Sage, 2009).
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boyd danah, , Golder Scott, and Lotan Gilad, “Tweet, Tweet, Retweet: Conversational Aspects of Retweeting on Twitter” http://www.danah.org/papers/TweetTweet Retweet.pdf (accessed 12 May 2014).
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Coleman Gabriella, “Our Weirdness Is Free: The Logic Of Anonymous—Online Army, Agent Of Chaos, and Seeker Of Justice” Triple Canopy, January 2012. http://canopycanopycanopy.com/issues/15/contents/our_weirdness_is_free (accessed 12 May 2014).
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Cusack Carole, Invented Religions: Imagination, Fiction and Faith (Farnham: Ashgate, 2010).
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Hardaker Claire, “Trolling in Asynchronous Computer-Mediated Communication: From User Discussions to Theoretical Concepts,” Journal of Politeness Research 6/2 (2010), 215–242.
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Hine Christine, Virtual Ethnography (London: Sage, 2000).
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Hjelm Titus, “Between Satan and Harry Potter: Legitimating Wicca in Finland,” Journal of Contemporary Religion 21/1 (2006), 33–48.
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Java Akshay, , Song Xiaodan, , Finin Tim, & Tseng Belle, “Why We Twitter: Understanding Microblogging Usage and Communities,” http://ebiquity.umbc.edu/_file_directory_/papers/369.pdf (accessed 12 May 2014).
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Kozinets Robert, Netnography (London: Sage, 2010).
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Lewis James R., , “Scientology: Sect, Science, or Scam?” in Hammer Olav, and Jensen Tim (eds.), Religion and Identity Politics (Leiden: Brill | Nijhoff, forthcoming).
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Lewis James R., Legitimating New Religions (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2003).
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Pink Sarah, Doing Sensory Ethnography (London: Sage, 2009).
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Possamai Adam, , “Conclusion: The Future of Hyper-Real Religions,” in Possamai Adam (ed.), The Handbook of Hyper-Real Religions (Leiden: Brill | Nijhoff, 2012).
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Postill John, & Pink Sarah, “Social Media Ethnography: The Digital Researcher in a Messy Web” http://blogs.bournemouth.ac.uk/research/files/2013/04/Postill-Pink-socialmedia-ethnography.pdf (accessed 12 May 2014).
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Singler, , Beth V.L., , “‘Always Two There Are, a Master and an Apprentice’: Online Legal Pluralities and Displays of Legal Mastery Amongst Scientologists and Jedi,” in Sandberg Russell (ed.), Religion and Legal Pluralism (Farnham: Ashgate, forthcoming).
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Sharf Barbara F., , “Beyond Netiquette: The Ethics of Doing Naturalistic Discourse Research on the Internet,” in Jones Steve (ed.), Doing Internet Research: Critical Issues and Methods for Examining the Net (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 1999), 243–256.
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Taira Teemu, “The Category of ‘Invented Religion’: A New Opportunity For Studying Discourses On ‘Religion’,” Culture and Religion 14/4 (2013), 477–493.
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Urban Hugh, The Church of Scientology: a History of a New Religion (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2011).
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Weil Kevin, “Twitter Analytics: Measuring Tweets.” blog.twitter.com/2010/02/measuring-tweets.html (accessed 15 April 2014).
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Zappavigna Michele, The Discourse of Twitter and Social Media (London: Continuum, 2012).
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Teemu Taira, “The Category Of ‘Invented Religion’: A New Opportunity For Studying Discourses On ‘Religion’,” Culture and Religion 14/4 (2013), 3.
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Titus Hjelm, “Between Satan and Harry Potter: Legitimating Wicca in Finland”, Journal of Contemporary Religion 21/1 (2006), 34.
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Carole Cusack, Invented Religions: Imagination, Fiction and Faith (Farnham: Ashgate, 2010).
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Michele Zappavigna, The Discourse of Twitter and Social Media (London; New York: Continuum, 2012), 14.
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Hugh Urban, The Church of Scientology: a History of a New Religion (Princeton, N.J.; Woodstock: Princeton University Press, 2011), 3.
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Search for other papers by Beth Singler in
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Lewis (2003) identifies three strategies of legitimation used by New Religions: rationality-tradition-charisma. Using the case of Jediism and the uk Censuses of 2001 and 2011, this article refutes the argument that the invented-ness, or self-conscious creation, of some New Religious Movements prevents their strategic reference to tradition for legitimation. Instead, this article explores a more contemporary understanding of tradition that takes into account how it can work online. Virtual ethnographic methods are used to examine the e-mail campaigns prior to the Censuses, as well as subsequent discussions about Jediism on Twitter and forum boards. This research shows how social media provides new sources of “tradition” that individuals and groups can reference to “prove” that Jediism is a really real religion. More formal, external, mechanisms of legitimation such as the uk and usa tax laws, charitable status and the uk Racial and Religious Hatred Act are explored as providers of “tradition” and authority – even when it is shown that they are negatively commenting on Jediism’s status as a legitimate religion. The “snowball” -like accumulation of legitimacy through interactions between informal and formal mechanisms shows that tradition is still referred to, even by “Invented Religions”.
| All Time | Past 365 days | Past 30 Days | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Abstract Views | 1744 | 357 | 106 |
| Full Text Views | 361 | 35 | 2 |
| PDF Views & Downloads | 220 | 47 | 6 |