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Secret police informer files as sources for the study of vernacular religion under communism
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Accepted version
Date
2021-08-13
Authors
Hesz, Ágnes
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Publisher
Routledge
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Abstract
This chapter focuses on a particular type of archival material, the secret police files produced by Communist totalitarian regimes in Romania and Hungary as possible sources for the study of vernacular religion. As an analytical concept, vernacular religion refers to “religion as it is lived” (Primiano 1995). It understands religiosity as an interactive process, an ongoing intersubjective negotiation and interpretation of religious ideas and practices. Vernacular religion is thus an ongoing creative process during which individual believers and the local religious groups they are part of mould their ways of religiosity – often in the face of, and in interaction with church or state authorities. To capture its complexity, researchers mostly access vernacular religion through ethnographic fieldwork. Relying on the methodological findings of Christina Vatulescu (2010), Catherine Verdery (2014) and Sonja Luehrmann (2015), however, this chapter argues that when applying critical reading, this multivocal and generically versatile material could be used as an ample source for the study of vernacular religion. It shows that not only do these documents inform us about how people under communist dictatorships practiced and experienced religion, but in countries like Hungary, they constitute a rare window on this particular dimension of religion.
Description
This research is part of the project Creative Agency and Religious Minorities: Hidden Galleries in the Secret Police Archives in Central and Eastern Europe. The project has received funding from the European Research 2020 research and innovation programme No. 677355.
Keywords
Secret police , Archives , Eastern Europe , Communism , Religion
Citation
Hesz, A. (2021) 'Secret Police Informer Files as Sources for the Study of Vernacular Religion under Communism’, in Kapaló, J. A. and Povedák, K. (eds)., The Secret Police and the Religious Underground in Communist and Post-Communist Eastern Europe, Routledge. doi: 10.4324/9780429331466
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This is an Accepted Manuscript of a book chapter published by Routledge in The Secret Police and the Religious Underground in Communist and Post-Communist Eastern Europe on 13 August 2021, available online: http://www.routledge.com/9780367279998