Title:
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Unfinished sympathy : embodiment of faith in an American fundamentalist Christian intentional community
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Much previous work on Intentional Communities (ICs) tends to 'fail' to fully 'understand' such social forms due to an over-emphasis on the division between theory and practice. One possible methodological route out of this impasse is to apply the paradigm of embodiment. Embodiment of faith is explored in relation to one such IC, God's Way Community, in southern Missouri (USA). The extent of this embodiment is located within a range of social spheres, including belief, everyday ritual, language, gender, work, and spatial constructs. It is argued that to achieve 'understanding' (in the sense of Weber's 'verstehen') of ICs, and similar types of 'extraordinary' forms of belief, it is necessary to dissolve the theory/practice (and by implication subject/object) divide inherent in much previous work on this subject. This is also made possible through the application not only of embodiment theory, but also through the use of a number of methodologies which could be loosely labelled 'post-structuralist'. This includes, for example, the application of historical analysis and cultural contextualisation. Such methodological approaches also affords an opportunity to challenge the prevailing stereotypes of such forms of beliefs, and so create new levels of 'sympathy' towards them.
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