Political Theology Reimagined

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Political Theology Reimagined

Edited by: and

Language: English

Published/Copyright: 2025

About this book

Political theology has emerged as an enormously energetic, creative way of exploring the complex relationships between religion, politics, and culture around the world. Political Theology Reimagined centers decolonial, Black, queer, feminist, and Marxist modes of critical practice to offer a cutting-edge vision of the field that foregrounds a political theology animated by both a fascination with and a suspicion of the secular. Among other things, contributors explore how religious ideas, practices, and imaginations are inflected by anti-Blackness, patriarchy, and colonial histories; theorize anew the status of secularization narratives; probe the universality and translatability of conceptual abstractions; and experiment with the powers of genealogy and speculation. In short, they grapple with religion and critique in all their complexity, opening new itineraries in political theology by transforming its fundamental theoretical coordinates. Traversing diverse sites, from South Asia to the Middle East to Indigenous North America, and working across diverse scales, from the national to the planetary to the cosmic, this volume models the future of political theology by pairing rigorous critique with a commitment to collective liberation.

Contributors. Prathama Banerjee, Agata Bielik-Robson, Kirill Chepurin, Alex Dubilet, James Edward Ford III, Lucia Hulsether, Basit Kareem Iqbal, Ada S. Jaarsma, Siobhan Kelly, David Kline, Adam Kotsko, Dana Lloyd, Vincent W. Lloyd, Beatrice Marovich, Aseel Najib, Milad Odabaei, Inese Radzins, George Shulman, Martin Shuster, Rafael Vizcaíno

Reviews

“In this bounteous volume, political theology takes stock of its pasts and its futures. It reveals itself as a discourse of concepts but also of names. What’s in a name? What indeed are the names of political theology? What paleonymy, what onomatology, sustains it? What names must it invent still? Old and new, necessary and unexpected, proper and (un)common—an indispensable nomenclature emerges from each of these rich essays.”
-- Gil Anidjar, author of On the Sovereignty of Mothers: The Political as Maternal

"This important volume expands beyond the usual connection between political theology and Christian doctrine, tracking how previously theological concepts continue to morph into various secular guises. The contributors demonstrate that political theology is a powerful resource by which to both recognize and challenge the modalities of politics and social life that are practiced in our own time. The reimagination that the title points to is not so much a way to start political theology all over again but to focus on its subversive and radical potential."
-- James R. Martel, author of Anarchist Prophets: Disappointing Vision and the Power of Collective Sight

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Frontmatter
i

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Contents
v

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Introduction
1
Alex Dubilet and Vincent W. Lloyd

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Part 1 Expanded Horizons in Critical Theory
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1 From Negation to Critique
31
Agata Bielik-Robson

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2 Political Theology’s Antagonisms
47
Alex Dubilet

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3 Exchange Beyond Exchange
64
Martin Shuster

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4 Keeping Life Living
79
Inese Radzins

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5 Passionate Thinking
96
Ada S. Jaarsma

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Part 2 The Colonial, the Planetary, and the Cosmic
113

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6 For a Historical Grammar of Concepts
115
Basit Kareem Iqbal and Milad Odabaei

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7 The Political as Method
128
Aseel Najib

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8 Postsecular Philosophy and Decolonization as a Political-Theological Struggle
142
Rafael Vizcaíno

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9 Political Theology and Religious Criticism
156
B. R. Ambedkar

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10 Cosmic Delegitimation
173
Kirill Chepurin

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Part 3 Race, Blackness, and Modernity
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11 Rethinking Political Theology as Faith, Poesis, and Praxis
193
George Shulman

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12 On Black Study and Political Theology
210
James Edward Ford

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13 The Science of the Word
226
David Kline

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14 Wounded or Healing?
242
Vincent W. Lloyd

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Part 4 Itineraries in Feminism and Gender
259

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15 Finding Air
261
Beatrice Marovich

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16 Sovereign Storytelling
275
Dana Lloyd

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17 Toward an Intersectional Genealogical Method
290
Adam Kotsko

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18 Political Theology’s Gender Trouble
304
Siobhan Kelly

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19 Tabitha’s Trauma
319
Lucia Hulsether

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Bibliography
337

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Contributors
369

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Index
371

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Publishing information

Pages and Images/Illustrations in book

eBook published on:

July 25, 2025

eBook ISBN:

9781478061144

Pages and Images/Illustrations in book

https://doi.org/10.1515/9781478061144

eBook ISBN: 9781478061144

Keywords for this book

secularism; critical theory; religion; Christianity; negation; immanence; messianism; Adorno; Gnosticism; rebellion; insurgency; stasis; Marxism; commodity exchange; Karatani Kojin; Michel Henry; Isabelle Stengers; secularization; biomedicine; prayer; Talal Asad; Islam; Claude Lefort; Enrique Dussel; B. R. Ambedkar; Buddhism; Dalit; India; Copernican Revolution; Hans Blumenberg; Quentin Meillassoux; Sylvia Wynter; Russian Cosmism; Fred Moten; W. E. B. Du Bois; Giorgio Agamben; Hortense Spillers; Aimee Césaire; autopoiesis; Luce Irigaray; feminist theology; Indigenous feminism; Adriana Cavarero; Silvia Federici; Judith Butler; gender theory; subject formation; performativity; heterosexual matrix; sentimentality; civil religion; liberalism; Jamie Raskin; January 6; 2021 attack

Audience(s) for this book

For an expert adult audience, including professional development and academic research

Duke University Press

Political Theology Reimagined

Overview

About this book

Reviews

Topics

Table of contents

Frontmatter

Contents

Introduction

1 From Negation to Critique

2 Political Theology’s Antagonisms

3 Exchange Beyond Exchange

4 Keeping Life Living

5 Passionate Thinking

Part 2 The Colonial, the Planetary, and the Cosmic

6 For a Historical Grammar of Concepts

7 The Political as Method

8 Postsecular Philosophy and Decolonization as a Political-Theological Struggle

9 Political Theology and Religious Criticism

10 Cosmic Delegitimation

11 Rethinking Political Theology as Faith, Poesis, and Praxis

12 On Black Study and Political Theology

13 The Science of the Word

14 Wounded or Healing?

Part 4 Itineraries in Feminism and Gender

15 Finding Air

16 Sovereign Storytelling

17 Toward an Intersectional Genealogical Method

18 Political Theology’s Gender Trouble

19 Tabitha’s Trauma

Bibliography

Contributors

Index

Bibliographic data