Bharat Ranganathan
Biographic Data
| ID | 1023778 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Bharat Ranganathan |
| GIVEN NAMES | Bharat |
| FAMILY NAME | Ranganathan |
| SIGNATURE | RANGANATHAN B |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Notre Dame |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-3979-6005 |
| VERIFIED | No |
| TOTAL WORKS | 8 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 1 |
| WORKS AS AUTHOR | 8 |
| WORKS AS EDITOR | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2012 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 1 |
Stealing My Religion
The Limits of the Ethnographic Turn
This article reflects on the ethnographic turn in recent comparative religious ethics (CRE). Comparative religious ethicists should be lauded because they privilege engagement with non-Western intellectual sources. Such engagement is important since it undermines the erroneous view that non-Western sources are either soft or are part of someone else's commitments and therefore irrelevant. Yet some recent comparative work stops at merely describin…
Description, Prescription, and Value in the Study of Religion
The study of religion is commonly divided into two sides. On the one side is the descriptive approach, including social scientific and historical scholars who seek to account for religion as it has been practiced. On the other side is the prescriptive approach, including religious ethicists, philosophers of religion, and theologians who seek to evaluate and prescribe religious practices and beliefs. But is this divide desirable or even tenable? S…
Introduction
Representing a spectrum of intellectual concerns and methodological commitments in religious ethics, the contributors to this focus issue consider and assess the advantages and disadvantages of the shift in recent comparative religious ethics away from a rootedness in moral theory toward a model that privileges the ethnography of moral worlds. In their own way, all of the contributors think through and emphasize the meaning, importance, and place…
Intelligibility and Normativity in the Study of Religion
In his essay "The Devil in Mr. Jones," J. Z. Smith issues a call. If religionists do not, he writes, "persist in the quest for intelligibility, there can be no human sciences, let alone, any place for the study of religion within them." How should Smith's call be construed? In other words, what constitutes the "quest for intelligibility"? And what (if anything) differentiates the religionist's quest for intelligibility from that of other humanist…
Mahmood, Liberalism, and Agency
In her book, Politics of Piety, Saba Mahmood (1) challenges liberal views about agency, and (2) offers her own account of agency. This article argues that Mahmood's characterization of liberal agency is a caricature. Contrary to her view, liberalism isn't merely procedural but rather espouses stringent commitments toward protecting people's basic rights and liberties. This article then argues that her account of agency may entail practices decrie…
Should Inherent Human Dignity Be Considered Intrinsically Heuristic
What are “human rights” supposed to protect? According to most human rights doctrines, including most notably the U niversal D eclaration of H uman R ights ( UDHR ), human rights aim to protect “human dignity.” But what this concept amounts to and what its source is remain unclear. According to G lenn H ughes (2011), human rights theorists ought to consider human dignity as an “intrinsically heuristic concept,” whose content is partially understo…
On Helping One's Neighbor
Few people doubt that severe poverty is a pressing moral issue. But what sorts of obligations, if any, do affluent people have toward the severely poor? If one accepts the idea that one has some obligations to the severely poor there still remains disagreement about the magnitude of this obligation and when it obtains. I consider Peter Singer's influential “shallow pond” argument, which holds that affluent people have greater obligations toward t…
Mahmood, Liberalism, and Agency
In her book, Politics of Piety, Saba Mahmood (1) challenges liberal views about agency, and (2) offers her own account of agency. This article argues that Mahmood's characterization of liberal agency is a caricature. Contrary to her view, liberalism isn't merely procedural but rather espouses stringent commitments toward protecting people's basic rights and liberties. This article then argues that her account of agency may entail practices decrie…
On Helping One's Neighbor
Few people doubt that severe poverty is a pressing moral issue. But what sorts of obligations, if any, do affluent people have toward the severely poor? If one accepts the idea that one has some obligations to the severely poor there still remains disagreement about the magnitude of this obligation and when it obtains. I consider Peter Singer's influential “shallow pond” argument, which holds that affluent people have greater obligations toward t…
Should Inherent Human Dignity Be Considered Intrinsically Heuristic
What are “human rights” supposed to protect? According to most human rights doctrines, including most notably the U niversal D eclaration of H uman R ights ( UDHR ), human rights aim to protect “human dignity.” But what this concept amounts to and what its source is remain unclear. According to G lenn H ughes (2011), human rights theorists ought to consider human dignity as an “intrinsically heuristic concept,” whose content is partially understo…
Mahmood, Liberalism, and Agency
In her book, Politics of Piety, Saba Mahmood (1) challenges liberal views about agency, and (2) offers her own account of agency. This article argues that Mahmood's characterization of liberal agency is a caricature. Contrary to her view, liberalism isn't merely procedural but rather espouses stringent commitments toward protecting people's basic rights and liberties. This article then argues that her account of agency may entail practices decrie…
Introduction
Representing a spectrum of intellectual concerns and methodological commitments in religious ethics, the contributors to this focus issue consider and assess the advantages and disadvantages of the shift in recent comparative religious ethics away from a rootedness in moral theory toward a model that privileges the ethnography of moral worlds. In their own way, all of the contributors think through and emphasize the meaning, importance, and place…
Intelligibility and Normativity in the Study of Religion
In his essay "The Devil in Mr. Jones," J. Z. Smith issues a call. If religionists do not, he writes, "persist in the quest for intelligibility, there can be no human sciences, let alone, any place for the study of religion within them." How should Smith's call be construed? In other words, what constitutes the "quest for intelligibility"? And what (if anything) differentiates the religionist's quest for intelligibility from that of other humanist…
Description, Prescription, and Value in the Study of Religion
The study of religion is commonly divided into two sides. On the one side is the descriptive approach, including social scientific and historical scholars who seek to account for religion as it has been practiced. On the other side is the prescriptive approach, including religious ethicists, philosophers of religion, and theologians who seek to evaluate and prescribe religious practices and beliefs. But is this divide desirable or even tenable? S…
The Limits of the Ethnographic Turn
This article reflects on the ethnographic turn in recent comparative religious ethics (CRE). Comparative religious ethicists should be lauded because they privilege engagement with non-Western intellectual sources. Such engagement is important since it undermines the erroneous view that non-Western sources are either soft or are part of someone else's commitments and therefore irrelevant. Yet some recent comparative work stops at merely describin…
Stealing My Religion
Philosophy (7 works) · Sociology (7 works) · Epistemology (6 works) · Law (5 works) · Law (5 works) · Philosophy (5 works) · Political science (5 works) · Environmental ethics (4 works) · Psychology (4 works) · Religion and Society Interactions (4 works)