Becoming Eastern Orthodox in diaspora

MaterializingOrthodox RussiaandHoly Rus

Bibliographic Data

ID4372278
AuthorsElena Kravchenko (Department of Religious Studies, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX, USA), Елена Кравченко (The University of Texas at Austin, corresponding author)
Year2018
Volume48
Issue1
Pages37-63
Publication date2018-01-02
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueReligion (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0048-721X • E-ISSN: 1096-1151
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/0048721x.2017.1328619
OpenAlexW2615087979
LanguageEN
Citations received3
References cited28

In this article, I draw on interviews and participant observation data from a two-year-long ethnographic study in a Russian Orthodox parish in the United States. I argue that both the Russian Orthodox immigrants and the Protestant converts to Orthodoxy attending this parish may be usefully thought of as diasporic groups. Seeking to construct their particular Orthodox identity, both groups deal with their own physical and symbolic displacements, and attempt to find their place of belonging. I demonstrate how in the process, through reliance on religious narratives, prayer, and Russian Orthodox icons, parishioners construct two overlapping, yet distinctive places of their origin: Holy Rus’ and Orthodox Russia. Finally, attending to how some Orthodox Christians were able to position themselves in two groups simultaneously, I suggest that we think of religious practitioners as able to inhabit two diasporas at once

Aesthetics · Archaeology · Art · Construct (python library) · Diaspora · Ethnography · Ethnology · Identity (music) · Literature · Narrative · Orthodoxy · Prayer · Protestantism · Sociology · Anthropology · Diaspora, migration, transnational identity · Gender Studies · History · Philosophy · Religion and Society Interactions · Religious studies · Religious Tourism and Spaces

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