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Intellectual History Commons

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Christian Denominations and Sects

College of the Holy Cross

Material religion

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Full-Text Articles in Intellectual History

Interviews In Global Catholicism: Dr. Petra Kuivala, Petra Kuivala Nov 2023

Interviews In Global Catholicism: Dr. Petra Kuivala, Petra Kuivala

Journal of Global Catholicism

Interview with Dr. Petra Kuivala, University of Eastern Finland


Dalit Catholic Home Shrines In A North Indian Village, Mathew Schmalz Sep 2016

Dalit Catholic Home Shrines In A North Indian Village, Mathew Schmalz

Journal of Global Catholicism

This article examines three Catholic home shrines in a Dalit community in North Indian and argues that it is misleading to think that home shrines and other collections of material objects are somehow static conveyors of meaning. “Meaning” can mean many things or nothing at all, depending upon the terms we are using and the scholarly methods we deploy. The crucial aspect of Dalit Catholic home shrines is that they are literally open to interpretation and reinterpretation, to touching and being touched. Their significance—their meaning—depends not on decoding their structure or symbolic logic, but interacting with them as part of …