Atheism in Southeast Asia: Nonbelievers’ ways of life in plural societies shaped by religion

• Applicant: Dr. Timo Duile
• Subject Area: Asian Studies
• Term: since 2022
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 491339839

In area studies, cultural anthropology, political science, and sociology, Southeast Asia is usually considered a merely religious space. In most research, especially societies in insular Southeast Asia appear as religious. Although religion plays, without doubt, an important role in these societies, this focus on religion tend to neglect the fact that more and more citizens in these countries consider themselves secular or even atheist. Especially during the last years, atheists have begun to organize in social media. Also, the topic of atheism was subject to some media coverage on conventional media in the region. Increasing religiosity in Southeast Asia seems to be accompanied by a growing number of atheist convictions, but the latter have not often been topic of research yet. The project aims to describe and compare atheist ways of life which emerge within the plural and religious societies in Southeast Asia. Indonesia, Malaysia, and the Philippines are examples of plural societies in which distinct ethnic and religious groups live in a single political unit, but their religious-historic contexts differ greatly from each other. The political unit, the state, is, just as the segments within society, shaped by religion to different degrees. Whereas church and state are formally separated in the Philippines and influence rather works through lobbying and politicians, religion and the state are institutionally interconnected in Indonesia and especially in Malaysia. All three societies are predominantly religious and the majority tend to be hostile towards atheist convictions and ways of life. The research investigates how atheists deal with pressure both from society and the state, how they develop coping mechanisms and constitute non-religious social spaces. The aim is to analyse how atheism as a form of life, as a fundamental feeling of being-in-the-world, comes to existence through distinct ways of life. As atheism constitutes a basic relation towards the world, this relation can be realized in many particular ways in regard, for instance, to social class, habitus, education, ethical or political convictions, and so on.In a first step, we aim to analyze discourses and state responds concerning atheism. These discourses, laws, and state reaction are compared between the three countries, with a special focus on the religious-historic contexts and positions of the respective major religions. In the following, we will describe distinct atheist ways of live by applying ethnographic methods. Thus, these ways of life are also subject to a comparative analysis. Finally, we ask whether there are locally/regionally specific patterns of atheist life and specific emic concepts of atheism within the religious plural societies in Southeast Asia.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants