网络空间里的权威与流动性宗教:宗教传播的新疆域

Authority and liquid religion in cyberspace:the new territories of religious communication

本文用(作为传统正教的)伊斯兰教、新异教和超现实宗教(民间宗教的例子)作为个案研究,对权威如何让网络空间发生疆域化进行了调研。首先,作者考察了穆斯林青年一代在网络实践中怎样对传统权威观念提出质疑,而后,将伊斯兰教与新异教和超现实宗教进行了比较。超现实宗教是近期在互联网上发展起来的民间宗教。在互联网中,突显个性特色创造的自由漂浮灵性(free-floating spirituality)被视为规范,权威被看作是过时的东西。作者在深入考察此问题之后发现,这个在人们眼中最为民主的精神空间里,各种形式的权威依然存在。那些出类拔萃的文本盗猎者(德塞尔托语)似乎把离线世界的惯习也带进了在线世界。

Using Islam(as a traditional and established religion),and neo-paganism and hyper-real religions(as examples of popular religion) as case studies,this article investigates how authority territorialises cyber-space.It first explores how the traditional notion of authority is questioned in the practice of young Muslims on the Internet,and then compares it to neo-paganism and to hyper-real religion,a recent development of popular religion on the Internet where the individualistic creation of free-floating spirituality is perceived as the norm and where authority is seen as anachronistic.When examining the issue more closely,forms of authority are found in this supposedly most democratic of spiritual spaces.These textual poachers(de Certeau) par excellence seem to carry a habitus from the off-line world to the on-line world.