Faith communities: immanence, aesthetics and thinking through figures

Abstract

AbstractIn this paper, I draw on ethnographic fieldwork to develop a conversation between Deleuze and Guattari’s geophilosophy (Deleuze and Guattari in What is philosophy?, Verso Books, London, 1994: pp. 85–113) and concepts within and findings from empirical fieldwork exploring religion, faith and everyday belief systems. This leads to some new ways of thinking about faith and draws parallels between religion as a mode of ‘thinking through figures’ (1994, p. 89), in contrast to faith as a way of ‘being connected rather than being projected’ (1994, p. 92). Through geophilosophy I develop a way to understand the changing contextual meanings people give to faith and/or religion. For example, people of the same faith or religion may often believe in such different ways that they cannot recognize the faith held by the other person as being the same as their own. They speak the same language but do not understand each other. (Deleuze and Guattari in What is Philosophy? Verso Books, London, 1994: p. 110).