@book {1293,
	title = {Religions of Modernity: Relocating the Sacred to the Self and the Digital},
	year = {2010},
	publisher = {BRILL},
	organization = {BRILL},
	abstract = {Religions of Modernity challenges the social-scientific orthodoxy that, once unleashed, the modern forces of individualism, science and technology inevitably erode the sacred and evoke the profane. The book{\textquoteright}s chapters, some by established scholars, others by junior researchers, document instead in rich empirical detail how modernity relocates the sacred to the deeper layers of the self and the domain of digital technology. Rather than destroying the sacred tout court, then, the cultural logic of modernization spawns its own religious meanings, unacknowledged spiritualities and magical enchantments. The editors argue in the introductory chapter that the classical theoretical accounts of modernity by Max Weber, Emile Durkheim and others already hinted at the future emergence of these religions of modernity},
	keywords = {Emile Durkheim, individualism, Max Weber, modernization, religion, Spirituality},
	url = {http://books.google.com/books/about/Religions_of_Modernity.html?id=l85zsiTI28sC},
	author = {Stef Aupers and Dick Houtman}
}
@book {2830,
	title = {The Sacred in the Modern World: A Cultural Sociological Approach},
	year = {2014},
	publisher = {Oxford University Press},
	organization = {Oxford University Press},
	abstract = {The central aim of this book is to provide a theoretical framework for using the concept of the sacred as a tool for social and cultural analysis. It differentiates between ontological theories of the sacred which locate the sacred in the essence of the cosmos or the human person, and a cultural sociological approach which understands the sacred as culturally constructed. Adopting the latter, a critical re-reading is given of Emile Durkheim{\textquoteright}s understanding of the sacred, and of later theoretical contributions made by Edward Shils, Robert Bellah, and Jeffrey Alexander. Using this framework, the intersection of multiple sacred forms is used to analyse the cultural meanings surrounding the systemic abuse and neglect of children within the Irish industrial school system. The role of public media in circulating sacred meanings is also discussed, and the case of the BBC{\textquoteright}s refusal to air a humanitarian appeal for Gaza in 2009 is explored to demonstrate the tensions between the sacred function of public media and journalistic notions of impartiality. The book concludes by examining whether human society without sacred forms is possible, and argues that the communicative structure of the sacred underlies the very notion of moral, human society. A critical approach to the sacred is required which involves both a recognition of the harm that can be done through the pursuit of sacred commitments, and the development of critical practices that make it possible to understand the significance of the sacred in social life.},
	keywords = {child abuse, cultural sociology, Edward Shils, Emile Durkheim, industrial schools, Jeffrey Alexander, media, Robert Bellah, Sacred},
	url = {https://oxford.universitypressscholarship.com/view/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199557011.001.0001/acprof-9780199557011},
	author = {Lynch, Gordon}
}
