Fiction-based religion: Conceptualising a new category against history-based religion and fandom

Abstract

During the last decade, scholars of religion have researched Star Wars-based Jediism, the Tolkien-inspired Elven community, and other religious movements inspired by popular fiction. This article raises two related questions about this new kind of religion: what should we call it?, and what differentiates it from conventional religion on the one hand, and from fandom on the other? Referring to Jean Baudrillard, Adam Possamai has suggested referring to new religions based on popular culture as ‘hyper-real religions’. I contend, however, that for Baudrillard, all religions are hyper-real in the sense that they ascribe reality to the socially constructed. I therefore offer fiction-based religion as a more accurate term. Fiction-based religions draw their main inspiration from fictional narratives (e.g. Star Wars and The Lord of the Rings) which do not claim to refer to the actual world, but create a fictional world of their own. As such, they can be contrasted with conventional (or ‘history’-based) religions whose core narratives (e.g. the Gospels) do claim to refer to the actual world and therefore fall under the narrative meta-genre of history, although they do not correspond with the actual world from a historian's perspective. Despite their fictional basis, fiction-based religions are genuine religions because the activity and beliefs of which they consist refer to supernatural entities which are claimed to exist in the actual world. As such, fiction-based religions can be contrasted with fandom which, as a form of play, creates a fictional play world rather than making assertions about the actual world. Fiction-based religion emerges when fictional narratives are used as authoritative texts for actual religious practice.

Keywords::

• fiction-based religion
• hyper-real religion
• Adam Possamai
• defining religion
• fiction
• religious narratives
• fandom

Notes

^1. Speculative fiction is an umbrella term for fantasy, science fiction, horror and other fantastic forms of fiction, including superhero fiction, apocalyptic fiction and alternate history.

^2. In this article, I use the term ‘actual world’ to refer to the real world in contrast to imagined worlds (e.g. textual, fictional, counterfactual and utopian worlds). This usage is inspired by possible worlds theory, cf. Section 3.

^3. Most of Possamai's references to Baudrillard are found in Possamai (2005). Readers are invited to compare my account of hyper-reality and religion in the work of Baudrillard and Possamai with those by Geoffroy (2012) and Cusack (2010a, 125). Especially Geoffroy's emphasis and understanding of Baudrillard differs somewhat from mine.

^4. I propose this typology as a more refined analytical instrument than Possamai's distinction between hyper-real religions that use popular culture as a source of ‘secondary inspiration’ (2009, 89) and hyper-real religions that use popular culture as a ‘first hand source of inspiration’ (2009, 89) so that popular culture is ‘appropriated as the spiritual work in itself’ (2009, 90). This typology is discussed in more detail in Davidsen (2014b).

^5. Possible worlds theory is a form of modal logic which analyses propositions in terms of their truth value in the actual world and in other possible worlds.

^6. The paratext includes all the auxiliary texts around the main text, such as the authorial preface, but also the book cover and notes from the publisher (Genette 1997). The function of the paratext is to make it clear to the reader how to read the main text.

^7. On the difference between myths and legends in relation to folktales (which are fictional), see Bascom (1965).

^8. The fandom-as-religion discourse is not restricted to text-centred fandom such as Star Trek fandom; it has also been argued that celebrity fandom and sports fandom constitute religious phenomena (e.g. Chidester 1996).

^9. Supernatural agents include both personalised agents, such as gods and spirits, and impersonal powers with will and power of action, such as ‘the Universe’ or the cosmic life force. Supernatural worlds include both dualistic concepts of a spiritual world, for example the Christian Heaven and the Celtic Otherworld, and notions of other planes or dimensions, such as the astral plane. Supernatural processes refer to supernatural ‘laws’, such as the karma law, that are believed to govern the workings of the universe, and to magical processes by which the universe can allegedly be influenced. My definition follows Steve Bruce who defines religion as ‘beliefs, actions and institutions which assume the existence of supernatural entities with powers of action, or impersonal powers or processes possessed of moral purpose’ (2011, 112).