England's Secular Scripture: Islamophobia and the Protestant Aesthetic

146 Pages·2011·1.06 MB·English

by  Jo Carruthers

ENGLAND’S SECULAR SCRIPTURE

New Directions in Religion and Literature
Series Editors: Mark Knight, Roehampton University and Emma Mason,
University of Warwick This series aims to showcase new work at the forefront
of religion and literature through short studies written by leading and rising
scholars in the field. Books will pursue a variety of theoretical approaches as
they engage with writing from different religious and literary traditions.
Collectively, the series will offer a timely critical intervention to the
interdisciplinary crossover between religion and literature, speaking to wider
contemporary interests and mapping out new directions for the field in the early
twenty-first century.
Titles in the series include:
Blake. Wordsworth. Religion.
Jonathan Roberts
Do the Gods Wear Capes? Spirituality, Fantasy, and Superheroes
Ben Saunders
The New Atheist Novel: Fiction, Philosophy and Polemic after 9/11
Arthur Bradley and Andrew Tate

ENGLAND’S SECULAR SCRIPTURE
ISLAMOPHOBIA AND
THE PROTESTANT AESTHETIC
JO CARRUTHERS
NEW DIRECTIONS IN RELIGION AND LITERATURE

Continuum International Publishing Group
The Tower Building, 11 York Road, London SE1 7NX
80 Maiden Lane, Suite 704, New York, NY 10038
www.continuumbooks.com
© Jo Carruthers 2011
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted
in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying,
recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without prior
permission in writing from the publishers.
Jo Carruthers has asserted her right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents
Act, 1988, to be identified as Author of this work.
Act, 1988, to be identified as Author of this work.
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN: 978-0-82643937-6
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
A catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress
CONTENTS
Acknowledgements
Series Editors’ Preface
Introduction
Chapter One The English Reformation and the Protestant Aesthetic
Chapter Two Secularizing the Protestant Aesthetic
Chapter Three Contemporary Englishness and the Protestant Aesthetic
Chapter Four The Protestant Aesthetic and Islamophobia
Notes
Bibliography
Index

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Thanks must first go to the Series Editors Mark Knight and Emma Mason who
first thought that a book on Englishness and Protestantism was a good idea, and
without whom it may never have been written. Unremittingly supportive, they
have undoubtedly enriched this book by commenting on its early drafts. I am
indebted to the Research Councils UK, who funded my Research Fellowship. I
am also grateful to David Avital and Colleen Coalter at Continuum for bringing
it to publication.
This book has been brewing for a long time and there are many people to
thank for contributing towards it and for helping me refine my ideas. It is in
conversations with Naomi Baker, alongside whom I first taught early modern
literature at Manchester University, that the kernel of this book first started to
take shape. I owe to her and my fellow postgraduates – especially Deirdre
Boleyn, Rachael Gilmour and Zoë Kinsley – a debt of gratitude for support and
friendship. My thoughts about Englishness were also helped along by the
undergraduates at Lancaster University who took my course on ‘England and
Englishness’. They brought the many texts we studied to life and made me think
more deeply about emotional attachment to nation. I have been extremely
fortunate in my places of work and I thank my current colleagues at the
University of Bristol in both the English and Theology departments, and those
involved in the Place and Space theme, all of whom provide a collegial and
stimulating research context.
My profound thanks go to all those who have generously commented on
drafts: Naomi Baker, Sally Bushell, Ranji Devadason, Nasar Meer, Angela
Piccini, Tom Sperlinger and Ika Willis. Many of my ideas have been formed
over conversations with friends and colleagues, especially: Jeanette Brejning,
Daniel Pablo Garay, Vivienne Jackson, Jon Roberts, Helen Smith, Catherine
Spooner, Andrew Tate. I owe an especial debt of gratitude to those colleagues
who have been unremittingly encouraging and wise: to Gavin D’Costa and
Carolyn Muessig for being amazing, and to Angela, Ika, Ranji and Tom for
friendship and collaborations.
My profound gratitude goes to my family. To my mum and John, thank you
for moving to Skye and providing me with such a congenial working place! To
Sue and Jeff for all your encouragement. To Richard, who has patiently
supported the long hours that have gone into this book, thank you for your love,
belief and practical support. And to Molly, whose support has been markedly
less practical but who made my breaks more frequent and more fun.

SERIES EDITORS’ PREFACE
This series of short monographs seeks to develop the long-established
relationship between the disciplines of religion and literature. We posit that the
two fields have always been intimately related, aesthetically, formally and
theoretically, creating a reciprocal critical awareness framed by the relatively
recent theo-literary thinking of figures such as Walter Benjamin, Martin Buber,
Hans-Georg Gadamer and Geoffrey Hartman. Committed to reflecting on the
question of how these two disciplines continue to interact, we are particularly
concerned to redress the marked evasion of this relationship within existing
scholarship. As Stanley Fish recently declared, religion has the capacity to
‘succeed high theory and race, gender and class as the centre of intellectual
energy in academe’. The books in this series are written by a group of critics
eager to contribute to and read work intimate with both evolving and new
religious and literary debates. Pursuing a variety of theoretical approaches to an
array of literary and cultural texts, each study showcases new work on religion
and literature while also speaking to wider contemporary concerns with politics,
art and philosophy. In doing so, the books collectively map out new directions
for the field in the early twenty-first century.
Mark Knight
Emma Mason