The Secular Sacred: Emotions of Belonging and The Perils of Nation and Religion

PALGRAVE POLITICS OF
IDENTITY AND CITIZENSHIP
The Secular Sacred

Emotions of Belonging and the
Perils of Nation and Religion
Edited by Markus Balkenhol
Ernst van den Hemel · Irene Stengs
Palgrave Politics of Identity
and Citizenship Series
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Markus Balkenhol
Ernst van den Hemel • Irene Stengs
Editors
The Secular Sacred

Emotions of Belonging and the Perils
of Nation and Religion
Editors
Markus Balkenhol Ernst van den Hemel
Meertens Institute Meertens Institute
Amsterdam, The Netherlands Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Irene Stengs
Meertens Institute
Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam
Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Palgrave Politics of Identity and Citizenship Series

ISBN 978-3-030-38049-6 ISBN 978-3-030-38050-2 (eBook)
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Contents
1 Introduction: Emotional Entanglements of Sacrality and

Secularity—Engaging the Paradox 1
Markus Balkenhol, Ernst van den Hemel, and Irene Stengs
Part I Culture 19
2 The Boomerang-Effect of Culturalized Religion: The

Impact of the Populist Radical Right on Confessional
Politics in the Netherlands 21
Ernst van den Hemel
3 ‘We’ and ‘The Others’ as Constituents of Symbolic

Politics: On the Populist Exploitation of Long-lasting
Nationalist Sentiments and Resentments Regarding
Citizenship in Germany 43
Irene Götz
v
vi Contents
Part II Public Space 67
4 Religion, Aesthetics, and Hurt Sentiment: On the

Visibility and Erasure of a Muslim Minority in India 69
Stefan Binder
5 Spatial Piety: Shia Religious Processions and the Politics

of Contestation of Public Space in Northern Nigeria 89
Murtala Ibrahim
6 Samba Struggles: Carnaval Parades, Race and Religious

Nationalism in Brazil107
Martijn Oosterbaan and Adriano Santos Godoy
Part III Tolerance 127
7 Homo Sanctus: Religious Contestations and the

Sanctification of Heritage and Human Rights in Vietnam129
Oscar Salemink
8 Secularist Nativism: National Identity and the Religious

Other in the Netherlands155
Josip Kešić and Jan Willem Duyvendak
9 Dutch Tolerance in Black and White: From Religious

Pragmatism to Racialized Ideology173
Alex van Stipriaan
Contents vii
Part IV Images 193
10 Colonial Heritage and the Sacred: Contesting the Statue

of Jan Pieterszoon Coen in the Netherlands195
Markus Balkenhol
11 Rooted in the Sacred? On Mark Rothko, Tears Flowing,

and Enargeia217
Herman Roodenburg
Part V Bodies 235
12 Disgust and Difference: Conflicting Sensations of the

Sacred237
Jojada Verrips
13 United in Competitive Mourning: Commemorative

Spectacle in Tribute to King Bhumibol Adulyadej of
Thailand263
Irene Stengs
Afterword285
Birgit Meyer
Index291
List of Contributors
Markus Balkenhol Meertens Institute, Amsterdam, The Netherlands

Stefan Binder University of Göttingen, Göttingen, Germany
Jan Willem Duyvendak University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The
Netherlands
Adriano Santos Godoy University of Campinas, Campinas, Brazil
Irene Götz Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, Munich, Germany
Ernst van den Hemel Meertens Institute, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Murtala Ibrahim Freie Universität Berlin, Berlin, Germany
Josip Kešić University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Birgit Meyer Utrecht University, Utrecht, The Netherlands
Martijn Oosterbaan Utrecht University, Utrecht, The Netherlands
Herman Roodenburg Meertens Institute, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Oscar Salemink University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark
ix
x List of Contributors
Irene Stengs Meertens Institute, Amsterdam, The Netherlands

Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Alex van Stipriaan Erasmus University Rotterdam, Rotterdam, The
Netherlands
Jojada Verrips University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
List of Figures
Fig. 3.1 Cover of the German weekly Der Spiegel, No. 2, 1999/1/11:
Wer darf Deutscher werden? Operation Doppelpass (Who is
allowed to become German? Operation dual passport) 53
Fig. 3.2 Campaign of a local conservative party with German-Turks
refusing the Social Democrats’ offer of a dual citizenship,
Rheinland-Pfalz, March 1999; source: Süddeutsche Zeitung,
1999/03/05, p. 5 55
Fig. 3.3 Article Einbürgerungshemmnis Frau. In: die tageszeitung
(taz): 13./14.2.1999, VII, picture by Birgitta Kowsky/
Buenos Dias 56
Fig. 3.4 Campaign of the German government promoting the new
German Nationality Law: Einbürgerung: Fair. Gerecht.
Tolerant (Naturalization: fair, just, tolerant.) (2000),
photograph I.G., placard on a house wall, Berlin 62
Fig. 7.1 Preparing for a spirit medium possession ‘performance’ at
the conference in Nam Đi.nh 2016 140
Fig. 7.2 Spirit procession during Nam Đi.nh conference 2016 142
Fig. 7.3 Spirit medium during procession ritual, Nam Đi.nh 2016 144
Fig. 7.4 Spirit medium in front of the altar with sacrificial effigies,
Nam Đi.nh 2016 145
Fig. 7.5 Petition of spirit mediums to Vietnamese authorities 147
Fig. 10.1 Announcement of the unveiling of the statue of Jan
Pieterszoon Coen, 1893 200
xi
xii List of Figures
Fig. 10.2 Empty pedestal of the Coen statue, 2011. © Vereniging

Oud Hoorn 204
Fig. 11.1 Rothko Chapel, 1970–1971. Massachusetts Institute of
Technology, photograph by G.E. Kidder Smith 218
Fig. 11.2 Aelbert Bouts, The Man of Sorrows (oil on oak,
37.9 × 26.5 cm). Harvard Art Museums/Fogg Museum,
The Kate, Maurice R. and Melvin R. Seiden Special
Purchase Fund in honor of Seymour and Zoya Slive 225
Fig. 11.3 Rembrandt van Rijn, Saint Bartholomew, 1657 (oil on
canvas, 122.7 × 99.7 cm, detail). Putnam Foundation,
Timken Museum of Art 230
Fig. 12.1 Corner Dominicusstr.—Fritz Elsasstr., Berlin, 3 July 2016 238
Fig. 12.2 Dominicusstr., Berlin, 3 July 2016 239
Fig. 12.11 Corner Dominicusstr.—Fritz Elsasstr., Berlin, 14 December
2016248
Fig. 12.12 Corner Dominicusstr.—Fritz Elsasstr., Berlin, 26 November
2017248
Fig. 12.13 Corner Dominicusstr.—Fritz Elsasstr., Berlin, December
2018249
Fig. 13.1 Identification and dress code check point at the entrance
of Sanam Luang, Bangkok July 2017 265
Fig. 13.2 Billboard commemorating King Bhumibol, Bangkok 2018 266
Fig. 13.3 Food counter with mourning stickers, Bangkok July 2017 266
Fig. 13.4 Street art ‘we were born in the reign of King Rama 9’,
Bangkok July 2017 272
Fig. 13.5 Building-to-let-advertisement-cum-mourning board,
Chiang May July 2017 273
Fig. 13.6 Queuing mourners in the Temple of the Emerald Buddha,
Bangkok 7 July 2017 277
Fig. 13.7 Screen shot of a figure 9 rituals compilation 280
1
Introduction: Emotional Entanglements
of Sacrality and Secularity—Engaging
the Paradox
Markus Balkenhol, Ernst van den Hemel,
and Irene Stengs
How, in various places across the world, do religious emotions and

national sentiment become entangled? In exploring this theme, this book
focuses on such diverse topics as the dynamic roles of Carnaval in Brazil,
the public contestation of ritual in Northern Nigeria and the culturaliza-
tion of secular tolerance in the Netherlands. What binds the chapters in
this volume is the focus on the ways in which sacrality and secularity
mutually inform, enforce and spill over into each other. The case studies
offer a bottom-up, practice-oriented approach in which the authors are
M. Balkenhol • E. van den Hemel

Meertens Institute, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
e-mail: markus.balkenhol@meertens.knaw.nl;
Ernst.van.den.hemel2@meertens.knaw.nl
I. Stengs (*)
e-mail: Irene.stengs@meertens.knaw.nl
© The Author(s) 2020 1

M. Balkenhol et al. (eds.), The Secular Sacred, Palgrave Politics of Identity
and Citizenship Series, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-38050-2_1
2 M. Balkenhol et al.
wary to use categories of religion and secular as neutral descriptive terms.

At this moment in time, it has become somewhat of a stale repetition to
criticize the secular-religious divide. We are very much part and parcel of
a world in which these boundaries overlap, are claimed, contested,
reclaimed and re-contested in new and dynamic ways. If the debate on the
postsecular has taught us anything, it is that the tools with which we work
are implicated in these contestations. The notions ‘secular’, ‘sacred’ and
‘religion’ are as much part of our conceptual toolbox as objects of investi-
gation. In order to illustrate how we are always in the middle of things,
and in order to see how we should, if we are to understand the entangle-
ments of sacrality, religion and secularity, think our way up from praxis,
we opt for a start in medias res. We therefore open this introduction in
Bangkok, Thailand, 26 October 2017 to be precise, when the mourning
rituals for the recently deceased king are about to reach their apex.
The Thai King as Secular and Sacred

Again, thousands and thousands of people have come to the sacred heart of
the ‘City of Angels’ (khrungthep) to get as close as possible to the place
where King Bhumibol Adulyadej of Thailand (r. 1946–2016) will be cre-
mated. One day earlier, at 5 AM, the gate had opened briefly to allow sev-
eral thousand people in, most of whom had been waiting for three days and
nights, enduring burning sun and heavy rains, in the hope of being among
the happy few to enter. The early morning television news interviews one
of them, a young woman in tears, overwhelmed by exhaustion and grate-
fulness: she will show her love, respect and gratitude to ‘father’ in the closest
proximity possible for an ordinary person. This Thursday, the day of the
actual cremation, people have been queuing since the early morning at
various replicas of the Royal Crematorium Stadium, to offer sandalwood
funeral flowers in commemoration of the king. It would take people up to
eight hours to reach the spaces in front of the cremation replicas to offer
their flowers. At the Royal Plaza, the square with the most important rep-
lica in terms of size and centrality, the crowd has grown to such a size that
even the streets leading to the actual beginning of the queue are completely
congested. What makes people want to endure such hardships?
1 Introduction: Emotional Entanglements of Sacrality… 3
One possible answer lies in the specific figure and reign of the king
himself. The death of King Bhumibol on 13 October 2016 left many in
the kingdom in grief and confusion. With his seventy years’ reign, only a
few of his subjects had lived without him on the throne. In the general
perception, the king, working hard and suffering difficult circumstances,
had lived a life of self-sacrifice for the wellbeing of the nation and the
people. In tribute, people would be very much willing to endure their
one-day-only hardship.
Another possible answer lies in a specific entanglement of religion and
politics. The emotional mass pilgrimage to the mourning site and the
eventual cremation for one part attests to the sacred status of the Thai
king. This sacredness draws on Hindu-Buddhist notions of the ‘righteous
ruler’ whose charismatic royal merit and virtue (bun barami) are sup-
posed to protect and sustain the nation and its people. In this perception,
the monarch is regarded as a beneficial power above politics. In the course
of his long reign, King Bhumibol gained currency as ‘pillar of stability’ in
a country where politics are characterized by a seemingly endless sequence
of coups d’états, new constitutions and corruption scandals.
The sacrality of the king seems obvious in this context, yet it would be
wrong to suggest that people’s devotion to the king is owed exclusively to the
religiosity of the Thai people, to a kind of inherent magical thinking. It is
not uncommon for Western media outlets to present Thai royal rituals as
somewhat outlandish expressions of extreme religiosity. As orientalist per-
ceptions of Asian religiosity tend to do, such exoticism blinds our under-
standing of specific intricacies of religious–political entanglements. For
instance, when highlighting the religious dimension, one obscures the fact
that the Thai king is not only a religious figure, but also someone of political
presence in a secular state, if only as the single most important national symbol.
Within the legal framework of the Thai state, a nominally democratic
regime of popular sovereignty upholding a religiously pluriform society,
the king—the head of state—has no formal political authority, and his
tasks are limited to specific ceremonial executive duties. The Thai state—
whether governed by an elected government or by a military junta—fol-
lows a secular model. Yet, whatever the regime, the king is brought
forward as the symbol of sovereignty of a democracy. Hence, devotion to
the king implies devotion to the (secular) nation. This raises the issue
how this formally secular nation relates to the equally uncontested sacred-
ness of the king.1 In order to understand the political and religious impli-
cations of a shared mourning ritual such as that for the recently deceased
Thai king, we would need to unpack carefully the ways in which religion,
secularity, power and popular emotion are conjointly invested.
Such questions how secular and sacred authority is enmeshed make up
the central theme of this book. How, in various places across the world,
do religious emotions and national sentiments become entangled? The
Thai example resonates in many ways with other spectacles of religious-
secular belonging. Across the world religion and nationalism are re-
articulated in new modes that often challenge existing paradigms and
approaches. From the Brazilian carnaval, with its roots in religious festivi-
ties, its development into secular celebration, which in turn is embraced
by national politicians as hallmark of Brazilian national identity (see
Oosterbaan and Godoy in this volume), to the ways in which religious
diversity in Nigeria is performed and challenged by spatial practices such
as the Ashura ritual procession, performed by Shia Muslims (see Ibrahim),
from public transgressions and expressions of disgust through graffiti in
the streets of Berlin (see Verrips), to the magical power of colonial statues
in the Dutch national imagination (see Balkenhol), the role of religion
and secularity, sacrality and profanation in demarcating communities
increasingly demands our attention. Over the past decades, we have wit-
nessed a spectacular rise of often polarizing sentiments concerning reli-
gion and national identification across Europe and the globe. In Europe,
feelings of home, emotional appeals to community and even the ‘people’
(Volk) are entwined with and fueled by the increasing presence of religion
in European public spheres, long considered to have been thoroughly
secularized. For instance, new nationalists and the continent’s political
and cultural elites frame the presence of Islam as a threat to the ‘secular’
character of the nation. At the same time, religious, for example, ‘Judeo-
Christian’ roots of secular nations are increasingly mobilized (Hemel 2014).
In short, contrary to the commonly held view that nationalism offers
an alternative imagined community for the religious community
The political relevance of this question is demonstrated by a ruling of the constitutional court in
1
August 2019, that the Thai king is above the constitution.

(Cavanaugh 2011), this book is inspired both by recent developments in

which religion, secularity and nationalism are interconnected in new
ways, as well as by recent scholarly approaches that are sensitive to the
interconnections of nationalism and religion. Generally, scholars have
traditionally identified nationalism as religion, nationalism or religion,
and nationalism and religion (Anderson 1983; Safran 2002). Instead of
focusing on the creation of meta-categories, we argue that religion and
secular nationalism can both partake in processes of sacralization and de-
sacralization. This book focuses, not on the separation of categories, but
on the interconnections and the new forms of sacrality that arise as a
result of new connections (Meyer and de Witte 2013). As the mourning
rituals for the Thai king demonstrate, the emotions involved are con-
nected simultaneously with the secular Thai state, with the king as its
religious figurehead, and with the modes of belonging that are produced
by its interconnections (see Stengs, this volume). Secular nationalism and
religious dimensions are connected in many ways and we need to unpack
the many folds carefully and according to the context in which they arise.
A focus on emotions, we propose, allows us to bring together practices,
both religious and secular, that are often studied in isolation. We propose
to approach the way in which emotions are implicated, performed and
become legible by using a concept we call ‘the secular sacred’.
The Secular Sacred: A Praxeological Approach

The Thai king, ‘Upholder of the Buddhist Religion, and Defender of the
Faith’ and head of a religiously diverse secular state, but also the sanctifi-
cation of tolerance as a ‘Judeo-Christian value’, and the human right of
religious freedom, used as a global value to define and defend religious
practices (see Salemink in this volume) are all examples of what we call a
‘secular sacred’: a person, object, image, representation or place in which
secular and sacred ideas, feelings, emotions, motivations, experiences,
perceptions, intertwine, conflate and conflict. We take the secular sacred
to denote the intertwining processes of secularization and sacralization.
This entanglement works both ways: sacred objects can take on new func-
tions in secular imaginations, gazes and practices, thereby potentially
losing or at least transforming their sacredness in the process. Inversely,

secular practices and values can take on well-nigh sacred dimensions as
they become the subject of worship or interdiction. All of these entangle-
ments are objects of study in what we call the secular sacred.
We deliberately use the articulation of ‘secular’ and ‘sacred’ to distin-
guish the ‘secular’ from the ‘profane’. Whereas the profane, in the words
of Roger Caillois (1959), the sphere of common usage, is opposed to the
sacred (an ambiguous domain of fear and hope and characterized by dan-
ger), the secular is not. Following scholars like Talal Asad, we argue that
the secular contains or even emerges through processes of sacralization.
In Asad’s words, the secular:
(…) is neither continuous with the religious that supposedly preceded it

(that is, it is not the latest phase of a sacred origin) nor a simple break from
it (that is, it is not the opposite, an essence that excludes the sacred).
(2003: 25)
Instead of the opposite of religion, Asad understands the secular to be

an ordering principle that brings together certain ‘behaviors, knowledges,
and sensibilities in modern life’ (ibid: 24). Saba Mahmood goes a step
further by pointing out that the notion of ‘the secular’ is far from a neu-
tral separation of religion and state, but should be seen as an extension of
an ideological view, secularism, in which a normative bias toward
Christianity is palpable:
As much of recent scholarship suggests, contrary to the ideological self-

understanding of secularism (as the doctrinal separation of religion and
state), secularism has historically entailed the regulation and reformation
of religious beliefs, doctrines, and practices to yield a particular normative
conception of religion (that is largely Protestant Christian in its contours).
(2009: 87)
In Mahmood’s understanding, to portray secularism as opposed to

religion is itself an operation of secularist ideology, in which the secular
conceals its quintessentially Protestant foundations. These considerations
are of importance to this book not because we want to repeat a critique
of secularity. We want to take our cue from the insight that such critical
investigations of secularity mean we have to start in medias res. This book
understands these critiques of secularity as an impetus to work bottom
up, all the time taking our own conceptual background and trajectories
into consideration.
Transcending the idea that ‘the secular’ and ‘the sacred’ are separate
categories, we seek to find new and better ways to understand the current
emotionally charged articulations of nationalism and religion that have
come to define the beginning of the twenty-first century in many places
across the globe. We propose to use the notion of the ‘secular sacred’ in
order to analyze this worldwide phenomenon. The key innovation of this
book is that it investigates this conjuncture by bringing together three
focal points: emotions, nationalism and religion. We argue that this com-
bination provides an important update to an understanding of the poli-
tics of binding, belonging and exclusion across the globe. The concept of
the secular sacred allows us to focus on the processes of cultural produc-
tion through which notions of the secular and the sacred emerge in spe-
cific ethnographic settings. Not seeking to define the secular or the
religious, the book focuses on the boundary work through which both
categories are being defined, contested and re-made in social and political
practice.
The ‘secular sacred’, then, in this book is crafted to approach new
modalities of sacrality as well as the impact of secular paradigms on more
classically religious registers of sacrality. The ‘secular sacred’ indicates a
starting point in the middle of this entanglement in order to understand
how public spaces, images and bodies are constituted and contested in
new ways.
Far from being an emphasis on the rational choices individuals might
make, we focus on how the secular sacred unconsciously guides emotions
and delineations of belonging. For instance, echoing Sara Ahmed’s work
on emotions, we might not know how we feel nor why we feel the way
we do. The person standing before a painting by Mark Rothko who feels
the tears well up might not be conscious of the tradition of sacred tears
and art, nor might it be a conscious continuation of a tradition, yet as
Roodenburg outlines in his description of this phenomenon, the words
used to describe these experiences, the way in which Rothko describes his
artworks all directly draw from or resonate with explicit registers of

sacrality.
These shifting, coalescing, overlapping and contradicting qualities
associated with secularism and religion call for a praxeological approach,
paying particular attention to the involvement of the body, the emotions
and the senses or, more specifically, to ‘embodied practices’, ‘sensational
forms’ and sense perception (aisthesis) (Meyer 2006; Scheer 2012; Verrips
2005). Such an approach sheds light not only on how the secular and the
sacred are mediated, but also on how they deeply take root in people
becoming all the more persuasive. The secular sacred emphatically
includes the study of objects, materials and images that would be excluded
in a ‘mentalistic’ (Meyer 2012: 8) framework. The secular sacred is not
inward and personal, but takes place precisely at the intersection of the
public and the private, evoking and mediating emotions, mobilizing old
and creating new publics. Taking the established notions of habitus, the
body, senses, and emotions as a point of departure (Bourdieu 1977;
Connerton 1989), then, may provide us with a more detailed under-
standing of how practices may both reproduce and (temporarily) subvert
structures of power. Thus, our notion of the secular sacred implies a criti-
cal engagement with seemingly self-evident distinctions between religion
and the secular inherent in Western modernity. In other words, the emer-
gence of categories like ‘religion’ and ‘the secular’ have to be understood
in the context of European colonial expansion, and the confrontation
with difference it entailed (Veer 1994).
Sections of this Book

This book is structured around several ‘secular sacreds’ that unfold in
various contexts worldwide. In particular, we present the following nodal
points: culture, tolerance, public space, images and the body. Guiding
principle in these sections is that the chapters take a bottom-up perspec-
tive by presenting ethnographic studies in which the nation, secular and
religious dimensions entangle. Unpacking these entanglements provides
us with an opportunity to revisit familiar approaches and hence formu-
late an updated understanding of our emotionally volatile times.
Culture
Culture has, in recent decades, become a sacrosanct concept in many
places around the world. Whereas in mainstream secularization theory
the spheres of the religious and the secular drift apart, we witness, in
Europe and elsewhere, both academic and politically influential
approaches that emphasize interconnections, fusions and more complex
relations to cultural identity. Take for instance Samuel Huntington’s
famous idea of a clash of civilizations, in which the fault lines of the next
major conflicts were announced to be cultural (Huntington 1993). In his
framework, cultural identity is defined as the most broad, far-reaching,
basic identification humans are capable of. For Huntington, secularity is
part and parcel of a Western, cultural framework in which religion plays
a significant role. Note also how religion and secularity are part of this
cultural clash:
We are facing a need and a movement far transcending the level of issues
and policies and the governments that pursue them. This is no less than a
clash of civilizations—the perhaps irrational but surely historic reaction of
an ancient rival [Islamic civilization] against our Judeo-Christian heritage,
our secular present, and the worldwide expansion of both. (Bernard Lewis,
as quoted in Huntington 1993: 32)
For Huntington, secularity is part and parcel of a Western, cultural

framework in which religious heritage plays a significant role. In this
sense, cultural identity is frequently opposed to and triggered by critical
reflections on globalization. In the twenty-first century, religion and sec-
ularity are taken up in processes of culturalization and polarization in
new and often profoundly disruptive ways. This is further complicated by
the fact that culture is formulated in increasingly nativist terms
(Duyvendak 2011; Balkenhol et al. 2016). As Etienne Balibar argues,
cultural identity can play the role nature once played, raising the question
in what ways culture can function in structurally similar ways to race.
Frequently what is at stake in invocations of culture is what Appadurai
has called a ‘community of sentiment’ (Appadurai 1990: 93): ‘a group
that begins to imagine and feel things together’. This can take the shape
of rather vague or even deliberately empty signifiers that invite people to

attach their feelings of discomfort. The chapters in this section deploy
ethnographic analysis to map how invocations of cultural communities
of sentiments take place.
In his contribution, Ernst van den Hemel looks at the implications of
current populist discourse on ‘religion’, which sets up new conflations of
and juxtapositions between the secular and the religious. His analysis of
a local debate by a Dutch orthodox Protestant political party shows that
populist discursive practice can productively be characterized as a pro-
foundly influential postsecular imagination. Irene Götz presents a case
study on the repetitive debates on ‘dual citizenship’ in Germany, that has
to be contextualized by a historic sketch on the ‘anthropologization’ of
the ‘national’, which developed into a powerful emotional movement
during the nineteenth century and started to attract the masses via cul-
tural images and bodily practices.
Public Space
The public sphere has long been a constitutive element of ‘the secular’.
Presumed to be neutral, and its neutrality safeguarded by a secular state,
the public sphere is, both in common parlance as well as in theory, an
important site where citizens of the secular state can meet on equal foot-
ing regardless of religious outlook. Religion, concomitantly, is relegated
to the private sphere (e.g. the conjugal home) where it can be practiced
without interference. Such a clear distinction has become, as we have
argued above, untenable considering the continued presence and newly
emerging forms of public religion (Vries and Sullivan 2006), the increas-
ingly apparent entanglements of the public sphere with religion in gen-
eral and Protestantism in particular (Asad 2003; Mahmood 2009), as
well as nascent questions concerning location of religion in connection to
new media and globalizing currents (Knott 2005; Meyer and Moors
2006). These developments have led scholars to be wary of clear-cut dis-
tinctions between private and public spheres, and the presence or absence
of religion. The spatial turn, marking a move away from place as neutral
metric and toward space as constitutive, dynamic and complex, has
inspired scholars of religion to ask not just what takes place in public
places but also how space constitutes publics and vice versa how public
performances constitutes public space. In a 2013 volume, for instance,
Knott et al. highlight how media portrayals of religion and new media
activities re-shape the role of religious and secular beliefs and values in
public life. Moving beyond these critical reflections, we focus on material
and spatial contestations in particular, taking place in public space. This
focus on public space allows us to unpack the way in which divisions
between public and private registers are far from stable but hinge upon
perpetual performances and forms of public circulation. Moreover,
notions of who belongs to the public sphere and the complex role of reli-
gious items, rituals and people therein, are themselves to an important
degree, constituted by performances taking place in public space. From
Hindu-nationalist public proclamations that public space should be
dominated by a homogeneous shared culture, to the performance of pub-
lic mourning as we have seen in Thailand, public space is the site of
clashes and contestations in which emotions related to nationalism, reli-
gion and secularity run high. Ethnographic description and analysis of
contestations in public space are ways of entry into understanding the
complex forces that make up who will be seen, heard, felt and smelled and
will take up a certain place in a community.
Stefan Binder, in his contribution, highlights how organized atheism
presents a particular challenge to the way in which religious nationalism
increasingly aligns itself with Hinduism in India. Murtala Ibrahim pres-
ents an analysis of a variety of ‘pious spectacles’ in Northern Nigeria in
which particularly the rituals of Shia Muslims highlight questions of vis-
ibility, contestations and presence of religious pluriformity. In their chap-
ter, Martijn Oosterbaan and Adriano Godoy present an analysis of
Brazilian carnaval, where the festive body is framed by overlapping layers
of religion, popular culture and national identity.
Tolerance
Originally a concept that arose in Western Europe to manage conflicts
between Protestants, tolerance developed for many into a hallmark of
Western modernity. Continuously, the notion served to regulate differ-
ences, but also to demarcate communities along moral lines. Tolerance
has proven a tricky and at times paradoxical notion, however. Karl Popper
has described the ‘paradox of tolerance’ as follows: ‘Unlimited tolerance
must lead to the disappearance of tolerance. … We should therefore
claim, in the name of tolerance, the right not to tolerate the intolerant’
(Popper 1945: 226). But how are the borders between tolerance and
intolerance defined and policed?
In recent decades, the nature and boundaries of tolerance have become
a hotbed of debate, division and conflict. According to Wendy Brown,
there has been something of a global renaissance in discourse on toler-
ance. Tolerance is now enumerated and promoted at the United Nations,
in the context of human rights campaigns, as a tool of managing diverse
societies, as a key to pacifying racially divided neighborhoods, or in the
context of LGBTQ+ rights. Tolerance has become transpolitical as it is
being mobilized by progressives, liberals, conservatives, fundamentalist
Christians and atheists alike:
tolerance knows no political party: it is what liberals and leftists reproach a

religious, xenophobic, and homophobic right for lacking, but also what
evangelical Christians claim that secular liberals refuse them and what con-
servative foreign policy ideologues claim America cherishes and ‘radical
Islamicists’ abhor. (Brown 2009: 3)
What originated as a theological and philosophical debate about free-

dom and the state has in recent years turned into a sacrosanct essence
through which various actors define themselves.
The three articles in this section each take up this changing character
of the notion of tolerance. Oscar Salemink describes how tolerance is
central to human rights discourse, and the implications of the global use
of tolerance. In particular, he explores how religious toleration in Vietnam
is used by a variety of actors to claim (inter)national recognition. The case
of spirit possessions in Vietnam provides a particularly poignant example
of the disciplinary implications of global tolerance. Josip Kešić and Jan
Willem Duyvendak argue that tolerance is mobilized from a quasi-
historical perspective in which it incorrectly appears as a continuous his-
tory since the time of Spinoza. This selective history of the concept
implies the ‘forgetting’ of many other periods in which the Dutch were
conservative and intolerant. Alex van Stipriaan asks how this famed
Dutch tolerance functions within a history of extreme asymmetrical rela-
tions between white and black in Dutch history from slavery up till today.
Is tolerance a white privilege? If so, is there also black tolerance? And
what does tolerance mean in the (coming?) age of reparations and
reconciliation?
Images
Images are often found at the heart of controversies around where to
draw the line between the secular and the religious: at what point does an
image lose or gain its sacredness, where does freedom of expression end,
and blasphemy begin (Kruse et al. 2018)? Cartoons of the Prophet
Mohammed or the protests by Pussy Riot and Femen have become scan-
dalous precisely because they test and redefine the limits of tolerance, free
speech and transgression. In short, the boundaries of the secular and the
sacred are not given, but emerge through an engagement with images.
People not only embrace or reject certain images, but they show strong
bodily and affective responses. Cases of blasphemy, for instance, can
cause literal disgust or nausea, but images, both religious and profane,
can also be held dear and caressed. All of these processes deeply involve
the body, the senses and emotions. In the words of Hans Belting the sig-
nificance of images ‘becomes accessible only when we take into account
other, non-iconic determinants such as, in a most general sense, medium
and body’ (Belting 2005: 302). The body may be both performing and
perceiving, but Belting regards bodies as central to an understanding of
the significance of images. This resonates with the idea of religion as an
outward form that exerts influence beyond religious contexts as such, but
intersects with politics and society at large.
The contributions in this section engage with black Atlantic and Dutch
settings. Markus Balkenhol looks at the international controversies about
colonial statues through the lens of the Dutch case of Jan Pieterszoon
Coen, widely seen as a maritime hero of the Dutch Golden Age, but also
infamous for his brutal reign in the Dutch East Indian colonies. Balkenhol
looks at how the magical power of statues is harnessed, disavowed and
contested. At stake here is the modern subject whose supposed secularism

is constantly undermined by magic. Herman Roodenburg analyzes the
way in which the abstract art of Mark Rothko is the subject of processes
of secular sacralization. Analyzing the tears viewers shed in front of his
monochrome artworks, Roodenburg outlines the way in which registers
of the sacred and profound bodily reactions to sacred images such as tears
cross over into the domain of modern art.
Bodies
In societies where issues of secular and sacred values are at stake, the body
invariably becomes the object of fierce debate. Debates on the status of
the body are a hallmark of secularizing society where secular autonomy
has frequently clashed with more explicitly confessional oriented concep-
tualizations of the body. However, more important than re-hashing the
struggle between liberal autonomy and confessional dependence, this
book aims to highlight what binds approaches to the body. The sover-
eignty of the body as the ultimate locus of self-understanding, indisput-
able site of existential experience and embodied knowledge has attained a
sacred value in many societies (Csordas 1994). This leads to all sorts of
new clashes. For instance, the universal rights of personal freedom and
integrity of the body often clash with the sovereign secular power of the
nation-state, which aims to discipline human bodies by exercising rules
and regulations, politics that often include violence. The body is thus also
a visual marker of autochthony and belonging (Geschiere 2009). The
immanent transcendental potential in bodies is often most palpable dur-
ing emotional events that celebrate the nation-state or other communi-
ties, such as commemorative ceremonies, sport celebrations, election
victories, entailing processes of sacralization in which bodies play a piv-
otal role (see Emile Durkheim’s (1915) and Victor Turner’s (2018) respec-
tive notions of effervescence and communitas). In our view, this shows
that such communities are not simply ‘imagined’ (Anderson 1983), but
that they take shape through emotional and visceral engagements
(Meyer 2009).
The essays in this section reflect these tensions: through his discussion
of disgust as a deeply physical sentiment that is in close proximity to the
sacred, Jojada Verrips analyzes how linguistic violence is part and parcel
of both the religious as well as the secular sacred. Verrips focuses on vul-
gar graffiti on glass containers in Berlin, where a scatological debate on
immigrants is waged. Verrips takes up this mundane occurrence in order
to analyze how disgust informs both contemporary polarization as well as
the reactions to contemporary political linguistic violence. Irene Stengs
presents an ethnographic analysis of the vast movements and choreo-
graphic ritual arrangements of Thai mourning King Bhumibol in black-
and-white colored bodies. She demonstrates how the massive emotional
ritual outpour for one part was grounded in a fierce and coercive royalist-
nationalism, and for another part has been organized by and dissemi-
nated along the administrative state structure. The Thai secular
administration, in other words, is pivotal in (re)producing the sacrality of
the monarchy.
The essays thus contribute to both a practical understanding of these
individual contexts, as well as to an overarching conceptual debate.
Taking our cue from Birgit Meyer, these contributions focus on ‘the net-
work of relations that make the sacred a social reality (…) what bodies
and things do, on the practices that put them to work, on the epistemo-
logical and aesthetic paradigms that organize the bodily experience of
things (…)’ (Meyer et al. 2010: 209). Paying attention to concrete
embodied practices, as well as the lives of images and the performance in
public space, enables us to understand in better detail how specific rela-
tions of power inform and transform people’s lives.
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licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or
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copyright holder.
Part I
Culture
2
The Boomerang-Effect of Culturalized
Religion: The Impact of the Populist
Radical Right on Confessional Politics
in the Netherlands
Ernst van den Hemel
etting the Scene: ‘Is Islam a Threat

S
to the Netherlands?’
The debate created quite a stir from the moment it was announced in
spring 2017. The poster depicting a bomb about to explode, in combi-
nation with the main topic of the debate—‘is Islam a threat to the
Netherlands?’—was associated with islamophobia as usually practiced
by the populist radical right (provocative cartoons of the prophet
Mohamed wearing a bomb as a turban or the well-known image of the
suicide bomber). However, in this case it was not the populist radical
right, but a confessional political party, the Reformed Party (the
Staatkundig Gereformeerde Partij [SGP]) who organized the debate. Was
the Reformed Party now copying far-right populist discourse? The reac-
tions suggest the organizers were at the least uncomfortable with the
E. van den Hemel (*)

e-mail: Ernst.van.den.hemel2@meertens.knaw.nl

22 E. van den Hemel
public associations the poster created. Faced with nation-wide backlash,

the organizers withdrew and re-designed the poster, replacing the bomb
with a mosque. But questions remained: was it simply naïveté on the
part of the organizers? Was it indicative of a shift to the right? Or, rather,
is this apparent flirt by confessional political actors with populist imag-
ery part of a more complex shift in the Dutch political landscape? By
zooming in on this debate, I investigate the question of how religious
players situate themselves in a political landscape that increasingly draws
on ‘religion’ as a marker of identity.1
In this debate, a number of important issues come to the fore. As I will
show, the discourse of the participants in this debate illustrates how sig-
nificant yet unclear the impact of the populist radical right2 is in the
Dutch political landscape. In particular, it shows that orthodox confes-
sional politics, long an outsider in the Dutch political landscape, is in the
process of resituating itself. As I will show, the rise of the populist radical
right on the one hand offers a register that allows confessional politics to
resituate itself in postsecular Dutch society, but this also brings along
unforeseen consequences. In times in which religion is used to indicate a
contrast between ‘Islam’ and ‘the Judeo-Christian West’, the question
arises who belongs to Dutch Judeo-Christian culture? What is the place
of orthodox Christianity in the clash of civilizations?
In order to answer these questions, I propose to close-read the way in
which participants of this debate fuse orthodox Protestant registers with
discourse hailing from the populist radical right and how this constitutes
a continuation or rupture with the register of Protestant orthodoxy. I will
first set the scene by situating the Reformed Party in the Dutch political
landscape. I will subsequently discuss how the rise of the populist radical
right has impacted the status of religion in Dutch political discourse. I
will then return to the debate and the discourse of its participants to show
how the political relevance of religion has been given a new yet
confusingly diverse lease on life in the twenty-first century. I conclude by
reflecting on implications for the future of the Dutch political landscape.
1
I base myself here and in what follows on fieldwork at the event, conducted together with my
colleague Pooyan Tamimi Arab. The responsibility for text, translation, and interpretation is mine.
2
In this article, I use Cas Mudde’s definition of right-wing political parties as characterized by ‘a
core ideology that is a combination of nativism, authoritarianism, and populism’ (Mudde
2007: 26).
2 The Boomerang-Effect of Culturalized Religion: The Impact… 23
onfessional Politics: The SGP on the Outside

C
and Inside
The Reformed Political Party was founded in 1918 as a result of discon-
tent among orthodox Protestants in the Netherlands with two other
Protestant political parties.3 The founders of the SGP accused the more
mainstream confessional parties of having become too weak in translat-
ing religious conviction in political principles. In a time when suffrag-
ettes, electoral innovation and rising communism was seen as threatening
the true Christian way of life, the SGP argued, a truly Christian political
party needs to take a firm stand for true principles of faith. The resulting
party, the SGP, developed into a firebrand theocratic party with unapolo-
getic activism in favour of theocracy. Up until today, the party includes a
paraphrase from the 1561 Belgic Confession (Nederlandse Geloofsbelijdenis)
in its declaration of principles: ‘the government should ban atheist propa-
ganda, false religions and anti-Christian ideologies from public life’.4 The
exact portent of this phrase, known as ‘the 21 words’, is complex and
changes over time. For instance, it was initially mainly oriented towards
the persecution of Catholics, and was later used to counter atheism, and,
presently, as we will see, Islam, but by and large it indicates that the role
of the government is not to be a neutral arbiter of a religiously pluriform
nation, but rather to be the protector of Christianity (Zwaag 2018). In
short, the SGP was a firmly anti-secular party in origin.
As the Netherlands transformed from one of the most religious coun-
tries in Europe to one of the most secularized ones, the party vehemently
opposed the legalization of abortion, euthanasia, and gay marriage. In
particular, the SGP has had a long track record of protesting equality
between men and women. Already in the first party programme of 1918,
they had explicitly rejected voting rights for women, and when the right
to vote was passed in 1922, in spite of fiery parliamentary objections by
3
I base myself here on the historical overview of the SGP published to commemorate its centenary
(Vollaard and Voerman 2018).
4
For the most recent statement of principles of the SGP and all past editions, see the repository
created by the University of Groningen: http://pubnpp.eldoc.ub.rug.nl/?Search=&SortBy=date_
issued&SearchIns[]=&Title=SGP%20beginselprogramma%27s&pQuery=Metadata_Party_pro-
gram.party%20like%20%27SGP%25%27
24 E. van den Hemel
SGP parliamentarians, the party called upon its female constituents not
to use their right to vote. This standpoint remained in effect until 1989.
In 1993, the party explicitly affirmed that women were not allowed to
become members of the SGP. After a long juridical trajectory, the party
was forced in 2010 to allow women to be electable for the SGP.5
Although these positions place the party on the margins of the Dutch
political landscape, the electoral appeal of the SGP has remained stable
though limited. Its electoral appeal has been almost exclusively based on
the religious communities it draws its inspiration from (orthodox
reformed Dutch Protestantism). It remains stable because the SGP has a
loyal electorate and, all reports of secularization notwithstanding, the
religious population it draws its voters from remains stable due to rela-
tively high procreation rates and diminished impact of dwindling church
numbers.
In order to further understand the position of the SGP, we need to
highlight not just how the SGP is situated in the Dutch political land-
scape but also in the geographical landscape. The main constituencies of
the SGP are located in the so-called Bible Belt.6 Running from the north
of the Netherlands down to the South West, the Bible Belt encircles the
most densely populated urban areas known as the Randstad. The Bible
Belt is a region where church attendance, in particular that of the
Orthodox Protestant Churches, remains high, and where the influence of
religion on public and political life is strong. As a result, the SGP can
count on solid electoral representation. This leads to the fact that although
the party has a limited presence in parliament in terms of parliamentary
seats, regionally they are a major player as they are included in many
executive boards of municipalities and they provide numerous aldermen
and mayors in the Bible Belt. In the Bible Belt, secularization plays out
differently than in the cities, and hardliner confessional politics plays a
bigger role in that region compared to the major cities. The Bible Belt
thus also is a place that challenges all too easy understandings of the
5
Henk Post ‘Een gespannen relatie. De SGP en de vrouw’, 2019.
6
Fred van Lieburg has provided an important impetus in modernizing the study of the Bible Belt
in the Netherlands (Lieburg 2010). Furthermore, see Hemel (2014) for an overview of how the
Bible Belt does not sit comfortably in larger histories of Dutch society as the vanguard of
secularization.
Netherlands as one of the most secularized countries on earth. The image

of Dutch secularity (both abroad and among the Dutch themselves) is
often predicated upon a foregrounding of the urban regions of the
Netherlands.
This short expose serves as a backdrop that allows us to understand the
shifts in understanding that occur when the political landscape changes.
It allows us to understand how the rise of the populist radical right pro-
vokes a reconsideration of the way in which the SGP is framed. The SGP,
which has historically been a self-conscious radical voice of orthodoxy
from the margin which prides itself for countering the secular spirit of the
times with theocratic hardlinership, is now confronted with a changed
religious-political landscape in which religion is present in new ways.
This challenges parties like the SGP to reformulate their own positions.
In particular, I want to highlight how the tendency of the populist radical
right to speak in terms of a dominant religious national culture (which
needs to be protected from Islam and multiculturalists) resonates as well
as clashes with the way in which SGP constituents conceive of the public
role of religion. In order to explain this, I need to first outline how the
rise of the populist radical right stimulated not just ardent islamophobia,
but also a reappraisal of (Judeo-)Christianity.
he Rise of the Populist Radical Right

T
and Religion: Dutch Culture Is Christian!
As is becoming increasingly clear, the rise of the populist radical right
changed the political agenda not only by including immigration and a
criticism of Islam, but also by its willingness to revisit and reframe the
role of religion and secularity in Western societies. In particular, the ten-
dency to reposition Christianity as Leitkultur of Western nation states has
led the populist radical right to a willingness to favour Christianity,
defined in religious-cultural terms, over other religions, most notably, of
course, Islam.7
Hemel (2017a).
7
26 E. van den Hemel
The perhaps most well-known example of this mode of thinking can

be found in Samuel Huntington’s ‘A Clash of Civilizations?’ In this semi-
nal text, the incommensurability of civilizations is proclaimed. These
civilizations, that are unavoidably headed for conflict according to
Huntington, are to an important degree characterized by religion. Take
for instance the following quotation, in which Huntington cites Bernard
Lewis and which was the inspiration for the title of this famous article.
Huntington describes how in the near future we will see a clash between
‘Islam’ and ‘The West’, which he further specifies as follows:
This is no less than a clash of civilizations—the perhaps irrational but

surely historic reaction of an ancient rival against our Judeo-Christian heri-
tage, our secular present, and the world-wide expansion of both.
(Huntington 1993: 32)
Culture, in Huntington’s mindset, is defined as the deepest identifica-

tion that a human being is capable of. Note how in this quotation, ‘our
secular present’ and ‘our Judeo-Christian heritage’ are conflated into ‘the
world-wide expansion’ of Western culture. For Huntington, as for many
others of the populist radical right, Judeo-Christian heritage and secular-
ity together make up contemporary Western culture.
In different contexts across Western Europe and North America, we
see similar discourses take hold.8 Take, for instance, this citation from
perhaps the first Dutch populist politician in the twenty-first century,
Pim Fortuyn:9
Problems concentrate around all those fellow-citizens that originate from

areas that are culturally very different from us. In general, we can say that
Islamic cultures are very different from areas that are culturally speaking
Judeo-Christian (…). Problems concerning integration and mutual accep-
tance are centred on the relation between the dominant Judeo-Christian
humanistic culture on the one hand and Islamic culture on the other. I
consciously speak in the broad terminology of culture rather than of
8
Duyvendak (2011), Duyvendak et al. (2016).
9
Pim Fortuyn (1948–2002) was a politician and founder of what has been called the first populist
radical right party of the Netherlands in the twenty-first century.
r eligion. One can leave a religion, as we can see happening massively in our
country, a culture however, one cannot leave behind. (Fortuyn 2002: 83)
In this citation, drawn from Fortuyn’s 2002 book De verweesde samen-

leving: een religieus-sociologisch traktaat (‘The Orphaned Society: A
Religious-Sociological Treatise’), religion functions in two ways. In the
first, religion is associated with cultural identity and in the second, it is
associated with a confession an individual can hold (or leave behind).
These two can clash, or contradict each other. As Fortuyn outlines, it is
one of the characteristics of Dutch Judeo-Christian-humanistic culture
that people leave religion behind, thus connecting an aspect of seculariza-
tion (dwindling church numbers) to Judeo-Christian culture. This asso-
ciation of secularization with a religious-cultural framework occurs more
frequently in Dutch exponents of the populist radical right. Thierry
Baudet, for instance, contemporary politician and self-expressed heir of
Fortuyn, is known for his embrace of Christianity-as-culture. In a recent
Tweet, he expresses a similar conflation of leaving religion and Christianity:
‘In fact, being atheist means being a Christian. Atheism is a subset of
Christianity’.10
Although discursive manoeuvres like this have been ridiculed as con-
tradictory, it is becoming more and more apparent that it resonates with
religious and non-religious members of the Dutch electorate. In earlier
publications, I have described how this discourse is increasingly effective
in setting up alliances of odd bedfellows (Hemel 2017a, 2017b; Balkenhol
and Hemel 2019). Secular (including explicitly atheist) and confessional
actors can find themselves united around a cause, be it a protest against
the construction of a mosque, alleged attacks on Easter by Muslims and
‘self-hating liberal elites’, or controversies concerning Christmas trees or
the saying of ‘Merry Christmas’, in the name of fidelity to a shared, yet
vaguely defined, notion of Judeo-Christian heritage.
What is more, whereas at the beginning of the twenty-first century this
discourse was largely limited to the populist radical right, it is now not
uncommon to see more mainstream liberal and Christian democratic
10
Thierry Baudet (@thierrybaudet): ‘Atheïsme is in feite een vorm van christen zijn; een subcatego-
rie van het Christendom.’ 10 September 2016, 12: 16. https://twitter.com/thierrybaudet/
status/774688057320738816
28 E. van den Hemel
parties echo similar sentiments. At the moment of writing, the three larg-
est parties in parliament have referenced as their goal to protect the
Judeo-Christian culture of the Netherlands. Thus, it can happen that a
liberal prime minister of the Netherlands takes it upon himself to protect
Easter Eggs against alleged attacks by self-hating elites and Muslims11 and
that the leader of the Christian Democrats proclaimed the following
rather free-wheeling interpretation of history when he was pressured to
provide examples of the superior Christian values: ‘well, you know, things
we’ve had here for thousands of years, like equality between men
and women’.
These examples show that the status of secularity is shifting in the
Netherlands. The rise of the populist radical right heralded the advent of
a discourse in which it is increasingly normalized to state that not all
cultures are equal, that it befits a government to discriminate between
native Judeo-Christian culture and the culture of newcomers, and that
Islam should be curtailed in order to protect the secular, and therefore
Judeo-Christian, culture of the Netherlands. The results of this are far-
reaching. Not only does the rise of such discourse create crucial questions
about the status of constitutional protection of the rights of Muslims in
the Netherlands, but it is also far from clear what the fusion of secular
and religious registers means for Christians themselves. When the popu-
list radical right speaks of Judeo-Christianity to describe the accomplish-
ments of secularity, where do Christians fit in? In particular, how do
Christians whose orthodoxy puts them at odds with secular accomplish-
ments fit in?
Having formulated an understanding of the religious-secular discourse
of the populist radical right, I will illustrate how this discourse resonates
with SGP constituents. Its insistence on the importance of religion in
national matters, its willingness to see the government as not only allowed
to, but also obliged to discriminate between religions, and its vehement
criticism of Islam resonate with the fighting spirit that has characterized
In 2017, a Dutch warehouse chain was accused of having changed the name of its assortment of
11
Easter Eggs, which now appear in the spring catalogue as ‘hiding eggs’. This was first taken up by
populist radical right politicians as an example of a ‘fatwa against Easter’ and it led prime minister
Mark Rutte to declare on national radio that he sees it as his task as leader of the Netherlands, to
make sure that ‘Easter remains Easter’. See Hemel (2017b) for further analysis.
the SGP since its inception. Yet, on the other hand, the conflation of
secular and religious registers also creates tensions for the constituents of
the SGP which, historically, has not had much truck with secular accom-
plishments and the embrace of gay rights and feminisms as hallmarks of
Western culture. As I will show, the populist radical right discourse is
present explicitly and implicitly in the discourse of the participants of the
debate, creating a particular set of tensions. To illustrate this, let us now
return to the debate.
The ‘Islam Debate’

The Islam debate took place in Oldebroek, which is a municipality of
23,500 inhabitants in the province of Gelderland. This location is of par-
ticular interest, as it is one of the better-known communities in the Bible
Belt. I described above how the Bible Belt is itself an anomaly in the
mainstream narrative in which secular Dutch society has shed its reli-
gious past. As I will show later on, the location of this debate is of impor-
tance in more ways than one.
The venue was Molen de Hoop, an old repurposed windmill which now
functions as a monument and a venue to be rented for events. We counted
80 people in attendance, of which 8 were female, and all were white. The
room in which the debate was held contained rows of opposing benches
and chairs. This set up was intentional, the moderator highlighted. The
set-up of the room aimed to mirror that of Lagerhuis, a Dutch
TV-programme in which proponents and opponents of a statement
debated whilst sitting on opposing sides of the room. This programme, in
turn, was named after the House of Commons in the United Kingdom,
where the two parties are seated opposite each other. However, as the
audience that was assembled in the old windmill was not divided accord-
ing to political leanings, the moderator of the debate in Oldebroek asked
the audience to ‘help out’ by taking up positions in favour or in opposi-
tion of the prepared statements. As the statements were read out, this
format was quickly abandoned and what took place resembled more of a
session in which SGP politicians and constituents reflected on a number
30 E. van den Hemel
of talking points that were direct citations from well-known populist

radical right politicians and movements.
The debate covered prepared statements such as ‘should Islam have the
same rights as Christianity in the Netherlands?’, and ‘Does moderate
Islam exist?’ and ‘We should no longer allow even a single Muslim to
enter the Netherlands’. What binds the statements is a concern with
Islam and the need to take measures to curtail its influence and presence.
What is more, all of these statements are either direct citations from or
paraphrases of a discourse championed by the populist radical right. For
instance, populist radical right politician Geert Wilders has included in
its programmes and publications sentences such as ‘there is no such thing
as moderate Islam’ and ‘moderate Islam does not exist’.12 In general, the
selection of statements communicated a clear goal for the evening: what
should the SGP’s reaction be to arguments put forward by the populist
radical right?
As the debate unfolded, there was little disagreement about the state-
ments themselves, nor was there a debate about the viability or desirabil-
ity of constitutional changes necessary to effectuate the implementation
of most of these statements. On the contrary, a majority of participants
seemed to be in agreement with these statements. Most of the energy of
the debate was directed towards providing argumentations why these
statements should be supported. Let me provide some illustrations.
When debating whether ‘Muslims should have the same rights as
Christians’, most participants chimed in with arguments in favour of dis-
criminating in favour of Christians. A participant mentioned that terror-
ism is a suitable reason for ‘keeping a closer eye on radical Islam’. Yet, a
number of participants felt the need to push the point a bit further. Take
for instance this contribution, provided by a man who introduced him-
self as a lifelong SGP supporter:
We all agree that terrorism constitutes a danger for the Netherlands. But
we should also say that Islam as a system is incompatible with our Western
way of life, including the Christian way of life which has historically
imprinted the West, and is present in the roots of Dutch society. We should
De Volkskrant, 8 August 2007. Genoeg is Genoeg: Verbied de Koran.

12
therefore not be ashamed to publicly say that we should arm ourselves

against this culture that is now entering the Netherlands. This means that
we should dare to publicly support our culture, however you would want
to define our culture, but it sure is not Islamic. We should be able to stop
the construction of minarets like in Switzerland, because they are a threat
to our culture. And because it just doesn’t fit in. We should be allowed to
discriminate between cultures and we should not be forced to participate
in the ideology of equality (gelijkheidsdenken) that Islam should have as
much room in the Netherlands. We should discriminate. My appeal to van
der Staaij (SGP chairman and member of parliament) is to take a firmer
stance. I say, show them how it’s done!
The participant hints at his intimate knowledge of SGP political jar-

gon in multiple ways. For instance, in using the term gelijkheidsdenken,
the participant acknowledges a well-known notion in orthodox Protestant
thought. Originally directed at the representatives of the (French)
Revolution, gelijkheidsdenken decries that all modes of life are equal and
therefore deserve equal treatment (Baalen et al. 2018). Opposing this
false ideology of equality, the Reformed Party’s standpoint is that reli-
gions are not equal, there is only one true religion. In the past, the word
has been part of an outright theocratic argument and has transformed
over the course of the twentieth century into a term more open to cul-
tural and constitutional issues.13 In short, gelijkheidsdenken has been a
battle cry of the orthodox Protestants since the foundation of the party.
A second indication that this participant knows his orthodox reformed
sources is his use of the phrase ‘the Christian way of life which has histori-
cally imprinted the West’ (door het christendom gestempeld). This phrase
has appeared in SGP party programmes since, at least, 1994, where we
can read:
When minorities are given the opportunity to maintain their own cultural
identity, this should not negatively impact the historically imprinted (ges-
tempeld) character of the Dutch nation. Government should not contrib-
ute financially nor otherwise to the spread of anti-Christian views.
Subsidizing mosques should be rejected. (SGP 1994, translation EvdH)
13
Zwaag (2018), ‘Van theocractie naar godsdienstvrijheid: de SGP over religie en politie’.
32 E. van den Hemel
Since then, it has appeared frequently in SGP discourse. Most recently,

it has appeared in publications of the scientific bureau of the SGP, where
it is used to promote maintenance of the Christian way of life, even when
it violates constitutional equality.
The Netherlands is a country that has been imprinted by Christianity. The

Christian conviction has influenced our state and mode of government.
For instance, we do not have an officially recognized Islamic holiday. If we
would use a strict ideology of equality (gelijkheidsdenken, EvdH), this
should not be allowed, whereas from a Christian-historic perspective there
is nothing wrong with this. (Schippers 2016: 248)
By using the terms ‘imprint’ (gestempeld) and ‘ideology of equality’

(gelijkheidsdenken) this participant shows that he is well-versed in ortho-
dox Protestant political thought. Yet, it is important to indicate that there
is a certain distance or change in emphasis in this contribution with
regards to the way in which these terms are used.
For instance, in contrast with the explicit embrace of orthodox
Protestantism as the true religion, there is a certain vagueness with which
the participant describes Dutch culture: ‘we should dare to publicly sup-
port our culture—however you would want to define ‘our culture’—but
it sure is not Islamic’. Christianity is mentioned only as part of Western
way of life. This leads to the concrete example that is given on how the
historical imprint should be safeguarded: ban the building of ‘minarets’.
This participant explicitly states that favouring Christianity over Islam is
not only about protecting society from terrorism. The threat to Dutch
society this participant is concerned about is formulated in terms of cul-
ture, not confession. What is more, Christianity here is spoken of as a
vaguely outlined cultural way of life. Also, the participant states that the
parliamentary faction of the SGP should, ‘more firmly’, protect Dutch
culture. The participant addresses the SGP directly for not doing their
job thoroughly enough. This was a recurrent tendency during the debate:
the parliamentary faction of the SGP was addressed critically for not
being firm enough on Islam. In short, from this intervention, we can
glean tendencies that recurred more often during the debate: a discourse
reminiscent of that of the populist radical right was used to critically
revisit SGP positions. As the following example illustrates, a tendency

during the debate was to conflate religious and secular categories in man-
ners reminiscent of that of the populist radical right.
Short Skirts Against Islam?

One participant, a man who described himself as having ‘considerable
professional experience’ in the Middle East, described how: ‘In Islamic
countries (moslimmeerderheidslanden) tolerance and freedom do not exist
(…) all the short skirts in Afghanistan and Iran disappeared since the
Islamists came to power’. The participant concluded that one should not
be tolerant to a culture that does not allow for tolerance and that there-
fore the expansion of ‘Islam’ in the Netherlands can rightfully be curtailed.
For anyone who has followed Western European (or Northern
American) political discourse, this is a frequently heard argument: the
reference to the freedom of women is a particularly frequently occurring
trope in the clash of civilizations-style rhetoric which places the secular
West over and against the Islamic East. However, the argument is a bit
more surprising to hear for those with any knowledge of orthodox
reformed Protestantism in the Netherlands. For those who, like me, grew
up in a province where the orthodox reformed are numerically strong, it
was and remains to this day a well-known phenomenon to see large
groups of long-skirted schoolgirls cycle their way to the orthodox
Protestant schools in the province. Long skirts were obligatory dress-
codes at orthodox Protestant schools (dress codes are almost fully absent
from the Dutch education system). In short, this particular strand of
Protestantism was associated with wearing long skirts to such a degree
that the long skirt was an icon of this form of orthodox Protestantism. It
is surprising then, to hear a participant in the debate criticize Islam not as
a false religion that needs to be rooted out, which would fit in with the
classical SGP-line one could say, but as anathema to the cherished free-
doms of Dutch society of which the short skirt has become one of the
favourite symbols.
The role of women was invoked more often during the debate. This
exchange took place when the statement ‘We should not admit any more
34 E. van den Hemel
Muslims into the Netherlands’ was debated. A lull in the discussion was
filled when one of the women in the audience stood up and stated ‘well,
when the men fall silent the women should step up’. This remark was
followed by cheering and applause. She continued:
we should not forget that Dutch culture is starting to change … particu-

larly in the cities. That is a sort of danger, when people with very different
norms and values are taking up increasingly important positions in society
and perhaps even in government. When that happens, a lot is going to
change in the Netherlands. Perhaps especially for us Christians (….) to
stop all Muslims from entering our country is perhaps practically impos-
sible but you could make the argument that we should be careful not to
admit too many Muslims.
We see in this short contribution a similar emphasis on cultural iden-

tity and norms and values. She also indicated a fear that Christianity, in
a future where Muslims will become part of government, might be espe-
cially targeted by these changes in Dutch culture. Implicit in this inter-
vention was the close proximity of ‘Dutch culture’ and ‘us Christians’.
This symbiotic relation is now changing, according to this participant,
particularly in the cities (implying that Dutchness and Christianity
remain more intimately connected in the countryside). There was also a
nod in the opening of the woman’s contribution to the debate. When she
stated ‘when men are silent women should step up’ she seems to refer to
the issue of the role of women in the SGP. Let me unpack this particular
point in more detail.
As I indicated above, the SGP has a long history of resisting gen-
der equality and has included many references to the traditional family
values. Since 2010, the SGP was forced to stop officially banning women
from active functions. Since then, the first female members of the SGP
have offered themselves for election. One case in point was a municipal
election in Vlissingen in 2014, in the South-Western province of Zeeland
(part of the Bible Belt, like Oldebroek). The woman who was on the roll
to be elected offered the following argument: ‘when there are no suitable
men to lead, women should be allowed to step up’.14 Importantly,

according to both the politician herself and the leadership of the party,
this was an exceptional situation. As far as the party was concerned,
nothing drastically changed. The woman who stepped up to contribute
to the debate with the words ‘when men are silent, women should step
up’ referred to this incident of a couple of years earlier. The laughter and
cheering by the audience seemed to me to indicate a sort of ironic rec-
ognition of this development and a celebration and encouragement of
this development.
Both in the content of the words of this contributor as well in the
jovial reception of them, the image is conjured up of a Dutch culture
which has solved the issue of feminism, which has been stamped by
Christianity and whose accomplishments are now under threat from
abroad. The more complex and decidedly more anti-feminist aspects of
recent SGP history remained absent during the remainder of this
evening.
All in all, ‘culture’ was a more frequently used trope to outline the dif-
ferences between Dutch national identity and ‘Islam’ during the debate.
Religion arose most frequently as extension of, and inherent part of, a
cultural identity. In order to illustrate how speaking of religion in terms
of culture might create tensions with the register of religion as confession,
let me provide another example from the debate.
After culture and cultural identity were invoked in the discussion on
whether any Muslims should be allowed in the Netherlands, a white
middle-aged participant intervened. He described himself as someone
who ‘works with refugees’, and he described how he has set up a bible
class for refugees, many of whom are from countries ‘with an Islamic
background’.
Listen. We teach in Arabic. Five weeks later they are baptized. This happens
purely because we communicate in Arabic, because then these boys under-
stand the love of Christ directly. They understand the word of God and
that understanding for them happens in Arabic. When you address them
in Arabic, they will feel at home a lot sooner in the Netherlands. If we were
14
De Volkskrant 19 March 2014: ‘SGP-vrouw schrijft geschiedenis in Vlissingen’.
36 E. van den Hemel
to say to them ‘you are doing this wrong in Dutch, the Arab will say: “get
lost!”’ (dan zegt de Arabiër: dikke lul drie bier).
This participant highlighted terms that resonate with a different regis-

ter from that of cultural identity. This participant highlights conversion
(something which in a culturalized framework is well-nigh impossible),
the love of Christ and baptism. Concomitantly, because conversion is
placed central, this participant is less inclined to worry about that which
has become over the last two decades or the typical hallmark of successful
or failing integration: speaking Dutch.
The tension between cultural identity and conversion generated lively
reactions from the room. Multiple people stood up wanting to react. A
man stood up and interjected:
This is a beautiful example. Indeed, you have to realize that a Muslim can
become a Christian and therefore you should never write off a Muslim
completely. Because a Muslim can become a Christian. But this debate is
about Islam. Islam is the book [sic] that they read over there (het boek dat
ze daar hebben) and what they get passed on: that is the biggest evil that
you can find in the Netherlands. And then you shouldn’t be saying ‘well,
Muslims are people too’.
Here, we see how the opposition of two registers. In one register reli-
gion is associated with the confession individuals hold (and might
change), in the other religion is seen as a belief-system that can be judged
independently from the individuals that adhere to it. This contribution
mirrors the statement which was debated earlier, when it was discussed
that ‘moderate Islam does not exist’. Participants during this section
repeated the argument made by populist radical right politician Geert
Wilders that although moderate Muslims may exist, there is no such
thing as moderate Islam.
It became apparent that there is a tension between seeing Muslims as
individuals that can be converted or as believers of an intolerant way of
life. As these registers played out during the evening, people highlighted
the tensions between the two. If one is too strict on cultural identity and
the persecution of Muslims, one risks giving up on potential converts and
limiting the universal message of the Gospel to those who share the same
cultural backdrop. On the other hand, in the experience of multiple par-
ticipants in the debate, if one ‘imports’ too many intolerant people,
Dutch society including Christianity is threatened. Another man stood
up and offered the following thoughts: ‘I understand what you mean, the
Christian love for thy neighbour, but if we import too many intolerant
people, we could destroy ourselves’.15 As the evening drew to a close the
tension between a culturalized register and a confessional register returned
explicitly in the closing remarks offered by party leader Kees van der Staaij.
The Boomerang Effect of Invoking Leitkultur

Fraction leader and long-time parliamentarian Kees van der Staaij was
present at the debate and was invited to provide concluding remarks. As
he was frequently addressed by the participants in the debate, in particu-
lar by people pushing Van der Staaij and the parliamentarians of the SGP
to take a firmer stance on Islam, he spent considerable time summarizing
the debates. Yet, he also addressed the perils of invoking the populist radi-
cal right discourse with regards to dominant cultural values. Van der
Staaij acknowledged his desire to curb the building of mosques and min-
arets. Yet he also warned for a ‘boomerang effect’ if national religious-
cultural identity is left unexamined:
Of course, I agree we should be able to be reluctant to allow these sort of

expression [such as minarets and other visible signs of Islam in the
Netherlands, EvdH]. But we should take into consideration that it makes
a big difference whether we speak from the perspective of Oldebroek or
from the Netherlands in general. It is easy to speak of Dutch culture and
how Christianity has ‘imprinted’ (gestempeld) it from our position here in
Oldebroek. But when you look at it from a national perspective, for most
Dutch people Dutch culture means gay marriage, strict equality between
men and women which has been a reason to sue the SGP, the abolishment
of confessional schools (bijzonder onderwijs) and the limiting of religion in
15
‘Ik begrijp heel goed wat je bedoelt, Christelijke naastenliefde, maar het kan tot zelfdestructie
leiden door intolerante mensen te importeren die dat kapot maken.’
38 E. van den Hemel
public life. That is Dutch culture and that is what most of my colleagues in
parliament are proud of, and that is what they want to maximize with their
legislation. It is always good to remind ourselves that we intend to do
against Islam could return to us as a boomerang.
Van der Staaij reiterates the phrase ‘imprinted’ (gestempeld), embed-

ding, as participants did before him, the debate in SGP terminology. He
acknowledges the call from his constituents who desire an unequal treat-
ment of Islam out of the name of cultural identity. Yet, he warns against
presenting Dutch national identity in overarching terms. The topics he
mentions, gay marriage, equality between men and women, and the lim-
iting of religion in public life, are all topics for which the SGP has received
critique from secular points of view. Van der Staaij also highlights that
how national identity is defined might differ significantly from region to
region. What shared national Christian culture means in the Bible Belt
(‘here in Oldebroek’) is not the same as what it means in The Hague. Van
der Staaij states that the enthusiasm with which participants in the debate
have argued against Islam as being non-Dutch, non-tolerant and non-
secular might be quite risky. The same arguments used to outlaw religious
accommodation in the case of Islam provide jurisprudence to curtail
other forms of orthodox religion. In other words: that which is thrown
with the intention to hurt Islam, might return to hit the one who threw
it in the back of the head.
This shows how complex these discourses on secularity and religion
can be. Van der Staaij, not known for his love of secular Dutch culture,
nonetheless argues in favour of some core elements of secuarlity. He here
warns against throwing away the protections constitutional equality
offers to orthodox Protestant movements such as the SGP. Inversely, the
participants in the debate who used an onstensibly more secular register
to discriminate against Islam (it is not secular, anti-feminist, etc.) can
actually be seen as aiming to replace a secular conceptualization of con-
fessional politics, in which religion is safeguarded by separation of church
and state, with a register in which the religious-cultural majority deter-
mines how rights with regards to religion are allotted.
Concluding Remarks
The poster initially used to advertise the debate was an indicator of what
we have seen during the debate: the icon of the bomb and the association
of Islam with violence against what is considered to be Dutch is a hot
topic. The organizers and the participants were eager to situate them-
selves roughly along the lines of how the populist radical right has argued
for discrimination of Islam: the argument of national culture, secular
tolerance and feminism are used to argue for withholding constitutional
protections from Islam.
This embrace of a populist radical right framework also entails a
reframing of the political meaning of Christianity. Used as a shorthand
for both the historical roots of contemporary Dutch national culture and
a characterization of its contemporary autochthonous population,
Christianity and secularity are no longer seen as competing worldviews,
nor as neatly separated categories in modern secular Dutch society, rather
they are seen as two sides of the same nativist coin. By fusing these cate-
gories together, by allying the short skirt of secular feminism with the
long skirts of orthodox Protestantism, so to speak, the religious-political
landscape which is built on secular categories is replaced with a muddy
new reality whose impact remains to be understood.
Although for the time being, the register of parties such as the SGP
and register used by the populist radical right both see (Judeo-)Christianity
as the dominant culture in the Netherlands, it remains to be seen which
way policy is going to go if this register remains dominant. It also remains
to be seen which new tectonic plates are formed when the fault lines
between religion and secularity shift. Orthodox Protestant politicians like
Van der Staaij might, paradoxically, end up defending the accomplish-
ments of secular values whilst those who proclaim to wish to protect
secular Dutch society can be seen to engage in new forms of confessional
politics. This new form of politics aims to abolish the constitutional
equality of religions, but this time not in the name of a Church but rather
in the name of culturalized religion. In understanding how different reg-
isters religion partake in redefining contemporary religious-cultural land-
scapes in the Netherlands, we need to place our ear on the ground to see
what religion means for whom.
40 E. van den Hemel
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3
‘We’ and ‘The Others’ as Constituents
of Symbolic Politics: On the Populist
Exploitation of Long-lasting Nationalist
Sentiments and Resentments Regarding
Citizenship in Germany
Irene Götz
For some years, right-wing politicians all over Europe have demanded: bar
Muslims from entering the country; forbid the burka; defend pork dishes
in kindergartens1 and rule out dual citizenship, particularly for Deutschtürken
(Germans of Turkish descent). Pushed by the electoral success of the right-
wing populist party, Alternative für Deutschland (AfD), sections of the
German conservative parties have recently followed suit and have begun to
employ a xenophobic rhetoric similar to that of right-wing populists.
1
This debate only addressed ‘the Turks’ despite other religious prohibitions of pork existing for
Hindus and Jews, among others. This focus on the German-Turks is not only due to their mere
number and visibility in Germany compared to other non-Christian groups, but it is always ‘the
Turks’ who are complained about in such calls for a Leitkultur (i.e. the predominant culture to
which ‘the Muslims’ in particular are suspected not to be adjusted, see Pautz 2005a, b).
I. Götz (*)
Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, Munich, Germany
e-mail: irene.goetz@lmu.de

44 I. Götz
This chapter is about symbolic politics relying on such cultural argu-

ments and recalling long-lasting nationalist sentiments and resentments.
To illustrate how Symbolpolitik plays out in Germany in the public
domain I will focus on the debate on dual citizenship that began in 1999.
My main argument is that the reform of the citizenship law, suggested by
the red–green government in 1999, triggered two opposite develop-
ments, in which sacrality and secularity mutually inform each other in
regard to the legitimate conception of the nation state in times of an
ongoing immigration. On the one hand, the reform was meant to serve
as an important step towards a new culture-blind notion of citizenship in
Germany, which should no longer merely be based on ‘blood’ and
‘descent’. On the other hand, this step towards opening Germanness to
the notion of ‘demos’ led to a conservative counter-movement of re-
sacralizing nationhood: here, particularly among right-wing politicians,
being German has been valued as an exclusive privilege of native Germans;
and deutsche Leitkultur (German leading culture) has once again been
instrumentalized as a sacrosanct concept of belonging according to a
nativist notion by those conservative politicians and ordinary people who
are sceptical about sharing their social properties with ‘migrants’.
The example of the debate on the dual citizenship will provide insights
into this intersected process of opening and closing the nation, which has
much to do with either re-sacralizing nationhood as it was the case in the
times of the national movement in the nineteenth century, or de-
sacralizing the notion of national belonging by regarding citizenship as
nothing more than a matter of contract, so that newcomers could be
affiliated under certain conditions. The case study will also make plausi-
ble in how far we need a more differentiated understanding of how con-
temporary modes of nation-building and definitions of nationhood are
based upon both secular and sacred conceptions of ‘we’ and ‘the others’.
Thus, the ongoing debate on dual citizenship in Germany serves as one
striking and momentous example of such symbolic politics in which ‘our’
culture, Christian tradition and Volk (the people as an ethnic group), are
once again merged and promoted as the exclusive ‘property’ of the nation
endangered by far-reaching processes of transformation.
Before I go deeper into the ethnographic case study and show how the
traditional concept of the ethnic nation has once again been treated as a
3 ‘We’ and ‘The Others’ as Constituents of Symbolic Politics… 45
sacred and homogenous entity in this context, I will—in a first para-

graph—reflect on the character of symbolic politics, which employs and
fuels such notions of a traditional cultural repertoire of the national. I
make the argument that it is pivotal to reflect on the historical base on
which the long-lasting national patterns have been built and enforced. In
so doing, we learn about the durable repertoire of the national that—as a
powerful sacred belief system—can be easily recalled and put on the
political stage to attract people longing for a safety net in times where
they are expected to share their social privileges with ‘foreigners’ and new-
comers. Ever since the first debates on the new citizenship law in
1999/2000 the German passport has time and again been elevated to a
precious and exclusive entrance ticket to social rights by right-wing poli-
ticians; nationhood is seen as something sacred in this framework. The
idea of the ‘holy nation’ of the nineteenth century can easily be recalled
for this purpose; it is deeply rooted in people’s collective memories and
language, as I state in the last paragraph of this chapter.
ymbolic Politics as a Simplifier

S
and Constructor of a Belief System
In symbolic politics, as conceptualized by, amongst others, Sears (1993),
complicated and severe problems, such as integrating labour migrants
and refugees, reflecting the hybridization of identity in times of globaliza-
tion, fighting terrorism and obtaining public security and welfare, are
promised to be ‘solved’ by simplistic solutions.2 Symbolic politics simpli-
fies both such societal problems of transformation and the possible solu-
tions by reduction and condensation, and in doing so, it relies on cultural
arguments: cultural markers, such as the burka or the pork dishes, serve
as icons in which a wide range of strong connotations condense into
simple reductions: ‘The Christian Occident’ is endangered, ‘Islam’ as
aggressor to be fought. Employing and promoting such icons and
2
See the instructive and basic article on symbolic politics in the very sense by Sears (1993). See also
Kaschuba (1995), who employs a historical perspective on symbolic politics in the context of
nationalism, resp. the construction of a ‘homogenous national body’.
46 I. Götz
symbols—for instance, the dual citizenship—has turned out to be a pow-

erful ingredient of political debate in Germany and beyond.
The case of the revision of the citizenship law in Germany in 2000 was
one battlefield of such symbolic fights (or fights relying on cultural sym-
bols), in which both old concepts of the nation, differentiating between
a ‘we’ and ‘they’ in the line of ‘ethnos’ and religion, and a new notion of
citizenship, more open for newcomers, were disseminated.
This symbolic politics of defending cultural traditions (including the
Christian religion as a symbolic marker) and the liberal value fundament
of the secular country of a ‘Christian origin’ obviously recalls national
sentiments—for instance, nostalgia and concern for the country that has
to be protected against newcomers. In so doing, the logics and semantics
of social inclusion and exclusion are based on cultural arguments, for
instance, Muslims’ traditions of clothing and food are—in the sense of a
homogenous entity—deemed incompatible with and a threat to secular
life in a modern state.
National sentiments and resentments are easily available as fluid pat-
terns of a national repertoire deeply rooted in the collective memory3 of
the modern nation state since the era of the national movements in the
nineteenth century. Thus, a historical perspective is pivotal, considering
the principles and mechanisms of nation-building and forming national
identities through a constant training, it allows one to conceive why the
rediscovery and revitalization of national concepts of Volk in the sense of
‘ethnos’ and the idea of a culturally bound nation state could again have
been so successful throughout Europe in the last few decades (see Götz
2011, 2016; Götz et al. 2017). After the Second World War, national
feelings were supposed to have lost their legitimacy, particularly in
Germany, and after the fall of the socialist block, the old nation state was
expected to lose its importance in a new Europe of regions dawning in a
‘post-national’ era (Habermas 1998; Münch 1995).
It is in the wake of mass immigration, EU crises and the retrenchments
of the social states4 that the national notion is yet successfully being
3
This term refers to the concept of Aleida Assmann (1999) and Jan Assmann (1988).
4
In how far the social state is retrenched in Germany in the wake of the Hartz IV-reforms is bril-
liantly explained by Lessenich (2008).
r ediscovered, serving to legitimize the exclusion of groups of citizens. The

increasing gap between the few rich and the many living in precarious
conditions has often been stated in public debate as a main reason for the
flourishing of national resentment in Europe and abroad during the last
two decades, and can be easily exploited and fuelled by the rising right-
wing populists all over Europe.
Illoyal and Privileged: Holders of Two

Passports and Other Suspects
The debate on dual citizenship in Germany, which started almost 20 years
ago, is an important case that sheds light on the revival of nationalist
sentiments and resentment triggered by populist activities not only in
Germany but across Europe.5 As a milestone in this process of the de-
tabooing of national rhetoric and symbolic politics, it is well suited to
serve as an ethnographic setting where one can explore how nationhood
and citizenship have once again been culturalized to limit social rights to
‘the community’ of ethnic Germans. This ‘culturalization of citizenship’
(Duyvendak et al. 2016) is both underpinned and nourished by a tradi-
tional notion of ‘we’ and ‘they’; national semantics, such as the term Volk,
are deployed; a ‘cultural identity’ must be protected, whereas the Muslims
are, most of all, addressed as potential troublemakers.
As I show below, it was in the context of a new citizenship law in 1999
when the heated debate emerged for the first time. The new red–green
German government—the first coalition between the Social Democrats
and the Green Party—suggested this new law permitting dual citizenship
in Germany under certain conditions. This new law finally revised the
one from 1913, which had based German citizenship merely on ‘blood’
and descent. The revision, which aimed at simplifying naturalization,
should reflect mass immigration to Germany in the 1980s and early
1990s. Afterwards, the debate came up every now and then in the context
of elections and was fuelled particularly by the latest arrival of refugees
5
For the case of East Grmany see Shoshan (2016) and for Eastern Europe see Götz, Spiritova, Roth
(Eds.) (2017).
48 I. Götz
and recent terror attacks across Europe—two contexts that have been
irrationally intertwined and emotionally debated. Facing many ‘con-
cerned citizens’ in these contexts, the German politicians have displayed
strength and decisiveness, as the beginning of this chapter has shown.
After the media had reported on some German Turks having organized a
demonstration in favour of Erdogan in July 2016, questions arose in the
public media, such as: what about the loyalty of German Turks to our
democratic state when they stand up for an authoritarian Turkish leader?
Once more, ‘they’ were treated as the homogenous group of ‘unintegrated
Turks’. The suggestion of depriving these German nationals of their
German passports was an emotional reflex of some conservatives. They
insinuated that this would be a good means of “healing” the presumed
anti-democratic attitude of ‘the Turks’ in Germany. This populist attack
obviously fostered the resentments of the many who fear that holders of
two passports are privileged compared to ‘real’ Germans owning only one
such document.
According to this argument, one writer of an e-mail commented on an
article I wrote—as an anthropologist’s critical intervention—for the
weekly Spiegel Online which had defended dual citizenship as an achieve-
ment and step towards a modern immigration politics in Germany. The
commentator, whose opinion can stand for many others, related an
example which supposedly proved why this view disadvantages native
Germans. He reported on a friend of his who had emigrated to New
Zealand and naturalized. Of course, he agreed, there she had to give up
her German passport.6 The writer could hardly believe that she, although
German-born, had to apply for a visa for her home country when she
wanted to visit it for 3 months! It had not come into the writer’s mind
that these bureaucratic obstacles to a mobile life would be an argument
in favour of dual citizenship. By contrast, the writer of this e-mail deduced
that this case was an argument against dual citizenship. His logics implied
that if a ‘real German’, one of ‘us’, is not allowed to have two passports,
why should ‘we’ permit migrants to gain this ‘privilege’? According to his
6
Here the writer was wrong: New Zealand nationals are allowed to hold a passport from another
country if the other country allows it (see https://www.govt.nz/browse/nz-passports-and-
citizenship/getting-nz-citizenship/dual-citizenship/?OpenDocument and http://nomadcapitalist.
com/2014/04/25/countries-allow-dual-citizenship/).
interpretation, a “real” German woman was disadvantaged compared to

‘migrants’—who are still seen as migrants, no matter how long they have
lived in Germany—and who, on top of that, hold two passports! They are
deemed richer and privileged, even superior. In this story, nationality is
still linked to descent and, therefore, to a primordial—ethnic—identity.
Although he accepts the possibility of naturalizing in the host country, a
new passport never changes your ‘natural’ inherited cultural identity; this
is considered stable and exclusive; in other words, it is nothing hybrid; it
cannot be mixed with other identifications.
Many other comments to this article could be added proving that
being really German had something to do with birth, origin, language
and culture. Newcomers were suspected of not leaving behind their
‘inherited’ culture, which is proven by the instance that they were not
willing to give back their passport from their home country. Again, the
writers of the comments mixed up cultural identity and citizenship. The
latter, the (social) rights and duties of a state’s citizen, should be bound to
an adequate cultural identity. The ethnocultural notion of nationhood as
an exclusive good is prevalent in most comments. The idea of dual citi-
zenship as something rational, supporting transnational mobility as a
given fact of globalization and reflecting the needs of immigration coun-
tries and their citizens to participate as equal and full citizens, was seldom
part of the writers’ thinking. On the contrary, holders of two passports
were blamed for using the German passport only for strategic purposes
without feeling ‘true love’ for Germany and being stuck in a ‘foreign’
culture. To love one’s country is a notion which is part of the traditional
emotional repertoire of nationalism; such strong emotions are expected
from national citizens as a proof of their loyalty to ‘their’ one and only
national state.
This logic follows a nativist, racist argumentation:7 native Germans are,
in any case, superior to those coming from a ‘migration’ background’
regarding citizen’s rights and any other privileges as Germans. They
deserve them due to their origin in terms of ‘blood’ (ius sanguinis) and
7
See Balibar/Wallerstein (1991), who were one of the first in academia dealing with the relation
between class struggles, immigration and a new nationalism, whereas xenophobia and racism are
related to contemporary capitalism and the division of labor in the national state.
50 I. Götz
‘authentic’ feelings, such as love and pride. This idea is still part of the
sustainable common-sense knowledge of many Germans and is grounded
in the German citizenship law (Staatsbürgerschaftsgesetz) dating back to
1913 and not reformed before 2000 (see Gosewinkel 2001).
he Struggle for a New Citizenship

T
Law in 1999
In the spring of 1999, the new red–green coalition in Germany attempted
to transform the old citizenship law from a ius sanguinis into a ius soli in
order to facilitate assimilation and integration for immigrants and to
catch up with other European nation states such as France (ius soli means
that the place of birth counts regarding citizenship rights and nation-
hood). The aim of this reform was to consider that cultural homogeneity
after the Second World War, one backbone of German identity reflected
in this old citizenship law as well as in a widely spread public notion, can-
not be kept up in a country with such high immigration rates as Germany.
Therefore, Otto Schily, Minister of the Interior, and his staff presented
the concept of a law to parliament which would allow foreigners to
become German after having lived in Germany for at least eight years
(instead of fifteen years as was the case at the time) and—which was then
much criticized by political opponents—the ‘foreigners’ (die Ausländer)
should be generally allowed to keep their old passports so that they could
keep up their old loyalties. Another frequent point of criticism was that
children of foreigners born in Germany should get the German passport
automatically regardless of having another passport from the state of their
mother or father.
The CDU/CSU (at that time the non-ruling conservative party)
immediately started a very successful public campaign to collect signa-
tures in the streets and public assemblies against dual citizenship
(Doppelpaß).8 The campaign was soon taken over by almost all local
8
It should be mentioned that the plebiscite protest was initially started in the Bundesland Hessen
just before the regional elections took place and that these elections were won by the Conservatives
as a result of the successful populist campaign.
branches of CDU/CSU, and Doppelpaß became the most discussed topic

in public and everyday life for weeks (see Götz 2000, 2011). Suddenly,
the debate was no longer concentrating on parliament or the political
pages of the newspapers but reached the arts section and the letters to the
editor. It reached ordinary people on their way to work or shopping,
where they could not avoid noticing the little red and white tables of the
local conservative parties asking them to give their signature to what they
called in a slogan: ‘Yes to integration—no to dual citizenship’. The con-
servatives argued that by granting the Doppelpaß in an uncontrolled way,
integration would be hindered or delayed and not, as the left-wing parties
believed, facilitated.
Many ‘ordinary’ German-born citizens were involved in the highly
emotional debates around the little street tables organized by the CDU
or in the opposing left-wing parties and groups which struggled to
occupy central public sites and busy street corners with their competing
information tables close to those of the CDU. In a competition for pub-
lic space and opinion, various demonstrators stood up against the ‘racist’
politics of the Conservatives, as they put it. The debate was also reflected
in jokes, satirical magazines, flyers, postcards and election posters and in
Karneval.
The debate was soon removed from the legal problems concerning the
reform of citizenship and from the pragmatic question of how to manage
and facilitate integration. One could very often suddenly read or observe
romantic nationalism and ethnic constructions of identity which now
seemed to be activated or legalized by the political campaign of the
Conservatives and their supporters (Diez Poza 2000). Under the protec-
tion of a serious and large political party, which claims to represent the
centre of society as a Volkspartei, it seemed to be no longer a taboo to say
something against foreigners in public or to announce that being German
is something ‘very special’, even something ‘superior’, ‘sacrosanct’, some-
thing of ‘high value’ to be protected against ‘those foreigners’ who were
supposedly criminal, chronically unemployed or not willing to share the
same duties as the Germans (but to profit from the social rights pro-
vided). Stories about being the last ‘Germans in the district’, suppressed
by ‘aliens’ and ‘foreign languages’ and ‘strange customs’, circulated
among supporters of the campaign standing around CDU tables.
52 I. Götz
They debated fiercely with the passers-by who blamed the CDU for
‘being racist’.
In these debates objects and symbols played a crucial role: on the one
hand, there was the national anthem on CDs, which the passers-by were
given as a present by the members of the CDU, and the national colours
of their scarfs; on the other hand, the Palestinian scarf of the anti-Fascists
assembling and fiercely protesting in front of the CDU tables. So the
fierce debate in the streets relied on polarizing objects and symbols associ-
ated with complex belief systems: the idea of the nation as a homogenous
entity of well-integrated, respectively assimilated citizens on the one hand
and the reference to Nazi past by the anti-Fascists who ‘waved’ with the
symbols of left-wing fights for ‘internationalism’. Left-wing politicians
held up dual passports made of cardboard, opposing the CDU’s flyers,
which demanded only one passport as the legitimate basis for integration.
This form of symbolic politics reduced complicated issues, such as inte-
gration, citizenship, belonging and identity, to catchy slogans—‘Yes to
integration and no to the dual citizenship!’ (Ja zu Integration, nein zu
doppelter Staatsangehörigkeit!)9—and opposing commitments. The local
context in the neighbourhoods was connected to and informed by the
debate on the macro level of the media (Fig. 3.1).
The newspapers, also the liberal ones (see below), contributed to this
process of othering and exoticizing by reporting on the ‘poor’ and ‘home-
sick’ and so far unintegrated ‘foreigners in our cities’, who would wear
strange clothes and eat strange meals and—one very serious reason to
blame them—would very often not regard the German passport as a
necessary aim for which it was worth giving up old loyalties (see Vonderau
2000). Thus, this event turned out to be an ideal ethnographic labora-
tory10 to observe how traditional national self-images about being
German and stereotypes and beliefs about ‘the strangers’, especially about
‘the Islamists’ (Islamisten), became a topic of everyday discussion and
ritualized cultural performances. Rapid dissemination of different—also
of new, post-modern—national semantics and symbols into a variety
9
This slogan of the CDU’s campaign could be read on their flyers and posters.
10
The ethnographic material presented in this paragraph was collected in situ in a research project
at HU Berlin, to which master students, such as Diez Poza (2000) and Vonderau (2000), contrib-
uted and published under my supervision, see Götz (Ed.) (2000), also Götz (2011, 2016).
Fig. 3.1 Cover of the German weekly Der Spiegel, No. 2, 1999/1/11: Wer darf
Deutscher werden? Operation Doppelpass (Who is allowed to become German?
Operation dual passport)
54 I. Götz
of contexts could be described by means of participant observation and

discourse analysis of newspaper articles.11 This was particularly true of
‘letters to the editor’ and special stories (about underprivileged foreigners
striving to become German or not) reflecting crucial aspects of Germans’
national consciousness. The results of this eruptive de-tabooization of
the national notion after the anti-nationalist stance can still be
observed today.
The wide range of events at the beginning of 1999 reveals a character-
istic spectrum of cultural forms and practices, national symbols and
anti-symbols, icons and counter-icons. For example, the woman with
the headscarf symbolizing the unintegrated traditional Islamist in news-
papers (examples in Diez Poza 2000) was challenged by the culturally
integrated modern and athletic Turkish-German businesswoman in the
CDU’s election posters (see pictures below). The following example
stems from a discourse analysis which I undertook in my habilitation
project on the ‘rediscovery of the national’ after 1989 (Götz 2011). In
the context of the contested citizenship law reform, pictures and articles
were disseminated that aimed at proving in how far citizens of a ‘migra-
tion background’ were still stuck in their ‘foreign culture’. The following
sketch indicates that a broader programme of ethnographic study and
particularly cultural analysis could be of importance to scrutinize more
thoroughly how such political and juridical attempts of de-nationalizing
citizenship, such as the reform of 2000, entail counter-developments
and promote the re-nationalization of citizenship and culturalization of
belonging.
The newspaper article shown in Fig. 3.2 reports on a smart German-
Turk speaking against dual citizenship and campaigning for the CDU in
the local elections of the German state Rheinland-Pfalz. The woman’s
11
See Götz (Ed.) (2000). The sources of the students’ and my fieldwork were threefold: First, our
research was based on field diaries and minutes taken between January and April 1999. They con-
tain observations on the discussions around the tables of CDU in the streets of Berlin (Wedding,
Neukölln, Kreuzberg) as well as short interviews with opposing participants of these discussions.
Second, we collected letters to the editor and articles in different newspapers, such as the Berlin
dailies, the Berliner Zeitung and the Tagesspiegel, additionally the Süddeutsche Zeitung, die tag-
eszeitung, Frankfurter Rundschau, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, as well as in weeklies, such as
Die Zeit, Spiegel and Fokus. Third, the following analysis is drawn from flyers, posters and adver-
tisement of the political parties.
Fig. 3.2 Campaign of a local conservative party with German-Turks refusing the
Social Democrats’ offer of a dual citizenship, Rheinland-Pfalz, March 1999; source:
Süddeutsche Zeitung, 1999/03/05, p. 5
outer appearance, her open smile and hair, symbolize the assimilation
into a secular Germany. This personification of the good German-Turk as
a sporty team player, who stresses her unconditional and smooth integra-
tion into the local politician’s team, once again reveals that nation-
building has always been a cultural project which has had a lot to do not
only with the adequate outfit and practices, but also with being active as
a citizen. This icon was addressed directly against the ‘traditional’ woman
56 I. Götz
covered with the hijab and staying in the house—her sticking to a ‘sup-
pressing religion’ is supposed to be the obstacle against becoming
‘German’. Naturalization should be both the incentive and reward for a
‘good’ integration, which initially necessitates abstaining from (Muslim)
religious symbols (Fig. 3.3).
As discourse analysis has shown (Diez Poza 2000; Götz 2011), the
woman with the headscarf often served as a counter-icon to the ‘open and
modern’ well-integrated woman. Her unintegrated counterpart was for
instance portrayed in a stereotypical way by the German tageszeitung.12 In
an article on the Einbürgerungshemmnis Frau the headscarf once again
symbolizes the obstacle for naturalization. The article points at Islamic
women being suppressed by their husbands. Here this type of uninte-
grated woman is portrayed by the side-face of a covered woman bent
forward instead of looking ‘openly’ out of the picture. Her headscarf is
decorated by traditional rural ornaments. The caption stylizes the dual
passport to a magic formula which would abolish the missing cultural
assimilation automatically: ‘Owning the dual passport would make the
Fig. 3.3 Article Einbürgerungshemmnis Frau. In: die tageszeitung (taz):

13./14.2.1999, VII, picture by Birgitta Kowsky/Buenos Dias
Die tageszeitung: ‘Einbürgerungshemmnis Frau’ (1999/02/13, VII).

12
difference’ (Mit Doppelpaß sähe das anders aus). This fight of opposing
icons in the media as part of the symbolic politics again reduces complex-
ity: on the one hand the well-integrated open woman without a headscarf
and on the other hand, the unintegrated woman with her head covered.
The multifaceted issues fostering and/or hindering integration are con-
densed in simplistic cultural symbols and connotations of being ‘a for-
eigner’ culturally and regarding the religion.
It is important to mention that religion and culture are so far treated
as ‘interchangeable concepts’. As Monique Scheer has recently put it, the
‘terms culture and religion’ are ‘essentialised’ and ‘it is the job of ethnog-
raphy and discourse analysis to track how they are being used by whom
and to what end’ (Scheer 2017: 179). The case study on how the heads-
carf is being instrumentalized by members of the conservative parties as
well as the media serves as an instructive example of this ongoing confla-
tion of religion and culture into one homogeneous entity. Here the
notion of the secular nation state is addressed—it is considered to be
endangered by Islamic symbols shown in public. However, in doing so,
on the other hand, the freedom of religion as one fundament of the secu-
lar state is paradoxically ignored; the Muslim woman is not granted this
civil right on any account. Her religious display is seen as an obstacle for
becoming a full member of the nation.
Diffusion of Old and New National Rhetoric

The following paragraph summarizes the most popular traditional
national semantics that again circulated in those days (as well as before
and later) in newspaper articles, politicians’ speeches and ordinary peo-
ple’s comments when they faced the CDU tables and signature lists (see
also Götz 2011).
The following are some of the phrases heard and read: citizenship was
regarded as a special ‘gift’ which should not be given as a present to
everybody. In this argument, exclusivity of citizenship is emphasized.
People referred to the duties which were regarded as a premise for
becoming a citizen of Germany. Citizenship was treated as a ‘privilege’,
and one could detect the fear of being disadvantaged when having only
58 I. Götz
one (a German) passport. Germans with only one passport were afraid
of becoming ‘minor’ citizens. ‘Second-class citizen’ became a popular
term. Another argument produced various metaphors: ‘You have to
decide’, ‘You can’t be married to two women at the same time’, ‘You
can’t serve two masters’. Older theories about the typical German
authoritarian character are worth mentioning here, for in the last phrase,
citizenship is associated with Untertanentum (that is, behaving as an
inferior subject of the state which is respected as a master whom you
must obey uncritically).
German identity was seen in terms of Schicksalsgemeinschaft, as a com-
munity held together by a destiny from which its members cannot escape
and in which foreigners cannot really share.
In this context, the nation is constructed as innate, almost metaphysi-
cal, it serves as an anthropological root metaphor which reaches back to
an archaic origin. In these comments, stereotypes and phrases, nation
actually designates the ethnic and cultural community, and often espe-
cially the imagined Christian community.
This is, historically, not surprising. As a result of the longue durée of
the national ideology, which has sublimely survived in anti-national peri-
ods such as the post-war era in Europe, it is very easy for populists to
rediscover and recall the notion of the national. They manage to trigger a
certain repertoire of attitudes, feelings and associations very easily. When
the national card is played, it seems to be a kind of reflex—like a key-
locker principle—to react with the notion of superiority/inferiority, dif-
ferentiating between a ‘we’ and ‘the others’. Religion plays an important
role in this process. As European Ethnologist Wolfgang Kaschuba
explained (Kaschuba 1998): the astounding success of these national pat-
terns, which were created and distributed in the national movements of
the nineteenth century and beyond, was primarily a matter of aesthetic
and cultural conception. Implementing national feelings and identities
was the task of organized rituals and practices, such as singing ‘ancient’
folksongs, doing gymnastics (Turnvater Jahn, see Goltermann 1998) or
wearing traditional costumes, such as the members of shooting or marks-
men’s clubs (Schützenvereine).
By employing cultural forms and through a constant national educa-
tion, the national movement replaced the power of religion with a new
metaphysical ideology, such as nationalism. The national duties and ritu-

als became almost a religious service. German historian Michael Stürmer
(1993: 91) pointed at the role of religious processions that—in the nine-
teenth century—turned into national parades with participants waving
flags and singing chorally. Ever since this cultural repertoire was invented,
all its components have been employed to create a ‘mythical common-
ness’, excluding ‘the others’. In sum, European Ethnologist Wolfgang
Kaschuba (1998) is right when he concludes that the idea of having a
national identity became—as a common-sense knowledge—something
innate, taken for granted as a precondition of human existence. As he
puts it: it is one of the most astounding acts of training that the national
anthem or flag can trigger ‘authentic’ feelings in such a reliable pattern
and predicable way even today.
After having been exploited in Nazi times and subsequently treated
with ambivalence in post-war times (see Fullbrook 1999; Miller-Idriss
and Rothenberg 2012), German identity appeared to have again acquired
a positive value after German reunification and in the context of immi-
gration: during the debate on the dual citizenship the phrase ‘proud to be
German’ could be heard again in everyday speech. Expressions such as
‘real German’ or ‘German mentality’, which, for example, an Italian, as
one letter to the editor argued, would never be able to feel or to adopt,
proved how emotional the national discourses had once again become. A
very romantic language was employed: deutsche Denkungs- und
Wesensart—an idiom which could be translated as the typical German
way of thinking according to a specific ‘national character’. National
romantic feelings transformed everyday life and infused its language,
metaphors and phrases.
Therefore, the ‘real Germans’ were to be distinguished from the ‘half
Germans’ or ‘hybrid Germans’ who own another, second passport. New
derogatory terms and idioms, such as ‘part-time Germans’ and ‘children’s
citizenship’ (Kinderstaatsbürgerschaft) were dissimenated through mass media
and were popular at least for a period of time. These terms are due to the
planned and then ratified compromise to give the German passport to chil-
dren born in Germany despite having another citizenship through their par-
ents. However, they should decide on one citizenship when they reach the
age of 23, as the Liberals, the FDP, suggested successfully. (In 2014 another
60 I. Götz
act lifted this limitation and dual citizenship for German-born children
became generally accepted.)
This diffusion of old and new categories also concerned ‘the others’ or
‘foreigners’. The act of othering was no longer taboo but a widely accepted
practice in everyday debates around the CDU tables. The following are
some of the traditional phrases which became very popular in those days:
‘strangers’ were designated as ‘guests’—in the tradition of the euphemis-
tic term ‘guest workers’ who were brought to Germany from Southern
Europe between the 1950s and 1970s (but have actually chosen to stay in
Germany permanently—a fact which German politicians neglected for a
long time). No distinction was usually made between different groups of
non-Germans. These ‘guests’ should not generally stay too long, nor
should they be allowed to utter “demands”, for example, claim the right
to vote. Due to the concentration of Turks, the prototype of the foreigner
was ‘the Islamist’. Most of the supporters of the CDU campaign vowed
to sign against the Muslim who supposedly builds mosques and oppresses
his wife.
One of the most popular topics of communication was the so-called
criminal and dirty Ausländer. For some Germans whom I interviewed
after they had signed the CDU lists (see Götz 2011), the fear of losing
their job was one reason for their support of the CDU campaign. They
said that they were afraid of being disadvantaged. Thus, social prob-
lems, such as the unwillingness or fear of having to share social privi-
leges or jobs on a restricted labour market with “newcomers”, and
economic as well as cultural differences were explained in terms of sim-
plistic ethnic categories and closely linked to questions of political
membership. The case study illustrates how national semantics and
symbols are produced or reactivated and instrumentalized to gain polit-
ical power on a local or even nationwide level. It explores how cultural
anthropology can contribute to a critical understanding of the pro-
cesses of developing political culture in the face of the challenges of
redefining the nation and national identity in the global world. It also
shows how a seemingly secular context—the redefinition of citizenship
by a new law accounting for the post-migrant society—can lead to the
re-sacralization of a traditional concept, such as the nation state, that

had been deemed outdated in times of post-national connectedness
and global movements. The re-sacralization of the national repertoire
that was expected to expire in the post-war era came with a surprise and
has not been studied sufficiently (see also Shoshan 2016). The national
idea is, on the one hand, linked to secularism: the woman with the
headscarf is a danger to this secularist stance; on the other hand, the
national culture itself is sometimes upgraded to a somehow quasi-
religious and sacrosanct heritage to be protected. The national notion
certainly also entails the conception of demos; however, the rights as
equal and free citizens are often treated as an exclusive property or as
something that is deserved only in cases of assimilation to the secular
order. The questions of loyalty that were encountered in the debates in
Germany are part of this notion of citizenship that has turned out to be
a highly contested issue.
However, new models and images were also disseminated as a reaction
to this conservative process. As a result of the reform of the citizenship
law, the ‘red-green’ ruling party launched other campaigns in 2000 and
later: posters, postcards and virtual advertising actions on the Internet
showed ‘new Germans’, they gave Germany new faces (Fig. 3.4).
Such campaigns were intended to acquaint the German majority with
‘black-haired’ or ‘dark’ people who should be recognized as ‘typical
Germans’, as the texts of the posters with German-Turkish immigrants
implies: ‘German Turk—thinks German, speaks German’.
Symbols and practices, cultural forms and a national language have
had an effect on individual concepts of belonging and form a collective
national consciousness. They create it, as the patterns in question are
available in the collective memory. New images may also help to change
this notion of belonging. However, it is an open question whether and
how post-national icons, ‘new Germans’ and open ideas will be able to
modify the traditional pictures of being a German citizen. The traditional
ethnic notion and the nationalist sentiments and resentments seem to be
taken for granted as unchangeable realities by many people to the
present day.
62 I. Götz
Fig. 3.4 Campaign of the German government promoting the new German
Nationality Law: Einbürgerung: Fair. Gerecht. Tolerant (Naturalization: fair, just,
tolerant.) (2000), photograph I.G., placard on a house wall, Berlin
Outlook
In sum, the debate on dual citizenship coming up mostly in times of elec-
tions finally proves how long-lasting the effects of this nationalist training
are and how difficult it is to deconstruct the old notion of the nation and
its very sentiments and resentments of ‘us’ and ‘them’ in the line of ‘eth-
nos’ and an inherited culture. The recent success of right-wing groups
and parties throughout Europe is worrying. A new populist stance can be
observed in politics everywhere, from Europe to the US, from Russia to
Turkey. I am sceptical whether a kind of post-national consciousness or a
new sense of cosmopolitanism besides the circles of some intellectuals in
academia will ever develop. It is all about long-lasting sentiments and
resentments which are easy to recall, and this makes me pessimistic, as the
acceptance of societal changes is something that needs a deeper under-
standing and willingness to support long-lasting and complicated
procedures of a nation rebuilding in accordance with immigration. The

new old nationalist populism seems to be much easier to follow; it is
much catchier than the rationale of a post-national idea of citizenship
separated from the idea of ethnos, and promises a lot. Most of all, it leaves
its followers with the wonderful feeling of serving the good old nation as
a great communion, to fight the newcomers, as well as incompetent and
no longer trustworthy politicians and a European Union that seems to be
another scapegoat: it can—according to the logics of populist persuad-
ers—simply be blamed for the decline of the welfare state, for the debt
crises and weakness of the Euro, and for the transformation of everyday
life-worlds. Thus, finally, the notion of national identity is nourished by
the quasi-religious desire for salvation that is still or again being trans-
formed into the secular shape of the national state, which can be purified
from all problems and scapegoats easily, a communion and paradise
on earth.
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Part II
Public Space
4
Religion, Aesthetics, and Hurt
Sentiment: On the Visibility and Erasure
of a Muslim Minority in India
Stefan Binder
One of the Hindi words for secularism is sarva dharma sambhāva. It is often
translated as ‘all religions are true’ and is taken to express the distinct and
distinctly religious character of Indian secularism. The notion of a ‘secular
sacred’ in the sense of an intricate entwinement of religion and secularism as
well as religious and national belonging are largely considered common
sense in India. At the same time, however, current understandings of nation-
alism, democracy, and culture in India are increasingly marked by aggressive
assertions of Hindu majoritarianism, within which all religions may be
equally true but not, therefore, equally Indian. Within such a Hindu nation-
alist framework, the secular-sacred as a modern formation of religious, com-
munal, and national belonging becomes paradoxical and precarious for
religious minorities. In this contribution, I focus on public rituals of Shia1
1
I follow the colloquial use prevalent among my interlocutors in Hyderabad who, when speaking
in English, use the word ‘Shia’—rather than Arabic derivations like ‘Shi‘ī,’ ‘Shi‘ite’ or ‘Shi‘ism’—as
both an adjective and noun to refer to themselves and their community.
S. Binder (*)
University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland
e-mail: stefan.binder@isek.uzh.ch

70 S. Binder
Muslims in the South Indian city of Hyderabad in order to explore how

certain kinds of aesthetic visibility may entail forms of erasure for the sacred-
secular identity of a religious minority within a majoritarian representa-
tional regime. After a brief introduction of dominant understandings of
Indian secularism as a historically specific formation of the sacred-secular in
the first section, I present a vignette from the movie set of a recently released
Telugu blockbuster, whose cinematic use of Shia religious ritual offended
the sentiments of that community. Focusing on the unstable affective
dimensions of Shia public religion in Hyderabad, the third section locates
the cause of the movie’s offence in a ‘perverted’ commodification of Shia
aesthetics that disregards and erodes the secular-sacred formation of Shia
identity.
eligious Communalism and the Secular

R
Sacred in India
Scholars and public intellectuals have stressed time and again that, in
India, the secular is not the opposite of religion but of so-called commu-
nalism: a politicized form of collective identity grounded in religious
belonging (or caste), which is supposed to be a distinctive feature of
Indian society and its colonial history (Pandey 1992; Veer 1994; Tejani
2008). Moreover, secularism has been defined not only negatively as the
opposite of communalism but also positively as a tolerant, peaceful, and
celebratory form of religious diversity and co-existence. The reality of this
ideal has come under serious doubt, especially since the political rise of
the Hindutva movement and an increasingly chauvinist and violent asser-
tion of Hindu nationalism since the 1980s (Needham and Rajan 2007).
Debates about secularism and the role of religion in Indian society usu-
ally hinge on a unanimous rejection of communalism, which designates
a social formation based on a more or less calculated and harmful blur-
ring of the boundaries between religion, politics, and culture—regardless
of where and how exactly those boundaries are drawn. While earlier anal-
yses tended to attribute such blurring to the supposedly derivative nature
or flawed realization of secularism—and modernity more generally—in
4 Religion, Aesthetics, and Hurt Sentiment: On the Visibility… 71
colonial and postcolonial India, current scholarship on secularism sug-

gests that the production of collective identities based on religious belong-
ing as well as discourses of majoritarianism and (religious) minoritization
are intrinsic to liberal democracies and nation-states in all modern societ-
ies (Asad 2003; Mahmood 2016). Precisely to the extent that modern
secularism has sought to depoliticize religion by relegating it to the pri-
vate sphere and the domain of culture, it has ended up emphasizing and,
in some ways, creating religious difference and inequality as a fundamen-
tal and naturalized (because apolitical) aspect of civil society.
The logic of majoritarianism underlying the working of secular nation-
states was further reinforced in the colonial setting of British India, where
access to formal politics was severely restricted for colonial subjects. Since
the policy of “religious neutrality” after the rebellion of 1857 entailed the
colonial state’s commitment to non-interference in religious matters,
public religion became the primary idiom for legitimate assertions of
individual and collective identities and their political interests (Freitag
1989; Pandey 1992). Thomas Blom Hansen states that the emergence of
the political field in colonial India was ‘marked by mobilization around a
communal antagonism so deep that one may argue that the majority of
Indians who came to know themselves as political subjects did so through
categories, knowledge, and stereotypes that, one way or the other and not
always explicitly, were woven around communitarian symbols and related
to this communal antagonism’ (1999: 209). The concept of the secular
sacred as proposed by this edited volume is an apt analytical lens to
describe this historical configuration, where neat distinctions between
religion, politics, and culture break down, insofar as their entanglement
constitutes the very ground on which subjectivities and forms of person-
hood are constituted.
In this context, questions of affect and emotion are central to the
workings of Indian secularism. The depoliticization of religion in British
India assumed that religion had to be not only separated but also pro-
tected from politics, as recurring eruptions of communal riots (or anti-
colonial rebellion) would prove that it is the font of primordial and
potentially violent ‘sentiments,’ which cannot be controlled rationally or
politically (Viswanath 2010). As a consequence, the protection of
72 S. Binder
so-called hurt sentiment has not only become part of the political ratio-
nality of Indian secularism; it has also been structured by Hindu nation-
alism’s majoritarian logic, to the effect that the extent to which particular
sentiments are in fact protected varies with the social, political, and eco-
nomic dominance of those to whom they are ‘sacred’ (Viswanath 2016;
see also Jaffrelot 2008). In other words, communal belonging is ‘sacred,’
and therefore deemed capable of inspiring potentially violent reactions to
real or perceived transgressions, not primarily for being couched in reli-
gious symbols, but for constituting a sense of belonging that conflates the
boundaries between religion and nation, self and community, secular
state and religious society, political rights and personhood.
This does not imply, however, that communal identities or imaginaries
of the nation were simply given. The supposed homogeneity of religious
communities as building blocks of a pluralist nation are precarious
achievements, which are in need of being continuously policed and
enforced (Veer 1994; Jalal 2000). Especially in view of the ‘constructed-
ness’ of communal identities—which does in no way lessen their ‘force-
fulness’ or ‘reality’—it is important to note that within majoritarian
understandings of democracy and nationalism, different communities
face different kinds of constraints and possibilities not only for construct-
ing their secular-sacred identities but also for positioning them in relation
to the nation.
An important aspect of the reformulation of Hindu nationalism since
the 1980s into a form of ‘public culture’ (Hansen 1999: 4), rather than
merely a religious or political movement, pertains to the production of
what Arvind Rajagopal calls ‘Retail Hindutva’ (2001: 66). This refers to a
process whereby transforming media environments allowed for Hindu
visual culture and aesthetics to be severed from socially restricted ritual
contexts and to be made available for public consumption across caste
and sectarian divides. The commodification of religious culture enabled
hitherto excluded or segregated social groups to participate in an over-
arching and, therefore, majoritarian Hindu culture and identity, which
could be redefined as the nation and thus become a form of political
participation as well. While this was intimately tied to the transformed
political economy and social setup of post-liberalization India (Dasgupta

2006), Retail Hindutva could thrive on a much longer history of Hindu
hegemony within anticolonial and postcolonial projects of nation build-
ing (see e.g. Uberoi 2002; Ramaswamy 2010). Especially Muslim and
Christian minorities have become not only hyper-visible, when com-
pared to the more or less unmarked and naturalized Hinduness of the
nation, but also paradoxical: due to their ‘foreign’ origins and global net-
works, the principle of their belonging, that is, their religious tradition, is
simultaneously the principle of their otherness and their potentially sus-
pect national loyalties (Jalal 2000; Sherman 2015). After 1857, and espe-
cially in the wake of Partition, Muslims were therefore thrown back onto
an ‘abject citizenship’ (Sherman 2015: 12), since an explicitly political
mobilization as a Muslim community would risk undercutting its legiti-
macy by raising the specter of extraterritorial loyalties towards either
Pakistan or the Middle East, as well as the specter of communalism as an
illegitimate form of the secular sacred.
To a large extent, public debates on communalism and majoritarian-
ism focus on the question of Hindu–Muslim relations. While other reli-
gious minorities (Christians, Sikhs, Jains, etc.) may be conspicuous by
their absence, the case of Shia Islam is ambivalent because it is often hid-
den in plain sight within the category of Muslim minority. In fact, Shia
Muslims2 have consolidated their sense of identity as a distinct commu-
nity primarily in relation to the intra-religious majority of Sunni Muslims,
rather than in contradistinction to Hinduism (Jones 2012). The follow-
ing ethnographic vignette is intended to provide an entry point to the
contemporary dynamics of sentiment that structure Shia identity in its
specific location as a ‘double minority’ in Hyderabad.
2
The category of ‘Shia’ is, of course, by no means internally homogeneous and is itself structured
by majoritarian configurations. By speaking simply of ‘Shias,’ my own contribution engages in a
process of sectarian subsumption, where the specificities of various groups of Ismailis, for example,
are occluded by the dominance of a majority of Twelver-Shias in Hyderabad. This also demon-
strates the fractal nature of majoritarianism, and the Twelver-community is itself fragmented in
different sectarian—and unequally ‘large’—factions of ūsūlī and akhbārī (further subdivisions
could be retraced at ever more granular levels of ethnographic specificity).
74 S. Binder
he Precarity of Shia Visibility: Between

T
Hurting Oneself and Being Hurt
‘Ok! Now, very serious; I don’t want to see any smiles! Lots of grief and
pain. Three, two, one, action … Cut!’ yelled the director for the 136th
time, and the slightest sigh of frustration flowed through the plywood set
of Hyderabad’s Old City erected on an open field around thirty kilome-
ters outside of the city. We were in the midst of an action scene for a
major Telugu blockbuster movie. Each take lasted only a couple of sec-
onds and showed the film’s hero, famous ‘mega power star’ Ram Charan
Teja, thrashing a villainous antagonist against the dramatic backdrop of a
Shia Muharram procession, the most important event in the ritual calen-
dar of Shias in Hyderabad. Hero and villain were flanked by a cordon of
bare-chested Shia mourners (mātamdār) engaged in zanjīr mātam, a spec-
tacular and highly contested form of ritual self-flagellation with scourges
made of blades attached to a metal chain, while the whole shot was
framed by a colorful cinematic imagination of ‘Muslim’ onlookers.
Squeezed under a small arcade of a fake storefront in order to escape the
midday sun, I was watching the scene together with a group of around
twenty youngsters from the main Shia neighborhood in Hyderabad’s Old
City. Dressed as Shia mourners, we were waiting for our scene; we were,
it would turn out, waiting in vain.
The previous day, my friend Ali3 had asked me if I wanted to come
along to an educational event. He and some other youths from the neigh-
borhood had been invited to perform a Shia mourning ritual for a group
of students—or visitors, nobody knew exactly—in order to teach them
about Shia religion. When we met the following day, rumor had it that
we would be part of a documentary about different ritual practices of
various religious communities in India. As more and more youngsters
were gathering, however, it transpired that instead of a documentary, the
two coaches provided for us would be taking us to a movie shoot of a
commercial Telugu film. The shoot was already in full swing when the
two crammed buses arrived at the bustling movie set. On entering the
Name changed.
3
premises, we were earnestly warned against making any form of recording

or photo, which would cost us the 500 rupees we had been promised as
pay. A woman in charge of casting began splitting us into two groups by
selecting the twenty tallest and most ‘light-skinned’ ones among us (me
included) as the main group of mourners, while the rest was allocated to
some or the other group of extras. After dressing up—or rather undress-
ing—as ‘typical’ mātamdār with bare chest, white cotton pants splattered
with fake blood, a black shawl wrapped around the waist, and thick
surma (kohl) under our eyes, we began waiting.
During the ten hours we spent at the set, we were led three times into
plywood Hyderabad, only to be told after some time to continue waiting
outside, as the current scene was taking more takes than expected. At
around six o’clock in the evening, it had become apparent that our scene
would not be shot that day. Despite being invited to return the next day,
nobody was willing to do so. In fact, after the initial excitement of being
part of a cinema movie had died down, the group of ‘Old City boys’
became not only increasingly bored but also irritated and finally angry
while wasting away the day. Initially, it only seemed a bit absurd to have
two bus-loads of Shias from one of the most important centers of Shia
culture in India transported to a movie set in order to have them observe
one of their most sacred ritual practices being simulated by a number of
‘actors from Chennai,’ as my friends from the Old City sarcastically
referred to the Telugu extras performing zanjīr mātam. The director’s
repeated instructions to make serious faces and look grieved seemed to jar
uneasily with the deep and distinctly visible scars that actual blades had
left on the chests and backs of the Shia youths watching, half-naked and
uncomfortable, from the sidelines. ‘Look how they stare at us,’ com-
mented Ali during one of the times we were led onto the set, ‘it’s because
we are the real Shias.’
By the end of the day, the mood had turned sour and the group of
young Shias were outraged and offended; it had become evident that in a
fight scene, the hero slashes his enemy to death with one of the blades
used during zanjīr mātam. This, Ali explained, was entirely inappropri-
ate, as these blades are not at all weapons and are never wielded against
other people, least of all as murder instruments; they are objects used
exclusively on one’s own body in a ritual context meant to commemorate,
76 S. Binder
grieve, and participate in the acts of martyrdom through which Imam

Hussain and his followers and family sacrificed themselves for the sake of
Islam and a just society in the battle of Karbala in 680 CE. The young
men felt offended by this misappropriation and were deeply worried
about what the audience of Telugu cinema and ‘other religions’ would
think about Shia religion when seeing that scene. After all, Shia religion
is already famous—or rather infamous—for its spectacular rituals of pub-
lic self-mortification that appear extreme and unsettling to many outsid-
ers (including the majority of Sunni Muslims) and are subject to
controversial debate regarding their Islamic legality among Twelver-Shias
themselves (more on this below).
I had initially interpreted the anger and outrage of my Shia interlocu-
tors as a matter of authenticity and as a question of who had the right—
or the knowledge, ability, and skill—to ‘correctly’ represent Shia religion
in a popular mass medium, yet it seemed to point to a more fundamental
problem of visibility. In fact, Ali and many others who refused to return
the following day to the set were relieved that they were not given the
‘chance’ to represent themselves, as their inclusion in the scene would
have made things worse. A contorted depiction of their ritual instrument
in a Telugu movie was bad enough; but if the elders of their community
ever saw them in such a film scene, they would be scandalized by the fact
that their own youngsters were part of such nonsense, condoning and
authenticating it, as it were, through the presence and visibility of their
bodies. ‘They would kill us!’ Ali exclaimed. Feeling already humiliated
and neglected throughout the day (‘They didn’t even provide tea for us,’
someone remarked bitterly, pointing out the felt lack of minimal signs of
appreciation and courtesy), we were furthermore made to wait
another two hours after we had gotten onto the buses that would take us
home to the city. Apparently, someone had taken a selfie and we could
not leave before all legal matters had been sorted out. The men who had
organized our trip started scolding us, urging us to immediately delete
any and all pictures we might have taken. They were disappointed at such
reckless and embarrassing behavior, which would reflect very badly on
the whole community; it took indeed a few days of negotiations to have
the money we had been promised as pay finally reach the Old City.
It is important to note that the hurt sentiments of the young Shia men
were caused by a perceived mishandling of an artefact used in a ritual
practice that has come to be iconic for but also contested among Shias,
rather than any actual or explicit representation of the ritual as such; at
the time of the shoot, we had known nothing about the film’s plot and its
actual representation of Shia religion (the film’s title, Vinaya Vidheya
Rama, and teaser were released only two months later). What elicited
anger was rather a perceived carelessness and insensitivity about what the
ritual blades mean to Shias and what kind of image about Shia religion
their misuse in a deadly fight scene could, potentially, evoke.
In an inquiry into the concept of offensive pictures, Christoph
Baumgartner (2018) follows philosopher Harry G. Frankfurt in arguing
that pictures that offend do so because they are perceived to violate an
image about which people have come to ‘care’ in a way that incorporates
those pictures into their very identity and sense of personhood (see also
Mahmood 2009). Such cared-for images are not just pictures to which
people relate as external objects, but which have become part of how
people relate to themselves and their world; their power to offend is
therefore not only a cognitive process but ‘touches’ the embodied self in
a material and sensorial sense (Verrips 2018). In the case at hand, the
careless cinematic use of ritual blades for self-flagellation as a casual mur-
der weapon wielded against another gains its offensive touch precisely by
transgressing and, in fact, inverting, a crucial limitation regarding the
kinds of bodies those blades may legitimately touch. In order to fully
grasp the offensive implications of this inversion—and its casualness—it
is necessary to place the practice of zanjīr mātam in its larger ritual, his-
torical, and representational context in contemporary Hyderabad.
hedding Blood: Pious Embodiment

S
and Precarious Representation
The Hyderabadi Twelver-Shia annually commemorates the martyrium of
Imam Hussain and his followers during a mourning period (‘azādārī) of
68 days, starting on the first day of the Islamic month of Muharram.
78 S. Binder
Mātam is a central part of mourning practices and refers to public or

private recitations of dirges accompanied by ritual crying and forms of
self-mortification, ranging from rather soft rhythmic claps on the chest,
to choreographed styles of intense two-handed chest-beating (sīnah-zanī)
performed by male mourning associations (anjumān), to spectacular
forms of “bloody” (khūnī) mātam with different kinds of knives and
blades (Pinault 1992; Howarth 2005). The arguably most important and
well-known ritual event in the Shia calendar is Ashura, the day of Imam
Hussain’s martyrdom on 10th of Muharram, when a large procession
attended by thousands of people, including Hindus and Sunnis, is orga-
nized through the streets of the main Shia quarters in Hyderabad’s his-
toric Old City. This procession, which traditionally includes forms of
zanjīr mātam, was re-enacted during the movie shoot.
While the clerical establishment in post-revolutionary Iran has explic-
itly condemned and prohibited khūnī mātam as heterodox innovation
(bid’ah), Shia authorities in Iraq and especially in South Asia tend to at
least tolerate it as an expression of popular devotion with varying degrees
of legal or scriptural legitimacy. Besides religious doctrines regarding the
integrity of the body and the impurity of blood, a major argument raised
against khūnī mātam concerns its potential to make Shia religion appear
archaic, uncivilized, or fanatical to external observers, who may be unfa-
miliar with its theological, devotional, or historical foundations (see
Pinault 2001: 29–56). These concerns are not entirely unfounded, as
many of my (non-Shia) interlocutors in Hyderabad talk with a sort of
recoiling fascination about ‘azādārī as that quite unfathomable thing that
Shias do; however, many people know rather little about what is actually
going on, besides the fact that, on the Day of Ashura, blood and tears will
flow in the streets of the Old City for the sake of Imam Hussain. ‘Azādārī
and especially khūnī mātam on Ashura have become emblematic for the
social and temporal (‘archaic’) otherness of the Shias as a distinct com-
munity, yet they also constitute the most important trope for integrating
them into the time-space of the nation. The striking aesthetics of Shia
ritual provide the grounds for making Shias a maybe problematic but
nonetheless distinctly recognizable—or rather displayable—part of India’s
religious pluralism. Their specific history in South Asia furthermore
locates them firmly within the discourse of India’s ‘composite culture’ as
the historical foundation for the nation’s secular unity in diversity

(Jones 2012).
Especially in popular histories of Hyderabad, the ‘catholic’ nature of
Muharram commemorations and the continuous patronage they have
received by a diverse range of Shia, Sunni, and secular, that is, post-
independence, governments are widely considered to be hallmarks of the
City’s contribution to the supposedly intrinsic tolerance and secularism
of India’s Indo-Persian composite culture. In academic research, as well as
everyday discourse, communalist perceptions of ‘azādārī as an exclusively
Shia event are often understood as a historical departure from its erst-
while cross-communal nature and appeal (Hyder 2006; Freitag 2007;
Jones 2012). Among Shias, this registers in a pervasive temporal regime
of nostalgia, which maps narratives of religious decadence onto the com-
munity’s socio-economic decline and minoritization in post-Partition
India, as well as the material deterioration and ghettoization of the Old
City, as the historical center of Shia social and ritual life (Mirza 2017).
Many of my Shia interlocutors emphasize and indeed welcome the
continuing participation of other religious communities in Ashura com-
memorations, which they perceive as testimony to the universal scope of
the ethical model and spiritual power of the Imams and the Prophet’s
family (ahl-e bait). Popular narratives around the battle of Karbala and
Imam Husain’s martyrdom revolve around a moral paradigm of ‘ḥusaini
ethics’ or ḥusainiyyat (Ruffle 2011: 5; see also Deeb 2009), whose gender
and age-specific ideals of moral conduct encode values of sacrifice and
steadfastness in the face of injustice and adversity. Precisely because the
moral paradigm encoded by the battle of Karbala has been open to both
revolutionary and quietist interpretations, it has been a powerful concep-
tual and moral resource for negotiating different forms of political behav-
ior and, especially in South Asia, national belonging. In the context of
Indian communalism, quietist interpretations of ḥusaini symbols of mar-
tyrdom as a form of self-sacrifice for the sake of community (rather than
an incitement to revolt) have provided an apt aesthetic idiom for a depo-
liticized and inward-facing secular-sacred identity of Shia and Sunni
Muslims alike (Freitag 2007).
As one of the most spectacular and affectively charged forms of ‘azādārī,
zanjīr mātam has become an overdetermined and unstable symbol, which
80 S. Binder
conjoins diverging temporalities and indices of locality, as it negotiates a

Shia minority identity that oscillates between otherness and belonging.
Zanjīr mātam may be subject to anachronizing devaluations as irrational
‘archaism,’ which locates it in a religious and ritual time outside the ambit
of modernity and nationalism. However, it can also be anchored in the
historicity of the nation, insofar as it indexes the nostalgic past and pre-
carious present of India’s composite culture. The localness of that culture,
however, can be challenged within a Hindu nationalist framework, where
its Indo-Persian origins evoke notions of foreignness and the specter of
Muslims’ extraterritorial loyalties. This is further complicated by reform-
ers within the Shia community, who orient themselves toward religious
authorities in the Middle East, especially Iran, and oppose quietist inter-
pretations of ḥusaini ethics as self-sacrifice. These reformers tend to align
themselves with a larger (Sunni) reformist discourse and historicist
notions of a ‘pure,’ original Islam (Mirza 2014). They contest the legiti-
macy of zanjīr mātam by interpreting it not as a sign of the archaism of
Shia Islam but as a symptom of its syncretic contamination by an idola-
trous and superstitious Hindu environment.
Zanjīr mātam clearly demonstrates the precarity of the secular-sacred
as a form of identity and citizenship for the Shia minority: as a spectacu-
lar sign of extraordinary pious commitment, which literally inscribes
itself as scars into the surface of the body, it is a powerful way to embody
a Shia identity that hovers uneasily between national belonging and oth-
erness. The majority of Shias, ‘traditional’ as well as ‘reformist,’ are acutely
aware of this precarity, which manifests most forcefully in a sort of anxi-
ety around media representations of ‘azādārī in general and zanjīr mātam
in particular. Most of my Shia interlocutors not only tolerated me as an
outsider at their rituals but actively encouraged my participation and
welcomed my interest in their community. At the same time, many a
conversation started with a request to tell what, if anything, I actually
knew about Shia religion, followed usually by an inquiry about what
‘gain’ (fā’idah) I, and more importantly my superiors and those who
funded my research, hoped to get out of this project; ‘academic knowl-
edge’ often seemed to be a not entirely satisfying or credible answer.
Regardless, my insistence on wanting to learn and understand was favor-
ably contrasted with a superficial curiosity in the sensational appearance
of their rituals, which was often illustrated by stories about outsiders,

especially documentary filmmakers, who simply come, record, and leave.
There was, however, no general objection or sense of censure with
regard to witnessing or making recordings of religious events. Even
though it was made plain that it would take a lot of time and effort for
me to even begin penetrating the spiritual and philosophical depths of
Shia religion, it was nonetheless expected that I would be recording vid-
eos and taking photographs. My reluctance and perceived tardiness in
doing so seemed curious to many people. Again, my answer that, in terms
of technical quality, there was already plenty of well-produced documen-
tation available—especially on the internet—seemed unsatisfactory.
Despite the aforementioned discourse of nostalgia and religious deca-
dence among Shias, my interlocutors also tend to report a drastic increase
in ritual activity since at least the 2000s. This has been accompanied by
continuously expanding private as well as commercial practices of visual
and audiovisual mediations through local TV channels and especially
social media. All large, public ‘azādārī events can be watched through
multiple live streams on Youtube and Facebook, but also many organizers
of smaller, private mourning gatherings hire people to record and docu-
ment their rituals.
Such media practices can be understood in reference to the important
role of public ritual for collective self-assertions within the secular-sacred
framework of Indian communalism but also with regard to an economy
of spiritual merit and social prestige characteristic of a ritual life that
depends largely on private patronage. However, I want to focus here on
the fact that the simultaneous desirability and anxiety surrounding medi-
ated representations of controversial ritual practices like zanjīr mātam
turn out to be linked less to actual processes of consumption than to the
larger social circumstances and conditions of production within a secular-
sacred public. The images commissioned and produced by the Shia com-
munity are hardly distinguishable from those made by outsiders as far as
their ‘content’ is concerned. More importantly, their open accessibility
leaves them always vulnerable to being ‘de-contextualized’ and ‘re-
contextualized’ (see Bauman and Briggs 1990) in uncontrollable, poten-
tially adverse ways, once they circulate on the internet and in other media
environments (like journalistic or anthropological texts). As Ali told me
82 S. Binder
during the movie shoot: ‘Our religion is very famous… but, unfortu-
nately, not in a good way.’ In the conclusion, I want to return to the shoot
of Vinaya Vidheya Rama and further unpack what I mean by social condi-
tions of production and how they regulate the affective impact of media
images in relation to issues of agency and power.
Conclusion
I argue that the outrage and hurt sentiment experienced by my Shia
interlocutors during the movie shoot, as well as the more general anxiety
surrounding mediations of ‘azādārī and zanjīr mātam, are tethered less to
explicit messages and media texts than the current conditions of their
production. Rajagopal’s concept of ‘Retail Hindutva’ (2001: 66) captures
an important aspect of those conditions, namely the possibility of national
belonging and political participation via the consumption of a commer-
cialized aesthetics of Hindu religion refigured as the cultural foundation
of the nation. At a fundamental level, this process of refiguring the nation
has a gendered dimension, insofar as Hindu nationalist discourse has pre-
mised the wellbeing and ascendency of the nation on the ‘recuperation’
of Hindu masculinity, which in turn required an ‘expunging’ of a threat-
ening Muslim Other through both actual and symbolic acts of violence
(Hansen 1996: 138). Next to print media, television and cinema have
been the foremost vehicles for the nationalist aestheticizing of a majori-
tarian Hindu identity by either marginalizing, excluding, or vilifying
Muslim men in representations of the nation (for an overview of Muslim
themes in Hindi cinema see Dwyer 2006a: 97–131). While film scholar
Rachel Dwyer (2006b) cautions against conflating the predominance of
Hindu practices in Hindi film with Hindutva ideology, especially in the
absence of explicitly anti-Muslim texts, it is important to also pay atten-
tion to how Retail Hindutva’s ideological and affective force operates
beyond the level of explicit media texts.
Indian cinema’s relative resistance to overtly Hindu nationalist and
anti-Muslim messages is often explained by a confluence of state censor-
ship, the uncertain commercial viability of radical stances for a risky and
capital-intensive enterprise like cinema, and the disproportionately large
number of Muslims working in the film industry. However, the example

of Vinaya Vidheya Rama suggests that Hindu majoritarianism does not
necessarily operate by vilifying a Muslim Other; rather, it may ‘expunge’
his potentially threatening presence by reducing it to a ‘merely’ aesthetic
background in the service of Hindu masculine power. Vinaya Vidheya
Rama opened in cinemas in January 2019 during Sankranti, one of the
most important Hindu festivals and holidays in Andhra Pradesh and thus
a prime season for film releases. The film received overall crushing reviews,
especially in the English press, for a weak and unimaginative story relish-
ing in toxic masculinity: the plot revolves around a Hindu hero, Rama
(Ram Charan), who single-handedly kills hordes of criminal goondas in
extravagantly violent feats of martial prowess in order to protect his fam-
ily from a terrifying Bihari crime lord, who has come in conflict with
Rama’s eldest brother, an upright election commissioner. While the fight
scene against the backdrop of Shia ritual made it into the trailer and con-
stitutes a climactic moment just before the movie’s intermission, the Shia
ritual itself is merely a backdrop and has no narrative significance what-
soever: it functions as an aesthetic device to heighten the dramatic impact
of the over-the-top action sequence. Neither the main character wielding
the ritual blades nor the, as far as narrative goes, expendable bodies on
which they are put to use are marked in any perceptible sense as Shia. In
the cinematic universe, Shia characters were not implicated in the ‘per-
version’ of self-sacrifice into killing spree; they were arbitrarily introduced
for the sole purpose, it seems, of providing a dramatic ambience and a
“sensible” reason for a spectacular murder weapon to be at hand.
It matters little that we did not know the plot at the time of the shoot
because, as I suggested above, the hurt sentiment of the Shia youths was
not caused by any explicit misrepresentation of their ritual but by the
apparent carelessness with which the choreography of the fight scene
tapped into the unstable, ambivalent, and controversial symbolism and
affective force of zanjīr mātam. Ultimately, not only the ‘real’ Shias
watching from the sidelines of the set but also their ‘fake’ cinematic ava-
tars (‘actors from Chennai’) in ‘plywood Hyderabad’ were dispossessed
of any form of representational agency—whether positive or negative—
as they were reduced to a dramatic aesthetic surface in the service of a
narrative agenda unconcerned with the predicaments of secular-sacred
84 S. Binder
Shia identity. I argue that the main cause for offence was not really the
evocation of a ‘bad image’ of Shia religion but a sort of ‘non-image.’ The
fight scene evokes an almost ostentatious disregard and disinterested
carelessness for Shia matters, as it decontextualizes, harnesses, and expro-
priates the aesthetics of a spectacular and precarious ritual performance
of Shia masculinity as a dramatic ambience that enhances the virility and
virtuous anger of the film’s Hindu hero (for the cinematic trope of virtu-
ous anger in its relation to Hindutva ideology, see Rajamani 2016). This
process of sovereign expropriation was condensed most pithily in the
perversion of ritual blades into murder weapons. It was also mirrored in
a diffuse sense of denigration and expendability, which the group of
young Shias experienced throughout their stay at the movie set.
The young men may have set out from the Old City with a sense that
they were being invited because of their expertise and authenticity to
perform mātam, but upon arriving on set, they were demoted rather
abruptly from teaching others about Shia religion to being a mere back-
ground—something of which anybody who was ‘tall’ and ‘fair’ enough,
including a white foreigner like myself, was apparently considered capa-
ble. When some of the youth started complaining about the problematic
fight scene, they were told that they were free to leave any time (which
would have been rather difficult, given that there was no public transport
to and from the set). It became clear that their time, presence, and exper-
tise—valued at 500 rupees per head—was expendable and, indeed, not
that valuable after all; at the end of the day, it was made plain to us that
the potential leak of one selfie of the set was worth more than all our time
combined. What did have value, though, was the aesthetic effect of Shia
symbolism—to the extent that it was included in the movie’s trailer and
promotional material.
The concept of the secular sacred captures a socio-political configura-
tion where public and communal forms of religious identity become not
only compatible with but foundational for belonging—or having value—
in modern, secular nation-states. However, the seeming ‘compatibility’ of
the secular and the sacred is undercut by the logic of majoritarian nation-
alism, which requires religious minorities to embody a religious identity
that simultaneously becomes the principle of their exclusion from the
nation. In this contribution, I approached this constitutive precarity in
the context of a popular Telugu ‘mass film,’ where the visibility of a reli-
gious minority identity engenders its simultaneous erasure. In its phan-
tasmal cinematic rendering, zanjīr mātam was divested from its core
function as a symbol for the precarious, secular-sacred identity of Shia
Muslims; it was consumed, as it were, by Retail Hindutva.
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5
Spatial Piety: Shia Religious Processions
and the Politics of Contestation
of Public Space in Northern Nigeria
Murtala Ibrahim
Introduction
A large throng of Shia men and women converged at Hussainiyyah site,
a multipurpose sacred building, housing a mosque and a library, in the
morning of 12 December 2015 in Zaria, Northern Nigeria. The purpose
of the gathering was to perform the ritual of lowering the flag of Imam
Hussein from the dome of Hussainiyyah and to raise the flag of Prophet
Muhammad. As usual, before the ritual would commence, Shia guard
volunteers (khurras) blocked the main road adjacent to the Hussainiyyah
building. Somewhat later, the chief of army staff Lieutenant General
Tukur Yusuf Burutai and his entourage stumbled on the roadblock on
their way to attend a graduation ceremony of military recruits in the
nearby military school. Some of the Lieutenant’s guard soldiers came out
This research is supported by the Dahlem Research School, Freie Universitaet Berlin.
M. Ibrahim (*)
Freie Universität Berlin, Berlin, Germany

90 M. Ibrahim
of their vehicles and asked the Shia khurras to open the road. When the
khurras adamantly refused, the incident turned into a serious altercation
that eventually escalated into a deadly two-day clash between the military
and the gathered Shia. When the conflict ended, hundreds of Shia were
killed, Hussainiyyah demolished, and Sheikh Zakzaky, the Nigerian
leader of the Shia, wounded and incarcerated. According to the Premium
Times, 11 April 2016, the Kaduna government declared that the 347
Shias killed by Nigerian troops had been given a secret mass burial.
The flag of Imam Hussein originally had been flown on top of the
shrine of Imam Hussein in the city of Karbala in Iraq. When the flag was
brought down it was given to Sheikh Zakzaky by Shia clerics in Karbala
in the early 2000s to be hoisted on the Hussainiyyah dome to sacralize
the building. Every Muharram, the first month of the Islamic year, and
the month in which Imam Hussein was killed, Zarian Shias hoist the flag
on the Hussainiyyah after an elaborate ritual that includes parade and
prayers. Each first month of Rabiul Awwalin, in which Prophet
Muhammad was born, the flag of Imam Hussein will be replaced by the
green flag of Prophet Muhammad. The 12 December 2015 clash occurred
on the eve of the ritual of raising the flag of Prophet Muhammad.
The excessive use of force by the military on the unarmed Shia that day
and the refusal of the federal government to acknowledge the extra-
judicial killing revealed the longstanding tension between the Shia com-
munity and the government in Nigeria. Moreover, despite the magnitude
of the 12 December incident in terms of loss of lives, hardly any major
Sunni leaders in the north condemned the massacre. The silence of Sunni
majority on this event indicates the friction and hostility that exist
between Sunni and Shia in the north. The bloodshed of that day is not an
isolated incident but is an extreme example of the conflict and contesta-
tion that define Shia public practices in northern Nigeria and is indica-
tive of the complicated Shia/Sunni/State public space contestations in the
whole of Nigeria. Over the last decades, Shia public practices have become
highly controversial, generating anxiety and sometimes elicit hostile
backlashes from both the dominant Sunni public and state security forces.
This chapter looks at Shia public practices, the so-called Ashura pro-
cessions in particular. These sacred practices, performed in public space,
provide the starting point of the problematic encounters between the
Shias, the secular authorities, and the wider Muslim public. The conflicts
5 Spatial Piety: Shia Religious Processions and the Politics… 91
surrounding the processions foreground, as I will argue, the relationship

between the secular and the sacred. Moreover, the chapter examines how
the Shia processions inscribe their presence in the urban environment
and make their visibility threatening to what the Sunni consider to be the
normal spatial order of northern Nigeria’s urban centers.
A considerable body of literature has been published on the Sunni–
Shia conflicts presently raging in the Middle East and South Asia. These
studies (Allison 2007; Mashal 2014; Rabil 2014; Yusri 2010) document
the historical, political, theological, and social flashpoints and trajectories
that have placed Sunni and Shia on a collision course. However, remark-
ably few studies exist on the Shia in northern Nigeria. Most current stud-
ies tend to situate the Shia within the context of Islamic resurgence and
political Islam in Nigeria and Africa (Amara 2014; Falola 1998;
McCormack 2010). These studies, however, largely ignore the practices
through which Shia religiosity takes shape in public space, not asking
why these practices generate such strong controversies.
This chapter is based on my long-term observations of Shia religious
processions, as well as a number of qualitative studies conducted among
Shia and Sunni leaders and lay followers in the city of Jos, northern
Nigeria.1 I start by briefly presenting the historical background of the
Shia faith and the development of the Ashura procession in northern
Nigeria. Then I discuss how Ashura processions became the battleground
between the Shia and the state authorities. Finally, I discuss how Ashura
processions challenge the dominant Sunni majority in the region and the
resulting politics and contestations of public space.
F rom Student Activist to Islamic

Political Activist
In the 1970s, Nigerian campuses were dominated by two movements:
advocates of communism (the so-called comrades) and active members of
the Muslim Students Society of Nigeria (MSSN). These two powerful
groups competed with one another on the campuses, vying for the loyalty
1
The names of the interlocutors in this chapter are not their true names. I have used pseudonyms
for confidentiality.
92 M. Ibrahim
of the students. During the height of students’ activism, the earlier men-
tioned Sheikh Zakzaky became an active member of the MSSN and
steadily rose to the top leadership of the organization, with an appoint-
ment as Vice President (International Affairs) of the National Body of the
MSSN in 1979.2 In the same year, the Iranian Islamic Revolution
occurred, which saw the monarchy overthrown and replaced with an
Islamic republic under Ayatollah Khomeini. Zakzaky was deeply fasci-
nated by this event and decided to initiate a struggle to replicate a similar
Islamic revolution in Nigeria. Introducing Islamic political activism into
the MSSN brought him into conflict with the university authorities,
which ultimately resulted in the retraction of his degree after graduation.
Zakzaky established the Islamic Movement of Nigeria (IMN) (or
Muslim Brothers) in the early 1980s in order to coordinate the spreading
of his revolutionary ideology. The IMN succeeded in attracting a consid-
erable number of followers, particularly among urban young men and
women. Reputedly, Zakzaky covertly converted to Shia Islam and gradu-
ally and incrementally inculcated Shia elements into the IMN.3 By 1994,
the movement had completely metamorphosed into the Shia branch of
Islam. Presently, Shia membership comprises a substantial number of
youths, students, civil servants, and other lay followers. The national
headquarters of the movement is located in Zaria city and the center of
their activities is called Hussainiyyah, a sacred building, serving as a space
for lectures, studying Shia sacred scriptures, seminars, pedagogy, pilgrim-
age, and parade training.
Even though conversion of members of the IMN to Shia occurred
within the domain of Islam itself, it still entails a radical change in reli-
gious affiliation, identity, and worldview, and a rupture from the past.
What made this remarkable transformation of the religious identity of
such a large number of people possible was the fact that Zakzaky
gradually shaped the IMN structure in accordance with a Shia socio-
religious orientation. Since the early 1980s, Zakzaky has introduced
many Shia religious forms and practices, such as an emphasis on
2
Biography of Sheikh Ibraheem Zakzaky. 2011. https://www.islamicmovement.org/
3
His conversion to Shi’ism is shrouded in secrecy and there is no consensus as to the exact date of
his transition from Sunni to Shia Islam.
muzahara (processions or demonstrations) in public space, celebrating

the birthdays of Ahlulbayt (members of the Prophet’s family through the
descendants of Ali and Fatima), an emphasis on martyrdom, and orient-
ing the IMN’s outlook toward Iran and seeing its system of government
as the only legitimate form of Islamic state in the Muslim world. One of
the central motifs in Zakzaky’s preachings is the issues of economic injus-
tice and inequality in the country. This motif has played a significant role
in rallying potential converts toward the cause of the IMN in the country.
Shia Public Processions (muzahara)

One dimension that distinguishes Shia from other Muslims in northern
Nigeria is their plethora of public spatial practices. These practices include
processions and demonstrations in the urban centers, as well as a variety
of religious activities in public space. The most important of the Shia
public spatial rituals, processions and protests are the already-mentioned
Ashura ritual procession, the day of commemorating the martyrdom of
Imam Hussein; the Arba’een procession, a religious observance that
occurs fourty days after the day of Ashura; and the Quds Day demonstra-
tion, an annual event to express support for the Palestinians and oppose
Israel’s occupation of Jerusalem. In addition, Shia perform public activi-
ties to mark the days of birth and death of all their twelve imams as well
as that of Prophet Muhammad and his daughter Fatima. The most visible
of these public activities take place five times per annum. These rituals/
processions/demonstrations account altogether for a tremendous pres-
ence in the public sphere because of their combination of frequency,
spectacle, and blockade.
The most important of Shia public spatial practices is the Ashura pro-
cession. The Ashura is the public procession ritual performed by Shia
Muslims all over the world to commemorate the death of Hussein Ibn
Ali, the grandson of Prophet Muhammad, in Karbala on the tenth day of
the Islamic month of Muharram.4 The Ashura procession in Nigeria is a
4
The antecedent to the battle of Karbala was the refusal of Hussein to give an oath of allegiance to
Yazid bn Mu’awiya, the new caliph of the Umayyad dynasty. Hussein perceived Yazid as unrigh-
94 M. Ibrahim
recent religious spectacle that started not more than two decades ago. The
origin of the procession in the country can be traced back to the Ashura
preaching rallies, which used to be organized by Zakzaky in Zaria before
the IMN metamorphosed into Shia Islam. These preaching rallies were
part of Zakzaky’s strategy to gradually include Shia elements into IMN
activities. According to one of my interlocutors, in the 1980s and early
1990s, every tenth of Muharram IMN followers from all over the coun-
try would travel to Zaria for the Ashura preaching rally, listening to the
Sheikh preaching about injustice in the country and the need for resis-
tance and sacrifice. My interlocutor told me that at that time they had no
idea about Shia or Ashura rituals.
When the IMN fully converted to Shia, the Ashura procession was
introduced in Zaria as a national event. Shia members from all over the
country converged in Zaria to participate. As time went by, other ele-
ments were introduced to the procession, such as the display of flags, a
passion play, a parade, chest beating and songs. As the Shia population
continued to grow in Northern Nigeria through both natural growth and
proselytization, the processions became decentralized and are, at present,
organized in various cities in the north.
Ashura processions involve men, women, and children marching in
the streets in long rows, clad in black attire. Shia khurras, dressed in khaki
uniforms, are at the front, playing drums and holding black and red flags
of Imam Hussein, leading the procession in a military-style parade. The
procession is accompanied by loud chanting and the singing of highly
emotional songs lamenting the tragedy of Karbala. Some participants
carry oversized pictures of Ibrahim Zakzaky, Imam Khomeini and Ali
Khamenei, as well as images of Imam Hussein. The images of Imam
Hussein play a vital role in shaping, cultivating and directing the
teous, immoral and, therefore, unfit to serve as the leader of the Muslim umma (society). The
people of Kufa summoned Hussein and promised to support him against Yazid. However, Yazid
instructed the governor of Kufa to use force to thwart Hussein’s rebellion and compel him to pledge
allegiance to him. Hussein, his companions and other Ahlulbayt headed toward Kufa, but they were
intercepted by the forces of Yazid in Karbala, in present day Iraq. Despite the courage and gallantry
of Hussein and his companions in a battle that lasted throughout the day of Muharram 10, 61 AH,
they were ultimately overwhelmed. Hussein was killed along with the majority of his companions.
As the Shia community evolved and expanded, public rituals commemorating the death of Hussein
developed and taking place in several Muslim countries.
emotions of grief, focusing the attention of participants on the figure of

the Imam, who is the center of worship of the Ashura ritual. Contrary to
the strict Sunni aniconism observed in Northern Nigeria, which pro-
scribes the use of images of the natural and supernatural world, and the
interdiction of figurative representation, in Shia Islam images, and images
of Hussein in particular, are the constitutive elements of piety.
The Ashura procession is accompanied by an outpouring of emotion,
lamentation and street drama (ta’aziya) reenacting the martyrdom of
Imam Hussein in the battle of Karbala. The emotion generated in Ashura
processions is not nationalistic but is rather conflated with sub-national
and supra-national sentiments that link those taking part in the proces-
sion to the global Shia community. In other words, this emotion rein-
forces a distinct sense of both local and global Shia religious identity. I
suggest to understand this reinforcement of a sense of communal identity
in terms of an aesthetic formation, understood as ‘the convergence of
processes of forming subjects and the making of communities—as social
formations’ (Meyer 2009: 6). This perspective will help to see how some
aspects of the Ashura performances such as special dress, the deployment
of various images, emotional songs, and dramatic performance molds
religious subjects and forges a sense of a distinctive community of believ-
ers and solidarity of belief. The simultaneity and synchronicity of the
practices with other practitioners in different parts of the world help to
generate a sense of being part of a global Shia community. My interlocu-
tors regularly pointed out to me that the Ashura is not a local phenome-
non but rather a global practice performed with other fellow Muslims all
over the world.
The Secular-Sacred Encounter in Public Space

Taking the cue from Talal Asad and Saba Mahmood, the editors of this
book question the idea that ‘the secular’ and ‘the sacred’ are separate cat-
egories, and instead adopt the notion of the ‘secular sacred’, which among
other things focuses on the boundary work through which both catego-
ries are defined, contested, and re-made and reconnected in social and
political practice. The editors also argue against the perception of the
96 M. Ibrahim
public sphere as a site where citizens of the secular state can meet on equal
footing, regardless of their religious outlook. This ideal rests on a sharp
bifurcation that consigns religion to the private sphere while the public
sphere is assumed to be secular and neutral, and protected by the secular
state. The authors argue that this assumption is untenable because reli-
gion continues to be present in the public sphere. According to Marian
Burchardt (2015: 158), the public sphere is typically construed as discur-
sive, disembodied, and abstract, while public space concerns the materi-
ality of spaces and embodied forms of uses and practices that constitute
and validate spaces as public. However, despite its accessibility, the right
to use public space is often a contentious issue that presents opportunities
for conflict between those who claim the space for their own use and
those who feel they have been unjustly excluded (Neal 2010: 13–16).
The Nigerian state officially promotes the notion of a secular public
sphere which is neutral enough to accommodate a variety of social and
religious expressions. The federal constitution guarantees freedom of
assembly in public space.5 It is clear that the freedom to engage in public
space on an equal footing is restricted to what the state and larger society
accept as normal.
Shia religious processions (sacred activities) in northern Nigeria are
performed in public space, which is controlled by the secular authorities,
a situation that results in the entanglement or overlapping of the secular
and the sacred, which often degenerates into a conflict. State authorities
insist that before any group conducts processions in public space, they
must obtain permission from the police, who will assess the potential risk
of the event. Shia Muslims, however, do not want to subject their sacred
rituals to the approval of secular authorities which they regard as profane
power. When I asked Muhammad Kabir (53 years old), a Shia leader in
the city of Jos about the Shia’s refusal to seek permission from the police
before their public performances, he responded as follows: ‘The Ashura
procession is one of the most important Shia religious practices. Imagine
5
Section 38, subsection 1 of the 1999 constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria stipulates:
‘Every person shall be entitled to freedom of thought, conscience and religion, including freedom
to change his religion or belief, and freedom (either alone or in community with others, and in
public or private) to manifest and propagate his religion or belief in worship, teaching, practice and
observance’.
we seek permission from the government and they said no, you are not
permitted. What shall we do? Shall we forfeit one of our religious funda-
mentals?’ (Interview, 12 June 2018).
The Shia’s refusal to request government permission hinges on their
lack of recognition of the Nigerian secular government. The Nigerian
Shia population has a strong political ideology that aims to transform the
country into an Islamic theocracy. In the view of Shia leadership, as out-
lined in their teachings and preaching, politics is an integral part of the
Islamic religion. Islam as a religion is incomplete without an Islamic state
that will ensure the optimum implementation of shari’ah law, as well as
ensuring pious and egalitarian socio-political order. According to this
view, Islam cannot be restricted to the private sphere, since it is itself a
comprehensive legal system that covers public life. Shia leadership fre-
quently criticizes modern democracy, secularism, and unregulated capi-
talism. Zakzaky is nevertheless opposed to the introduction of shari’ah
law in Northern Nigeria, arguing that shari’ah cannot function within
the overarching framework of a secular constitution (Amara 2014).
Zakzaky thus rallies his followers with the goal of achieving a total over-
haul of the Nigerian political system, a system which the Shia perceive as
unjust, corrupt, oppressive, and un-Islamic.
The Ashura procession embodies this revolutionary political ideology
of struggling against an oppressive political order. Thus, the procession
has an underlying political undertone embedded in the binary notion of
struggle between good and evil, oppressors and the oppressed. Imam
Hussein’s martyrdom is seen as a sacrifice for the restoration of the true
Islamic faith, righteousness, and authentic Islamic leadership. The pro-
cession certainly serves as a vehicle for harnessing revolutionary senti-
ments among the Shia, making the ritual both a religious and political
activity. Shia leadership thereby symbolically associates the Nigerian lead-
ers with Yazid bn Mu’awiya, the murderer of Imam Hussein. As 48-year-
old businessman Habib Sule stated:
This country is built on oppression and extortion of the masses. Imam

Khomeini says ‘every day is Ashura and every land is Karbala.’ If someone
challenges the oppressive regime, the Yazidawa [the rulers who follow the
path of Yazid] will persecute them. The Hussein of West Africa is Sheikh
98 M. Ibrahim
Zakzaky, because he is the only person who is struggling to liberate the

poor in this country and establish an Islamic government (Interview 2
June 2018).
In this vein, the Ashura is practiced as a commemoration of the death of

Imam Hussein and a demonstration of struggle against the secular and
oppressive regime. As Cornell and Kamran maintain on Ashura rituals in
general, ‘the core of the symbolism of Ashura is the moral dichotomy
between worldly injustice and corruption on the one hand and God-
centred justice on the other’ (2007: 111–112). Thus, the Ashura and
other processions are political statements, directed to the Nigerian gov-
ernment, and as a result, the Nigerian government perceives Shia public
processions as a form of rebellion against the state. This revolutionary
clamor has put the Shia at loggerheads with state authorities.
onspicuous Visibility of Shia Processions

C
and Hostile Backlash from the Sunni Majority
While on the one hand the Ashura procession challenges the secularity
and authority of the state, on the other it challenges the position of the
hegemonic Sunni majority by entrenching Shia visibility in public space.
Shia processions contain configurations of visually stimulating elements
designed to express inner sorrow as well as to appeal to the spectators. The
spectators in this case are Sunni Muslims drawn to the Ashura by its ele-
ments of theatricality. One of the important features of Shia public pro-
cessions is the blockades of the public roads which add to their visibility
and lengthen their presence in public space. One of my Sunni interlocu-
tors stated as follows:
One day in September 2017, I was driving to go to my shop in Laranto

market when I found myself trapped in a long traffic jam at Bauchi Road,
Jos. I immediately realized that the cause of the traffic jam was a gigantic
crowd of Shia performing Ashura mourning ceremony. An endless row of
men, women and children in black dress blocked the right side of the road
forcing all the motorists to use one side of the road, which resulted in
g ridlock. I was so exasperated because I was in a hurry but at the same time,
I could not take my eyes off the fascinating performance of the events
(Interview 11 June 2018).
Often motorists and pedestrians are forced to become spectators when

they are caught in the traffic jams or blockages of public roads due to the
sheer size of the processions. Furthermore, people often become enthralled
by the performance, while at the same time judging it to be a wrong
expression of religiosity. People also express anger and frustration about
Shia blockading public roads, causing traffic jams and interrupting daily
activities with their public processions.
Despite the fact that the large size of the participants of Shia proces-
sions might naturally cause disruption to the free flow of traffic and peo-
ple, Shia also have another strategy of creating opportunities to preach to
Sunni and inform them about their doctrines. One of my Shia interlocu-
tors stated, ‘We distribute pamphlets about the significance of Ashura
and sacrifice of Imam Hussein to the Sunnis during processions and talk
to people who ask questions regarding our activities’. In this vein road
blockage is a means of da’wa or propagating Shia ideology. Many Sunni
perceive Shia processions in this light and one of the Salafi leaders told
me that, ‘Ashura and other Shia processions are a clever ploy to attract
and convert Sunni to the Shia form of Islam’. Moreover, blockade of
public roads enhances the performative element of the processions espe-
cially because Ashura involves street drama re-enacting the historical cir-
cumstances that led to the battle of Karbala.
Shia public processions are embodied religious performances organiz-
ing human bodies for collective public ritual. Increasingly, scholars exam-
ine embodied religious practices through a performative lens (Hollywood
2002), which means taking lived religious practices seriously. Also,
Chambers et al. propose a performative, rather than normative, concep-
tion of religion. They affirm that religion ‘is not (just) a set of ethical,
ontological or theological assertions, but a dynamic, lived, and fluidly
embodied set of actions, practices, gestures and speech acts at specific
points in time and space’ (2013: 1–2). A performative approach with
regard to Shia public processions highlights a situation where religious
doctrines and norms become enmeshed in spatial ritual. The
100 M. Ibrahim
performative aspects of the processions generally center on their spectac-

ular nature with its elements of theatricality.
The regular and conspicuous Shia public processions, coupled with the
Sunni perception of the Shia as a heretic sect, make their public visibility
threatening to the perceived normalized spatial configuration of the
urban environment. The established spatial order in Northern Nigeria is
to some extent tolerated and accepted by Sunni Muslims, despite the fact
that it is characterized by what Doreen Massey (2005) has described as a
multiplicity and simultaneity of space, which implies the coexistence of
diversity (including Christians) in the environment. Nevertheless, the
craving for spatial homogeneity is captured by the comment of the Emir
of Kano, Sunusi Lamido Sunusi, in the aftermath of the earlier men-
tioned clash between the Shia and the army on 12 December 2015:
‘Northern Nigeria is a Sunni territory; therefore, Shia have no place in
it’.6 In the same period the Kaduna state governor also declared a ban on
Shia Muslims in the state and prohibited their public activities.7 A
67-year-old Sunni imam of a small mosque in Jos remarked:
Shia is a great threat facing the Muslims of this country. They are very
deceptive and they are against peace. The performance of the Ashura is
pure propaganda and a strategy to attract the attention of Ahlul Sunna in
order to convert them to Shia under the pretext of sympathizing with
Hussein (Interview 11 June 2018).
In discussing similar practices of blocking public space during crusades

by Pentecostals and during Friday prayers by Muslims in Nigeria, Brian
Larkin argues: ‘By taking over space one asserts presence and thus, poten-
tially, engages in a hostile act of power. But at the same time this acts as
spectacle, a mode of publicity designed to attract new adherents’ (2016:
24). Sabrina Mervin corroborates this, stating that ‘More than ever, these
rituals enable the Shia to reaffirm their presence and their identity, not
always without a clash’ (2014: 507). Shia public processions can certainly
6
This comment of the Emir was recorded and circulated via WhatsApp messenger and other social
media platforms throughout Northern Nigeria.
7
‘Kaduna bans Nigeria’s foremost Shiite group, IMN.’ Premium Times, 7 October 2016,
Mohammed Lere.
be placed in the context of presence making and the asserting of power

and publicity in public space. Sunni criticism and hostility toward the
Shia resist the latter’s presence in their midst. This politics of contestation
of space attempts to exclude the Shia from the public domain in order to
minimize their visibility, hence their presence. Conversely, the Shia chal-
lenge these stands by continually staging public performances, proclaim-
ing that the space belongs to God and therefore they have a right to
engage in public processions.
Moreover, as mentioned earlier, the conspicuous visibility of Shia pro-
cessions in urban centers places them continuously in the limelight. As a
result, the Shia attract constant attention, particularly from Islamic
reformists such as the Salafis and Izala, who attacks the Shia preachings
and accuses them of heresy. Anger and anxiety toward the Shia reached
boiling point and exploded into violence during the Ashura of 2016,
when Sunni mobs attacked Shias throughout the north. In Jos, the gov-
ernor of Plateau State had in fact declared a ban on Shia processions. On
11 October 2016, the day of the Ashura, Shia leaders nevertheless decided
to defy the ban and gathered en mass at their markaz (center) in the
Unguwar Rogo area to commence the procession. State security forces
invaded the center in order to disperse them. The event escalated when
Sunni youths joined the security forces and violently attacked Shia mem-
bers. My Shia interlocutor Lawal Ibrahim, a 45-year-old businessman,
narrated his experience to me:
I was at the Katako area when my wife called me that she was under attack.
I quickly headed home. I saw a mob destroying our markaz, which is close
to my house, under the watch of soldiers and police. As I was knocking at
the door, calling my wife and children in order to take them to safety, I
overheard somebody from the mob saying gawani dan Shi’a nan [here is
another Shia]. Then a large number of people rushed toward me. That was
all I could remember. Next, I woke up in a police cell with bruises and
blood all over my body. I saw a number of other brothers [Shia members]
in the cell. That was how our ordeal began and we spent three months in
prison for the so-called crime of illegal assembly (Interview 11
December 2017).
102 M. Ibrahim
Similar incidents occurred in Kaduna, Sokoto, Katsina, Bauchi, and sev-

eral other cities, where Sunni youths assaulted Shias during processions,
razed their mosques and desecrated sacred objects such as flags.
Since the violent encounter between the Shia and the military on 12
December 2015, the Shia continue to experience intensified discrimina-
tion in the wider society and persecution from the state. The Shia have
remained steadfast and perceive the suffering and persecution as phe-
nomena that shape their religious experience and identity. Whenever I
asked my interlocutors about the issue of suffering, their immediate
response was that the path of Shia is one of suffering, and anyone who
chooses this path must be prepared to endure persecution. They high-
lighted the fact that most of their twelve imams have been persecuted and
martyred by the governments of their time. The Shia are of the view that
they are the bearers of the true light of Islam and that their persecutors
are motivated to quench this light.
Notwithstanding this Shia coping mechanism for dealing with suffer-
ing through the logic of their religious worldview, they have nevertheless
begun to claim their rights through the modern legal system, such as by
taking their case to court, documenting and publicizing their plight
through human rights organizations, and engaging in peaceful public
protests. The Shia clashes with the security forces during public proces-
sions raise the issue of human rights in the Nigerian polity. Human rights
groups such as Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and vocal
activists such as Femi Falana seize every moment of every clash between
the Shia and the police to advance the debate and discourse concerning
human rights violations carried out by the Nigerian state. These groups
also criticize the Nigerian government for continuing to detain Zakzaky
in defiance of the court order to release him.8
While the Shia challenge the state authorities through legal means
concerning their infringed rights, they also question the hegemonic
claims of the Sunni majority in the public sphere. Moreover, these new
developments have reshaped the group’s outlook and changed their
8
On 2 December 2016, the Federal High Court in Abuja ruled that El Zakzaky and Malama
Zeenah Ibraheem should be released within 45 days. The court described their detention, which
began in December 2015, as illegal and unconstitutional (Amnesty International 16 January 2017).
attitude toward some secular institutions such as the Nigerian legal sys-
tem, from outright rejection to some form of accommodation. The Shia
view accommodation of some secular institutions as dharura. In the
Islamic law dharura is the juridical concept of ‘necessity’ that allows the
Muslim, under the compulsion of necessity, to do things which would
otherwise be prohibited (haram) until that condition of necessity is
relieved.
Conclusion
This study deals with how Shia religious minorities exteriorize some reli-
gious activities beyond the confine of their places of worship into the
public realm. The resistance of the Sunni majority to Shia processions
and the Nigerian government’s attempts to ban these from public space
indicate that certain forms of religious visibility are privileged over oth-
ers. Indeed, Sunni mosques and churches are present in almost every
corner of public space and emanate a constant audible and visual pres-
ence. Different religious groups in pluralistic urban centers present their
manifold worldviews and inscribe their presence in public space. The
Sunni Muslim and Christian domination of Nigerian public space, flour-
ishing under the banner of the neutrality of the public sphere raise ques-
tions concerning the place of religious minorities. The presence of
religious minority groups in public space adds to the plurality of urban
centers, transforming these into a contested ground where diverging
forms of religious expression conflate, conflict and accommodate one
another. Contested public space has indeed become a site where the
political sphere relates to the religious sphere and vice versa, which results
in these spheres becoming either explicitly or implicitly entangled. This
entanglement has repercussions on the issue of secularism, the notion of
secular public space, and even on national politics.
Moreover, the Ashura procession is an affective practice because it is a
mourning ritual that is saturated with an outpouring of emotion. It can
be argued that Ashura processions temporarily take over public space and
thus force non-Shia or secular others to participate in these affective reli-
gious practices, in turn evoking highly emotional responses. These
104 M. Ibrahim
interventions in public space can be at loggerheads with the secular. In

other words, they contest the boundaries between the secular and the
religious on which the modern Nigerian state is based.
These entanglements corroborate the editorial of this book, where the
authors interrogate the framing of the public sphere as secular, a percep-
tion which sharply bifurcates between the public and the religious realm,
relegating the latter to the private sphere. It is apparent that the notion of
the secular public sphere hardly stands the increasing public visibility of
religion such as exemplified the Shia public processions. The issue of pub-
lic visibility of religion, particularly that of religious minorities, often
raises thorny debates and controversies in the national politics of many
countries around the globe. Depending on the local context, the notion
of secularism is called upon to either oppose the public visibility of reli-
gious minority or to tolerate it. However, in the case of Nigeria, the con-
troversies associated with the visibility of the Shia minority often
degenerate into violent conflicts, which put the nation at peril.
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6
Samba Struggles: Carnaval Parades,
Race and Religious Nationalism in Brazil
Martijn Oosterbaan and Adriano Santos Godoy
Introduction
In 2015, the creative director of the samba school (Escola de Samba)
Unidos de Vila Maria in São Paulo, Brazil, approached Adriano Godoy,
one of the two authors of this chapter. The director briefly explained that
Unidos da Vila Maria had just received the approval from the Catholic
Church in Brazil to develop a televised carnaval parade dedicated entirely
to Brazil’s national Catholic patron saint Our Lady Aparecida, and now
he was looking for anthropological literature that could help him to
develop the parade, which was scheduled to take place in 2017. He had
found Godoy’s master’s thesis (2015) on the devotion of Our Lady
M. Oosterbaan (*)
Utrecht University, Utrecht, The Netherlands
e-mail: m.oosterbaan@uu.nl
A. S. Godoy
University of Campinas, Campinas, Brazil
e-mail: a072716@dac.unicamp.br

108 M. Oosterbaan and A. S. Godoy
Aparecida and therefore was hoping to meet him in person to reflect on

the ways in which the Catholic devotion to Virgin Mary is constituted in
Brazil. While extremely honored, Adriano was also very surprised as this
was the first time in Brazilian history that the Roman Catholic Church of
Brazil sanctioned a carnaval parade of a major samba school. What to
make of this collaboration and why was it occurring now?
As we will argue in this chapter, the parade dedicated to Our Lady
Aparecida should be seen as one in a row of remarkable carnaval parades
held in the past ten years in Brazil. In these years, different carnaval orga-
nizations throughout Brazil organized carnaval parades that explicitly
foregrounded a particular religious tradition—Catholic and evangeli-
cal—and explicitly identified it as connected to a religious institution and
practice. The foregrounding of a particular religious tradition in carnaval
parades is remarkable because it signals a break with a long-lasting cus-
tom to produce carnaval parades that syncretically fuse Catholic and
Afro-Brazilian elements as national heritage and as popular culture, while
downplaying the explicit role of religious institutions, practices and doc-
trines and leaving intact the image that Brazil is by and large a Catholic
country.
This religious-national configuration, expressed amongst others in car-
naval parades, has come under attack by different parties in the last
decades, not in the least by the evangelical and born-again Christian
movements that have grown substantially in Brazil in the past thirty
years. In this period, Christian evangelical movements have progressively
become part of the political landscape of the country (Almeida and
Barbosa 2019). In neighborhoods across the land, evangelical pastors
have risen as community leaders and during the last three democratic
elections of Brazil many evangelical candidates were elected as representa-
tives in municipal, state and federal governments. Brazilian evangelical
churches have become very visible in the public domain. Especially the
globally operating Igreja Universal do Reino de Deus (IURD)1 stands out
as an example of the evangelical churches that have become very visible
in Brazil. In the past decades, the IURD has built many huge ‘cathedrals’
throughout Brazil and its leader owns one of the six national public
In English speaking countries known as ‘Universal Church of the Kingdom of God’.
1
6 Samba Struggles: Carnaval Parades, Race and Religious… 109
television broadcast networks, Rede Record that serves as an important

channel of evangelical communication.
Public discussions regarding the relation between politics, national
culture and religion have intensified as evangelical groups implicitly and
explicitly critique historical connections between national culture,
Catholicism and Afro-Brazilian religions. An influential moment was the
public desecration of Our Lady Aparecida in 1995 when an IURD pastor
willfully damaged a plaster statue of Aparecida during a television broad-
cast. Several authors have argued that this ‘kicking of the saint’ incident
was an attack on the cultural hegemony of Catholicism in Brazil (Almeida
2007; Birman and Lehmann 1999). Besides the particular conflicts
between the IURD and the Catholic Church, a number of evangelical
organizations throughout Brazil have openly criticized particular national
traditions, such as the music genre samba, the popular festivities related
to carnaval and a host of Afro-Brazilian religious representations and
practices that are considered typical of Brazilian society. Instead of por-
traying these practices and representations as the essence of ‘Brazilianness’
(Brasilidade), prominent evangelical organizations have re-identified
them as spiritually malevolent and they have openly attacked Afro-
Brazilian religious groups. Meanwhile, evangelical groups throughout the
country have started to incorporate certain typical Brazilian practices by
ridding them of their Afro-Brazilian and/or Catholic elements making
them fit for evangelical consumption (see also Reinhardt 2018). For
example, while historically many evangelical groups turned their back on
the carnaval festivities altogether, in the past decades evangelical groups
have started to celebrate carnaval gospel during the national carnaval
celebrations.
In this chapter, we argue that the evangelical carnaval parades we
describe display the desire of evangelical organizations to reform carnaval
parades so that evangelical groups can also partake in carnaval traditions
and inscribe themselves in representations of the nation, and we argue
that the selected samba school parades we describe demonstrate the aspi-
ration of Roman Catholic and Afro-Brazilian organizations to push back
the evangelical encroachment and defend their identity as privileged
partners of the nation. Our overarching argument is that while Brazilians
generally consider carnaval a ‘secular sacred’ national heritage, several
religious organizations strive to re-religionize carnaval.
To elucidate our argument, we will first briefly analyze the historical

religious-national configuration and explain that the concepts religion,
customs and laicidade were important in framing carnaval as a syncretic,
hybrid phenomenon, while still pushing the image that Brazil is essen-
tially a Catholic country. Then we will explain the overlaps and differ-
ences between televised parades that take place in special arenas
(sambódromos) and street carnaval parades (blocos). After that we will give
several examples of carnaval parades—evangelical, Catholic and Afro-
Brazilian—to show how religion is currently foregrounded and what
kind of struggles result from these efforts. Our analysis of these parades
shows that the recent interests of religious institutions in popular carna-
val traditions lead to new controversies about things and practices that
should be denoted as culture and as religion.
Carnaval, Religion and the Nation-State

Even though many Brazilians consider the constitutional separations
between state and religious institutions rightful, it would be wrong to
depict the Brazilian public sphere as inherently secular. Many of the com-
mon public manifestations and practices in Brazil present religious ele-
ments, yet many of these have become labeled as (national) culture instead
of religion. Distinctions between these categories had and still have gov-
ernmental reasons and effects. Eminent Brazilian scholars such as Paula
Montero (2015), Patricia Birman (2003), Joanildo Burity (2011) and
Emerson Giumbelli (2014) have shown how the categories religião (reli-
gion) and laicidade (secularity) played decisive roles in the restructuring
of the governmental roles of the state and the Roman Catholic Church in
Brazil. At the birth of the Brazilian republic in 1889, when the political
separation of church and state was introduced, the Brazilian Catholic
Church strategically conformed with the demands of the Brazilian state-
in-transformation so that it could define itself as a flexible partner in
several of the governmental projects. Around the same time, Candomblé
and other Afro-Brazilian religious practices were presented as backward
‘customs’ instead of ‘religious’ practices, which barred the legal protection
of such practices according to the new legislation. Furthermore, despite
the liberal constitution of the late nineteenth century—which granted

non-Catholic religions more freedom—dominant identifications of Afro-
Brazilian practices as fetiçaria (sorcery) also denied these practices the
protection the law otherwise would have granted them (Giumbelli 2014).
For a long time, Brazil was considered one of the most Catholic coun-
tries in the world (Birman and Leite 2000). During the republican, dic-
tatorial and democratic periods in Brazil history, Roman Catholicism was
tightly connected to national projects in such a way that its symbols and
rites marked much of public life (Montes 1998; Sanchis 2001). Many
other religious practices could be encountered in Brazil but, on the whole,
Roman Catholicism acted as the leading frame in which these religions
appeared (Berkenbrock 1998). In contrast to the disguised appearances
of Afro-Brazilian deities, Catholic icons, statues and practices were firmly
present in many of Rio de Janeiro’s public spaces (Giumbelli 2014).
Governmental changes at the turn of the twentieth century enforced
the description of ‘customs’ of urban, black populations as typical of
Brazilian national culture (Fry 1982; Montes 1998; Oliven 1984; Sansi
2007; Vianna 1999). As a result, carnaval parades and samba-enredo are
commonly represented as defining cultural practices of Brazil (Cavalcanti
2015; Damatta 1991; Pravaz 2008; Sheriff 1999; Menezes and Bártolo
2019). Such representations were and are characterized by racial politics
and class struggles. As Robin Sheriff (1999: 14) has put it: ‘It was particu-
larly during and after the 1930s that samba and the carioca carnaval [sic]
became simultaneously identified both with images of an authenticating
“blackness” (or even “Africanness”) and with those of the uniquely hybrid,
“mixed” national culture of Brazil.’ As a result of this constellation,
samba-enredo—the music of carnaval parades—is part of an embodied
and discursive field of collective identifications in a country that struggles
with social inequalities intertwined with class and racial categories. Samba
music is important for people’s sense of history, ancestry and collectivity
and popular accounts of samba are regularly infused with religious tropes
and experiences.2
2
We unfortunately do not have the space to discuss the historical cross-fertilizations between reli-
gious traditions, popular festivities and imaginations of the nation but many people have described
eloquently the complex articulations between popular and elite cultures in particular periods of the
nation building project (Vianna 1999; Cavalcanti 2015; Schwarcz and Starling 2018).
Samba music is a genre with many sub-styles and in relation to carna-

val, we are specifically writing about samba-enredo, a style of samba that
is defined by collective singing, accompanied by the sound of a cava-
quinho (string instrument) and a large percussion band (bateria) that can
be considered the motor of many parades in Brazil. While the majority of
samba-enredo parades displays musical and performative commonalities,
the context of the parades may vary significantly. Several Brazilian cities
have so-called sambódromos; large samba arenas where samba schools
compete. During the competitions, each samba school presents its own
parade, organized around a specific theme. In general, the parades of the
large samba schools in Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo are broadcast live by
the highly popular television channel TV Globo, while they are evaluated
by an appointed commission of experts who judge the performances.
Simultaneously, journalists, public figures and specialists comment on
the parades, stating their opinions on television. Besides the sambódromo
parades, there are also many carnaval street parades (blocos) throughout
the country. These parades generally do not enter in formal competition
but attract crowds that watch the parades or dance along with them as
they move through the streets. While blocos are generally not broadcast
on national television, new (social) media nowadays make possible the
widespread divulgation of street carnaval parades.
Evangelical Parades
For a long time, evangelical groups in Brazil portrayed carnaval as dan-
gerous and immoral. Generally, evangelical churches organize(d) so-
called retiros: camps that take place outside the city, far removed from the
street parades and sambódromo competitions. Besides their conviction
that carnaval festivities enhance adultery, substance abuse and violence,
many evangelical communities also believe that carnaval traditions repro-
duce Afro-Brazilian religious ideas and practices that are considered
demonic. For example, according to many Pentecostal and born-again
Christians in Brazil, samba-enredo music is inherently polluted because
the rhythms of samba-enredo stem from the rhythms of the candomblé
rituals, performed in terreiros (Afro-Brazilian temples).
Nevertheless, in the past decades, several evangelical groups and

churches in the country have started to produce Christian samba (samba
gospel) and carnaval gospel. In this chapter, we will highlight two churches
that have become very active: the Projeto Vida Nova from Rio de Janeiro
and the Bola de Neve Church from São Paulo.3 Bola de Neve Church is
a relatively young neo-Pentecostal church that has grown substantially in
the past decade and attracts young middle-class Brazilians. Their pulpits
generally have the form of a surfboard and their style of worship aims to
connect with mainstream youth culture in Brazil. Bola de Neve Church
has increased their evangelical carnaval performances substantially in the
past years. Since 2017, the church calls its carnaval street parade: Batucada
Abençoada (Blessed Beats). This street parade can best be described as a
translocal phenomenon since branches of the church located in different
cities practice the same samba rhythms and lyrics independently through-
out Brazil so they can perform collectively in one particular place. During
the carnaval of 2018, for example, the Batucada Abençoada brought
together seven hundred percussionists in Rio de Janeiro to perform at the
beach and in the favela Rocinha. Bola de Neve makes ample use of social
media and records and shares carnaval rehearsals and performances on
Facebook, Instagram and YouTube.4
Though the size of the Bola de Neve Church parade was exceptional in
comparison to other evangelical parades, such parades had been orga-
nized in Rio de Janeiro before. Projeto Vida Nova, a neo-Pentecostal
church, has been organizing carnaval parades yearly since the end of the
1980s. Each year, the parades of Projeto Vida Nova draw together mem-
bers from different congregations in the city to perform and to witness
the parade, to hear and to sing the samba-enredo, and to evangelize while
the parade takes places. One of the recurring wings of the parade consists
of costumed members who theatrically perform the battle between the
devil and God’s angels who eventually liberate the captives that immersed
themselves in the carnaval (Oosterbaan 2017).
3
Other churches that produce carnaval gospel can be found in Rio de Janeiro and Salvador da
Bahia (Oosterbaan, forthcoming).
4
See, for example, a YouTube clip of the 2018 parade: https://www.youtube.com/
watch?v=J8MRBrl4RuA
Neither Projeto Vida Nova nor the Bola de Neve Church organizes
parades at a sambódromo but their street parades do show striking resem-
blances with the parades at the sambódromo. As common in so-called
worldly parades, the parades of the two evangelical churches also have a
percussion section (bateria) that produces a thunderous and joyful atmo-
sphere. In contrast to the convictions of members of several other evan-
gelical churches in Brazil, these two churches believe that the samba-enredo
music is not inherently connected to Afro-Brazilian religious practice and
power. According to Projeto Vida Nova and the Bola de Neve Church, all
music originally belonged to God, but the devil stole particular music
styles and rhythms and made them available for hazardous spiritual tradi-
tions and entities. According to the churches, it is not the rhythm that
makes a song demonic but the lyrics. The rhythms can thus be employed
by Christians as long as the lyrics are godly (see Oosterbaan 2017).
Besides the samba-enredo music, there are also other commonalities
between these two evangelical parades and their worldly counterparts. As
in worldly parades, the evangelical parades are symbolically led by a
mestre-sala and a porta-bandeira. These figures form a couple dressed in
gala costumes that dance in front of the percussion section of a parade.
One generally encounters such a couple at carnaval parades throughout
Brazil and its presence is one of the markers of an ‘authentic’ carnaval
parade. The last commonality we want to mention concerns the clothing
that is visible at carnaval parades in Brazil. Many of the performers of the
Batucada Abençoada were clothed in so-called abadás. An abadá is a
sleeveless shirt with a Yoruba origin. Nonetheless, in contrast with the
worldly version, Bola de Neve Church calls these shirts aba Deus. In
Portuguese, aba could be translated as a piece of clothing that covers and
protects, an apron of sorts, and Deus means God.
We regard the evangelical appropriation of samba-enredo music and
carnaval clothing as attempts to uncouple Afro-Brazilian religious tradi-
tions from Brazil’s carnaval. Removing Afro-Brazilian religious connota-
tions from popular carnaval styles in Brazil not only allows evangelical
groups to partake in street carnaval and evangelize in the city during the
carnaval period, it also allows these churches to breach a popular
socio-cultural constellation in which national Brazilian practices such as

carnaval are described as having Afro-Brazilian religious roots. This stands
in striking contrast to the efforts of other groups that struggle to empha-
size the African religious elements of Brazilian carnaval (see also Armstrong
2010), yet displays commonalities with the parade sanctioned by the
Roman Catholic Church in Brazil.
A Roman Catholic Parade

The collaboration between the Roman Catholic Church and the samba
school Unidos de Vila Maria in São Paulo in 2017—which we described
briefly in our introduction—should be seen as historic. During the live
broadcast, when the parade was about to enter the sambódromo, a TV
Globo commentator covering the parades exclaimed that he was sur-
prised by the reactions they received from the audience. Two priests, two
Catholic dioceses communities and Franciscan monks had written TV
Globo to express that they were very excited to watch the parade. A sec-
ond commentator explained why they had received these unusual mes-
sages from the Roman Catholic clergy: ‘We are about to see a parade
without bikinis or religious syncretism. The Catholic Church has super-
vised this specific samba school and demanded specific modifications to
this parade.’
Never before had the church formally worked together with a samba
school or given its formal blessing to a carnaval parade. The unique
chance to do so for the first time was possible because 2017 marked the
300-year anniversary of the miraculous appearance of Our Lady
Aparecida, the Catholic patroness saint of Brazil. Aparecida is a small
statue of Virgin Mary that was found in the Paraiba River in 1717 by
three poor fishermen from the state of São Paulo. They had been on the
water for a long time, without catching any fish but after they found the
miraculous statue, their fishing expedition turned into an astonishing
success, which later was considered the first of Our Lady’s many miracles.
The Catholic Church5 considers Our Lady Aparecida a black Virgin

Mary due to the dark color of her terracotta statue, but for a considerable
period she was represented as having white skin. According to the histo-
rian Lourival dos Santos (2013), she started to be represented as black in
the late nineteenth century at the end of the Brazilian Empire and the
beginning of the first Republic. In response to the secularization of the
Brazilian state, the Catholic Church made much efforts to transform Our
Lady Aparecida into the prime symbol of the nation, emphasizing her
blackness and giving her titles such as ‘patroness of the Brazilian republic’
in 1931. In her honor, the Brazilian state installed an annual national
holiday that takes place on 12 October.
We can safely say that Our Lady Aparecida is a constitutive part of the
Brazilian religious and national landscape. After her transformation into
patroness of the nation, she remained highly popular as a national and
Catholic religious figure. For example, her shrine was visited by 13 mil-
lion people in 2017 and replicas of the original statue located at the
national shrine can be found in many public and private places through-
out the country (Godoy 2015, 2017; Rickli 2016). Given the statue’s
capacity to represent the unity between Roman Catholicism and the
Brazilian nation, it is not very surprising that the church used her anni-
versary as the ideal moment to collaborate with a samba school. It was
however not without controversy or struggle and involved compromises
from both parties.
One of the most important demands of the church was that partici-
pants in the parade could not display nudity or obscenity and that saintly
images would be represented appropriately as Catholic and not as syn-
cretic. To make sure that the samba school complied with these demands,
supervision occurred by means of two Catholic institutions: the director-
ate of the National Shrine of Our Lady Aparecida and the Archdioceses
of São Paulo. The pressure to supervise closely the appearance of the
Unidos de Vila Maria parade is related to the Brazilian tradition to broad-
cast the parades of the big, prestigious samba schools live on Brazilian
5
Whereas we hold that the Catholic Church should be considered a complex entanglement of
organizations and not as a monolithic institution, we nevertheless in this chapter refer to this
entanglement as ‘the Church’.
television and the public discussions about samba school performances

that usually follow.
The idea to dedicate the 2017 parade entirely to the anniversary of
Our Lady Aparecida initially came from the samba school. To avoid pos-
sible future conflicts, the samba school approached the church and asked
permission. Even though the Catholic Church officially approved the
collaboration, some Catholics were unhappy about that partnership.
Months before the carnaval, at least three different groups protested
against the parade under the allegation that ‘an unprecedented desecra-
tion will happen with the approval of the Holy Roman Catholic Church’.6
In response to this allegation, the Cardinal and Archbishop of São Paulo
published a letter in the local newspaper to justify the organization: ‘The
intention is good and the form as well. Would the place be unfit to honor
the purest Virgin Mary? But wouldn’t Mary want to be there where her
presence is necessary?’7
The church’s newfound collaboration with the samba school and
Mary’s official debut at the sambódromo altered popular representations
of the religious character of the nation, however. Our Lady Aparecida has
historically also appeared in southern Brazil as a syncretic figure repre-
senting Oxum, the orixá of the rivers. Nevertheless, as we describe below,
while Aparecida’s black embodiment of the nation was celebrated during
the parade, her Afro-Brazilian religious identity was erased in favor of her
Catholic identity. The Catholic Church tried hard to purify the religious
character of Our Lady Aparecida while preserving connotations to Afro-
Brazilian culture and heritage.
The attempt to negate her syncretic character yet preserve her racial
identity is supported by the so-called ‘myth of the three races’: an ideo-
logical position that maintains that Brazilian colonization was character-
ized by a harmonious coming together of Europeans, Africans and
Indigenous people that resulted in a culturally mixed country where race
is no longer a relevant category to power and hierarchy. While academics
have generally identified this position as a ‘myth’ (Schwarcz and Starling
6
See, for example, https://www.change.org/p/curia-metropolitana-de-são-paulo-dom-odilo-
contra-a-profanação-da-virgem-maria-no-carnaval-de-2017 or https://ipco.org.br/51644-2/#.
XEGfVMHPzIU
7
http://arquisp.org.br/arcebispo/artigos-e-pronunciamentos/nossa-senhora-aparecida-no-carnaval
2018), it is still often presented as a fact in politics, tourism and religious

institutions. The Catholic Church generally employs this myth to present
Catholicism as the powerful ingredient of this mixture of peoples and
cultures. In such a presentation, there is no room for other religious tradi-
tions and black and indigenous people are simultaneously presented as
Brazilians and as Catholics. Ultimately, this Catholic nation is incompat-
ible with Afro-Brazilian religions and with Pentecostalism, according to
the church, the national religion is Catholicism and Our Lady Aparecida
is the most powerful symbol of that constellation.
This was clearly visible in the design of the 2017 Unidos de Vila Maria
parade. As in many carnaval parades in Brazil, the parades that perform
at the sambódromo are made up of different alas (wings) and every wing
is categorized by a specific theme. The Unidos de Vila Maria parade con-
sisted of twenty-three alas showing Aparecida’s devotional history but
here we focus on three that showed clearly the particular entanglement
between national culture and religion.
The first wing was the ala das Baianas (the Bahian Women wing) a
specific wing dedicated to the veteran women of a samba school.
Traditionally, these women wear long dresses and turbans, clothing
inspired by the ritual garments of Candomblé. Strikingly, in this parade
the baianas were dressed to resemble representations of Our Lady of
Immaculate Conception, wearing ostentatious blue and golden mantles
and huge golden crowns instead of turbans. The dresses also featured an
embroidered (white) image of Our Lady of Immaculate Conception to
leave no doubt that this costume represented a non-syncretic Catholic
figure. Maria Aparecida was one of the baianas who took part in the
parade and after the parade she declared: ‘I was born a devotee. I am very
moved because my family is Catholic practitioner’. Questioned about the
45 kg costume she was wearing, replied: ‘the dedication and responsibil-
ity to honor our patroness are much heavier than the clothes.’
The second wing was the Ala Milagre do Negro Zacarias (Wing of the
Miracle of Black Zacarias), a wing dedicated to one of Aparecida’s mira-
cles: when a black fugitive named Zacarias was captured, he was allowed
to pray to the statue of Our Lady Aparecida before being brought back to
the farm where he was enslaved. When he did, the chains that held him
captive miraculously fell from his neck and wrists, making him a free
man thanks to Aparecida’s intervention. In the section, dedicated to this

miracle, bare-breasted black men costumed to resemble the enslaved
Zacarias, were followed by black and white men and women, wearing
luxurious costumes with plumages and stamps with African patterns.
This wing exemplified the acknowledgment of the history of enslavement
of African people and their shipment to Brazil, but projected Aparecida
as a liberator.
The third wing was the Ala Símbolo da Identidade Nacional (Wing of
the Symbol of National Identity). The dancing participants of this wing
were all dressed in green and yellow, the colors of the Brazilian flag and
they were accompanied by parrots, bananas, jaguars and other references
to the flora and fauna of Brazil. The tail of the ala featured a sambista
dancing, on a huge map of Brazil, in front of a gigantic yellow and green
crucifix similar to the one at the national shrine.
These three wings demonstrated that the partnership between the
Catholic Church and the samba school Unidos de Vila Maria produced a
particular configuration of culture, religion and nationalism. In this con-
figuration, Afro-Brazilian heritage is celebrated and presented as thor-
oughly Brazilian but Afro-Brazilian religious symbols and icons are
substituted by Catholic ones. The parade exemplifies the Catholic
Church’s new approach to carnaval and shows that it actively produces
and polices Catholic representations in popular culture, yet in doing so
the church attempts to purify and de-syncretize these symbols and icons.
As declared by one of the directors of Unidos de Vila Maria: ‘this year our
samba-enredo became a prayer.’
Afro-Brazilian Parades
In response to the increase of evangelical attacks on Afro-Brazilian reli-
gion and the Catholic Church’s purification of religious figures, samba
schools throughout the country have sought to re-affirm the historical
connections between Brazilian society and African traditions and they
have often done so by emphasizing the presence and importance of Afro-
Brazilian deities. Several of the parades of these samba schools have been
researched by a team of anthropologists from the Federal University of
Rio de Janeiro based in the Museu Nacional and their recent work gives
us great insight in the dynamics we explore in this chapter. In their deep
analysis of the parades of Mangueira and Renascer de Jacarepaguá, Menezes
and Bártolo (2019) defend the carnaval as a privileged ethnographic place
to understand the disputes over religion and national culture. For the
anthropologists, the carnaval parades in Rio de Janeiro provide a dual
classification in which religious practices can be transformed into cultural
manifestations to dispute what is the true nationalism.
The first parade we would like to discuss took place in 2016, when the
samba school Renascer de Jacarepaguá, based in Rio de Janeiro, organized
a parade entitled ‘Ibejís in children’s play: the orixás who became saints in
Brazil’. Annually in Rio de Janeiro, there is a very popular feast dedicated
to Cosmas and Damian, twin brothers and Catholic saints, who are also
known as syncretic manifestations of Ibejis, Afro-Brazilian orixá twins.
The most prominent ritual activity of this feast is the distribution of
‘candy bags’ (Menezes 2016) to groups of children who go door-to-door
in the neighborhood (not unlike Saint Martin’s day traditions common
in Europe). Both as saints and as orixás the twins are seen as protectors of
the youth.
Lucas Bártolo (2018), who researched the samba school Renascer de
Jacarepaguá has convincingly argued that their parade marked a striking
deviation from the hegemonic representation of Brazil’s religious tradi-
tions. Instead of focusing on Catholic representations and leaving room
for Afro-Brazilian religious incursions and interpretations, the parade
inverted this syncretic constellation and focused on the Afro-Brazilian
religious and cultural traditions, while Catholic representations featured
much less prominently.
The Orixás who became Saints wing was the most representative of the
inversion of the hegemonic syncretic relation, however. This wing fea-
tured two children dressed as the twin orixás Ibejis. While during the
parade, the duo momentarily appeared as the Catholic saints Cosmas and
Damian, quickly after they reappeared as the orixá twins. As noted by
Bártolo (2018), the succession of appearances in this section deviates
from the common representations of orixás and saints, in which Catholic
saints generally take the leading role and are presented as most important
religious icons. For the anthropologist, who compared the
samba-enredos from 1991 to 2017: ‘the saints are activated by the samba
schools to dispute the senses of the carnaval party and to discuss the place
of culture and religiosity in the city’ (Bártolo 2018: 16).
In 2017, samba school Mangueira performed a parade entitled Only
with the Help of the Saint. In the Brazilian context, santo (saint) is a hybrid
word that can denote both Catholic saints and Afro-Brazilian orixás. As
noted by Menezes and Bártolo (2019), Mangueira’s reason to use this
word appears to be their wish to propagate a syncretic approach to reli-
gious devotion. In Mangueira’s parade, men and women dressed as reli-
gious figures from Catholic and Afro-Brazilian traditions performed
dances side-by-side like Saint John, Iemanjá, Our Lady Aparecida, Saint
Anthony, Zé Pilantra, Saint Benedict, Ogum and many others, danced
though the sambódromo collectively.
One specific incident laid bare the forces we aim to excavate in this
chapter. Besides the appearances of religious figures from different tradi-
tions, Mangueira also fabricated a statute that syncretized Jesus Christ
and the orixá Oxalá in the same figure, one side showing Oxalá, the other
side Jesus. When Mangueira publicly announced the theme of the parade,
months before the carnaval, members of the Catholic Archdioceses of
Rio de Janeiro asked permission to inspect the costumes in Mangueira’s
headquarters to evaluate if the parade was not offensive to the Catholic
Church. Mangueira agreed and after the inspection, the samba school
was told that the church commission did not find anything offensive.
Nevertheless, when Mangueira performed their parade at the sambó-
dromo during the formal competition and the Cristo-Oxalá figure
appeared prominently, the Archdioceses stated that at the time of the
inspection they did not see that figure and would not have approved if
they did. Following the parade, the church asked Mangueira to withdraw
the figure from the ‘champions parade’, which traditionally takes place
on the first Saturday after the carnaval.
The request quickly instigated public controversy, replicated by main-
stream media. Newspaper headlines screamed out: ‘Under pressure of the
Church, Cristo-Oxalá figure did not parade’8 and ‘Church pressure
8
https://extra.globo.com/noticias/carnaval/tripe-de-cristo-oxala-da-mangueira-nao-desfila-por-
pressao-da-igreja-21011634.html
makes Mangueira take Cristo-Oxalá off the avenue.’9 Mangueira com-

plied with the church’s request but one of the samba school directors
responded: ‘I deeply regret that there is still a lot of “shadow” in the
attitudes of those who talk about “light”. Mangueira’s parade, among
other things, raised the necessary flag of communion and the fight against
intolerance. Doesn’t intolerance emerge in attitudes? I will quote the
words of the “man” who will not attend the parade today: Father, forgive
them, for they do not know what they are doing’.10
Conclusion
The last-mentioned conflict highlights the asymmetrical relation between
the Catholic Church and representatives of Afro-Brazilian religious tradi-
tions in Brazil and points to the present predicament of Afro-Brazilian
religious movements. Historical processes that transformed the Brazilian
carnaval into an amalgam of religious and popular cultural traditions
allowed Afro-Brazilian religions to be celebrated as part of Brazil’s public
life and to be represented as part of the nation. Nevertheless, this hap-
pened predominantly within a Catholic frame. Afro-Brazilian religion
could only appear publicly as a culture within a landscape dominated by
Catholicism when it would downplay explicit Afro-Brazilian religious
representations.
As a result of the growth of evangelical movements in the past decades,
Afro-Brazilian religious movements generally find themselves between a
rock and a hard place. On the one side, they are battling evangelical born-
again Christian movements that tend to define Afro-Brazilian religious
practices as demonic and that attempt to redefine the religious character
of the nation by way of their own carnaval parades, which take up and
translate Afro-Brazilian cultural representations while foregrounding
Pentecostal ideas and practices. On the other side, they are battling the
Catholic Church that also appears to be threatened by the evangelical
9
https://veja.abril.com.br/entretenimento/pressao-da-igreja-faz-mangueira-tirar-cristo-oxala-
da-avenida/
10
https://odia.ig.com.br/_conteudo/diversao/carnaval/2017-03-04/mangueira-cristo-oxala-fora-
do-desfile-das-campeas-apos-pedido-da-igreja.html
growth and, in response, collaborates with a samba school for the first
time in Brazilian history. Instead of affirming and defending the syncretic
nature of popular religious icons, the Roman Catholic Church—not
unlike the evangelical groups that partake in carnaval—tends to acknowl-
edge the African cultural background of Brazil’s popular traditions, yet
erases the Afro-Brazilian religious components in favor of their own theol-
ogy and position within representations of the nation.
Afro-Brazilian religious groups that strive hard to become visible by
means of the carnaval parades and samba schools that battle to present
Afro-Brazilian religious practices as constitutive parts of the Brazilian
nation should thus not count too much on the Catholic Church to help
them in their struggles against evangelical demonization. When present-
ing Afro-Brazilian religious figures explicitly in syncretic fashion, they are
met by the highly institutionalized Catholic Church that aims to control
tightly the appearance of Christian symbols in public. All in all, the con-
troversies we described demonstrate that different religious groups
attempt to foreground that Brazilian carnaval—itself conceivable as a
secular sacred amalgam of traditions—fits their particular religious tradi-
tion best.
References
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Part III
Tolerance
7
Homo Sanctus: Religious Contestations
and the Sanctification of Heritage
and Human Rights in Vietnam
Oscar Salemink
Introduction
Drawing on over 30 years of research on religious practices in Vietnam,
in this chapter I will focus on spirit possession as a religious practice and
as cultural heritage against the backdrop of human rights claims. In quite
a number of cases, religious experts and their followers had or have diffi-
cult relations with the Vietnamese state because of the restrictions that
the Communist Party-State in Vietnam imposes on religious practice,
sometimes erupting into overt conflict. Both inside and outside of
Vietnam such conflicts are usually understood in terms of human rights,
which assume a sacrosanct aura in the discourses of the various parties.
While the nature of these conflicts is different in each case (see Salemink
2006), the appeal to human rights creates a volatile arena of localized and
transnational contestations between diverging religious and secular
O. Salemink (*)
University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark
e-mail: o.salemink@anthro.ku.dk

130 O. Salemink
positions that both seek to legitimize their actions with reference to the
sacrosanct status of human rights. Even authoritarian states ‘subscribe to
them with a good deal of hypocrisy and reservation’ without questioning
their basic assumptions (Hastrup 2001: 9).
In this chapter, I shall argue that the discursive incorporation of debates
around religion into the transnational human rights arena re-frames the
relations of such practices with the state and re-defines notions of what is
seen as proper religion in the direction of the exclusivist; belief-centered
and confessional; and membership-based religions, historically dominat-
ing in the West and its paradigmatic monotheistic ‘others’—Judaism and
Islam. This ‘human rights encounter’ operates similar to the imperial
encounter which was instrumental in the emergence of vernacular notions
of religion and the secular in Asian languages, corresponding with the
emergence of discourses and institutions predicated on these concepts
(Veer 2001; Masuzawa 2005; DuBois 2009). Along similar lines, in this
chapter, I argue that the contemporary human rights encounter has a
transformative effect on religious practices and subjectivities. In the next
sections I shall discuss the connection between human rights, religion
and secularism. After that I shall offer a brief case study concerning con-
testations over spirit mediumship, as a religious practice that requires
some relationship with the Vietnamese state. I will briefly outline the
various social science and political debates over the interweaving ques-
tions of religion and superstition, religion and heritage, and religion and
human rights, with a focus on Vietnam. I then move on to a conference
in January 2016 in Nam Đi.nh, northern Vietnam, which functioned as
a stepping stone toward UNESCO recognition of Mother Goddess wor-
ship expressed through ritualized spirit possession as Intangible Cultural
Heritage (ICH). I pay particular attention to contestations during that
conference and the unexpected aftermath of the UNESCO inscription.
In the conclusion, I shall zoom in on the use of sanctified cultural heri-
tage and human rights discourses by local and transnational organiza-
tions in such contestations between the Vietnamese State and religious
communities.
7 Homo Sanctus: Religious Contestations… 131
Human Rights, Religion and Secularism

In a variety of contexts, human rights as articulated in the Universal
Declaration of Human Rights (1947) have been called a ‘secular religion’—
or sometimes civil religion, political religion, or political theology. In his
Modernity and self-identity (1991), Labour’s ‘New Way’ sociologist Anthony
Giddens simultaneously underwrote and modified Weber’s secularization
and disenchantment thesis by suggesting that a number of new social
movements, like the global human rights movement, displayed the charac-
ter of new, secular religions. This idea of human rights as secular religion
was broadcast widely by a person with impeccable human rights creden-
tials, namely Elie Wiesel.1 Michael Ignatieff, in his 2001 book Human
Rights as politics and idolatry, approaches human rights as a sacrosanct sub-
ject that must be rescued from political and social tendencies in both East
Asia, the Middle East and the West that undermine the liberal, individual-
ist foundations of human rights.
Despite the attribution of sacrosanct status to human rights by these
authors, they seem to have a strong conviction that human rights are
rooted in secularism. This is in line with the interpretation by Talal Asad
(2003) in his Formations of the Secular that the emergence of human
rights discourse is an instance of secular modernity, related to the domi-
nance of individualistic, liberal ideologies. This view is echoed by
Boaventura de Sousa Santos in his If God were a human rights activist
(2015) and by several contributors to the volume Politics of Religious
Freedom (Sullivan et al. 2015).2 What these scholars have in common is
that they describe the emergence of an immanent, secular frame which
arrogates inalienable rights to humanity, and thus shifts the sacrality of
the Gods to humans, conceptualized as autonomous and equal individu-
als before the sovereign authority of the state.
Nevertheless, there remain challenges against the universality of human
rights, namely as predicated on Western, liberal and individualistic
notions. Already in 1947, the Executive Board of the American
1
See http://www.pbs.org/eliewiesel/resources/millennium.html (accessed 20 May 2019).
2
But in his reply to Asad’s critique of his Public Religion, José Casanova (2008: 115–118) sketches
an alternative genealogy of Human Rights, namely as supported by the Catholic Church.
132 O. Salemink
Anthropological Association protested against the Universal Declaration

of Human Rights, and more recent histories of human rights make simi-
lar points that Human Rights are rooted in Western notions of the indi-
vidual (Moyn 2010; Santos 2015). In the global political arena, such
challenges are expressed by certain religious groupings—most promi-
nently Islamic groups as well as ‘Asian values’ protagonists in East and
Southeast Asia. After all, in contrast with Weberian prophesies concern-
ing rationalization, secularization and disenchantment there is a growing
awareness that the world is embracing a plurality of modernities that are
often experienced as religious rather than secular (Veer 1996; Hefner
1998; Eisenstadt 2000). Globally, this is evidenced by the growing social
visibility of religious beliefs and practices in the public sphere (Casanova
1994; Turner 2006a) and—within Europe—by enhanced religious plu-
rality as a result of migration and religious experimentation (Katzenstein
and Byrnes 2006; Turner 2006b).
Many human rights scholars, like Santos (2015), Sullivan et al. (2015)
and Hurd (2015), follow Talal Asad (2003) in situating the emergence of
the notion of the individual endowed with ‘inalienable rights’ in the early
modern Protestant Reformation in Europe, thereby elevating the notion of
religious freedom as the mother of the formulation of individual human
rights.3 This genealogy is predicated on an assumption of religion and secu-
larity as discrete spheres of human practice and thinking. In spite of Asad’s
(1993, 2003) analysis of religious and secular categories as genealogically
and historically connected, Eurocentric assumptions of religion as a dis-
crete category denoting a separate domain of social and cultural practice
still dominate scholarly and public debate. Thus, conceptual dichotomies
between the religious domain and this-worldly, secular domains of political
and economic practice are kept in place. This is in line with the first defini-
tion in José Casanova’s reformulation of the secularization thesis as ‘differ-
entiation of the secular sphere from religious beliefs and norms, … as a
decline of religious beliefs and practices, and … as marginalization of reli-
gion to a privatized sphere’ (2008: 107).
3
The main exception to this widely shared view is Samuel Moyn (2010) who emphasizes the genea-
logical contingency and the historical recentness of the idea of Human Rights as opposed to earlier
Enlightenment formulations of ‘Natural Rights’ or the ‘Rights of Man’.
As secularization in Europe is historically connected with the separa-

tion between church and state, one could question whether Western cat-
egories of religion and the secular make sense in other parts of the world
(Kipnis 2001; Turner 2006a), for example, with reference to ‘worldly’
religions as Confucianism and Daoism (Casanova 2008: 113). Raymond
Lee asserts that secularization in Asia assumes the form of individualiza-
tion of religious choice and a concomitant competition for local religious
‘consumers’ in a globalized religious market that is both local and simul-
taneously integrated into national spheres and transnational networks
(Lee 1993; see also Turner 2004; Masuzawa 2005; Ashiwa and Wank
2009). Also in post-reform Vietnam a religious arena emerged character-
ized by the individualization of religious choice and competition between
religious doctrines, practices and organizations. One rapidly expanding
practice since 1990 is spirit mediumship, connected with Mother
Goddess worship, as I shall describe in the next section.
Spirit Possession in Vietnam

Mother Goddess worship is part of a much wider, cosmological landscape
between the Daoist poles of this Dư ơ ng (or Yang) world and the other
Âm (or Yin) world, opening up a liminal space in between these two
poles. The beings inhabiting this liminal space—which is the cosmologi-
cal niche for spirit possession—are, first, the almost endless assortment of
local spirits linked to particular places and sites. A second category con-
cerns the souls of ancestors [tổ tiên], that is kinsfolk within the own
(patri)lineage who make the journey to the other world after a proper
death, funeral and rituals (Jellema 2007). Thirdly, the category of ghosts
[ma] refers to those souls outside one’s own kin, usually of those dead
who suffered an unfortunate death or who died childless, and keep on
wandering between the two worlds (Kwon 2008). A fourth category con-
cerns deified spirits—that is former souls (of ancestors or wandering
ghosts) who honed their efficacy through good deeds in this world,
thereby acquiring moral merit and moving up in the hierarchy toward
the other world. These deified spirits are then incorporated into the
134 O. Salemink
political theology of Confucianism and were in the past validated by the

emperor as a supreme medium between worlds (cf. Salemink 2007; for
China see Feuchtwang 2001; Palmer 2006; and Zito 1997). Mother
Goddesses belong to the latter category, but constitute an alternative—
more empathetic and efficacious—ritual channel mediating between this
world and the other world primarily populated by stern male, Mandarin-
like officials (Thien Do 2003), thus fulfilling a role similar to the bod-
hisattva Guan-Yin, Mother Mary, or the many other female Catholic saints.
Northern-style lên đồng [lit. ‘riding the medium’] is largely organized
around individual master mediums and her or his assistants. Historically
a largely rural phenomenon, the phenomenon has partly migrated to cit-
ies, with charismatic mediums building networks of clients and traveling
to temples to perform at temple festivals, or performing in their ‘home’
temple. A typical spirit possession session may take a couple of hours and
begins with the collection of the wishes (written as prayers [cầu] in
Chinese characters by a ritual specialist) and the preparation of the sacri-
ficial gifts and of the altar. Helped by her/his assistants and accompanied
by a chầu văn music band, the medium dons the clothes of the deity in
the Mother Goddess pantheon that s/he seeks to incarnate. After a series
of kowtows the medium sits down, veils the head, and touches the sacri-
ficial gifts (fruit, cans of drinks, edibles, fabrics, money) destined for that
particular deity. Then the medium stands up and, dressed in clothes and
handling props that recognizably refer to that deity, performs ritually pre-
scribed dance moves to songs that praise the deity. The scripted nature of
the ritual, however, leaves sufficient space for improvisation for the
medium to show the elegance of the performance; the aesthetics of dress,
dance, music and movement entrance spirits and people alike: seducing
the spirit to ride the body of the mediums while convincing the audience
of the ritual efficacy of the performance. After concluding the dance the
medium sits down, the sacrificial gifts are distributed among the musi-
cians and assistants, the audience and the larger part to the sponsor, and
a new incarnation begins. These incarnations of deities of both genders in
the pantheon can number up to 18 and each time the medium puts on
new clothes symbolizing the identity of the deity.
In other parts of Vietnam, traditions differ, as does the identity of the
Mother Goddess. The most popular Mother Goddess in northern
Vietnam is Princess Liêũ Hạnh (Dror 2006), but in the central part Thiên
Y A Na, a ‘Viet-ization’ of the Cham goddess Pô Nagar, is widely revered.
In many rural areas, the worship of Thiên Y A Na is a secretive, exclu-
sively male affair, but in the former imperial capital Huế hầu vui [merry
dancing] on the river involves groups of women (Nguyêñ Hữ u Thông
2001; Salemink 2007). In the South, a variety of more localized god-
desses such as Bà Chứ a Xứ [Lady of the Realm] in An Giang (Taylor
2004), or Bà Đen [Black Lady] in Tây Ninh are possessive agents. The
corresponding ritual practices are highly diverse across Vietnam, even if
one limits these to Mother Goddess worship. But in an article on spirit
possession in central Vietnam, I noticed how Ngô Đứ c Thi.nh’s 1996 col-
lection of lyrics of ritual chầu văn music was used by the medium and
musicians in the ritual performance to please the deities. The musicians
claimed that it enriched their repertoire by incorporating songs and lyrics
from various parts of Vietnam, but it standardized the music and lyrics
(Salemink 2007: 573), as also happened with traditional religions in
Africa (Hacket 2015: 96).
In precolonial Vietnam, mediumship practices were often frowned
upon or forbidden by Confucian elites (Nguyêñ Hữ u Thông 2001).4
Historically, lên đồng was considered a heterodox practice in the neo-
Confucian sense of not formally condoned by the Emperor who with his
mandate from Heaven mediates between Heaven and Earth (Feuchtwang
2001: Salemink 2007; Zito 1997).5 French colonial scholars often wrote
dismissively of mediums as sorciers/sorcières [sorcerers] (Giran 1912;
Durand 1959; Cadière 1992). The Communist authorities of postcolo-
nial Vietnam followed in the footsteps of the former Emperors and the
French colonial authorities and initially attempted to proactively sup-
press mediumship as deviant from (legitimate) religion in Vietnam, and
hence considered superstitious (Kendall 2008: 105; Salemink 2008).
In the mid-1980s the regime began to loosen its reign economically,
socially and culturally, and in the 1990s the practice came out into the
open through an active ‘fence-breaking and networking’ campaign waged
For China, see Sutton (2000).

4
The Vietnamese term mê tín dị đoan has the combined connotation of superstition and heterodoxy.
5
136 O. Salemink
by a coalition of practitioners, clients, scholars and artists (Vasavakul

2003; Ngô Đứ c Thi.nh 1999, 2004, 2010; Norton 2009). So after
decades of suppression, Mother Goddess worship and all sorts of spirit
possession practices started to flourish, and the political authorities did
not quite know what to do with this, the response varying per province
and location. Counterintuitively for many foreigners, the practices were
allowed especially in the north of Vietnam, quietly nudged on or actively
supported by the authorities, which stood to benefit culturally and finan-
cially from popular and successful temples in their territories. In other
parts of the country, authorities were often uncomfortable with ‘supersti-
tious’ practices in temples and continued to suppress them. While spirit
possession practices were mushrooming in Vietnam, this was from the
2000s studied by a copious amount of research, by both Vietnamese and
international scholars. Especially in the north, spirit possession temples,
sessions and pilgrimages were so visible that they led to a veritable schol-
arly industry, with dozens of Vietnamese and foreign scholars studying
spirit possession and Mother Goddess worship, albeit almost exclusively
on the North.6 Research on spirit possession in the central and southern
parts of the country and in the uplands was far and in between.7 In prac-
tice, this meant that the northern form of spirit possession [lên đồng] and
Mother Goddess worship [Đạo Mâ˜u] became the iconic types in the lit-
erature, and was seen by (northern) Vietnamese and foreign scholars alike
as representative for the country.
Superstition, Religion or Heritage?

In October 2010 I was asked to give a presentation on Mê tín dị đoan, tôn
giáo và khoa học [Superstition, religion and science] at a meeting of reli-
gious and heritage experts in Hanoi, who were debating whether lên đồng
should be admissible in temples and other sacred spaces that were
6
For a long but incomplete list, see Dror (2006); Endres (2008, 2012); Fjelstadt and Nguyen Thi
Hien (2006, 2011); Kendall (2008, 2011); Ngô Đứ c Thi.nh (1996, 1999, 2004, 2010); Nguyen
Thi Hien (2002); Norton (2009); Pham Quynh Phuong (2009); Thaveeporn Vasavakul (2003).
7
For southern Vietnam, see Gustafsson (2009); Kwon (2008) Nguyêñ Hữu Thông (2001). For the
highlands, see Vargyas (1993).
simultaneously listed as official state heritage.8 The occasion for the meet-
ing was a recent circular by the Ministry of Culture to ban spirit posses-
sion rituals from listed heritage sites. Many—but not all—of the experts
present disagreed with the Ministry’s circular, and sought to allow posses-
sion rituals on temple grounds, and some claimed that it constitutes
Intangible Cultural Heritage according to UNESCO ideas. Others—
mostly prominent mediums and their followers—claimed that lên đồng
constitutes an authentic Vietnamese religion and should be recognized as
such.9 My host (correctly) expected me to question the categorical dis-
tinction between religion and superstition, thus supporting their activism
against its proscription in listed temples.
According to Michael Lambek, spirit possession undermines our
‘modern’ comfort zones by violating ‘our own cultural distinctions and
deeply held assumptions concerning the “natural” differences between
such pairs of opposites as self and others, seriousness and comedy, reality
and illusion, and perhaps most critically, art and life’ (Lambek 1989:
52–53). But the question whether spirit possession is a religion is also
politically important in a country where a Party-State governing accord-
ing to Leninist principles follows in the footsteps of the erstwhile Emperor
and decides what constitutes a legitimate and admissible religion. It is
equally important in a situation where the stigma of superstition—and
its association with quackery and unscientific magical tricks—invites the
suspicion that possession is fake and that mediums are frauds.
With Vietnam’s 1998 embarkation on a path toward culturalization of
its policies and politics with Nghị Quyết V [Resolution V of the Central
Committee on ‘building a progressive culture imbued with national
identity’], open campaigning for recognition of spirit mediumship had
become possible. Some mediums aimed for official recognition of Đạo
Mâ˜u [Mother Goddess worship] as legitimate religion to be recognized
by the Bureau of Religious Affairs of the Communist Party. However,
8
Mê tín di. đoan, tôn giáo và khoa học [Superstition, religion and science], keynote speech for Tọa
đàm khoa học ‘Mê tín di. đoan, từ quan niệm học thuật đến ứ ng xử trong đờ i sống’ [Scientific
meeting on ‘Superstition, from scholarly concept to its application in life’], Hanoi, Center for
Cultural Heritage Research & Promotion, in the Women’s Museum, 23 October 2010.
9
This section is loosely based on Salemink (2015).
138 O. Salemink
many Vietnamese politicians and scholars still hold that spirit possession
is not a religion because it is not formally institutionalized, does not have
a formal doctrine, and does not have a priestly hierarchy. Another move-
ment led by scholars like Ngô Đứ c Thi.nh (1999, 2010) sought recogni-
tion for Đạo Mâ˜u as Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH), via the Ministry
of Culture and, ultimately, UNESCO. This scholarly interest in recogniz-
ing Mother Goddess worship as Intangible Cultural Heritage was fueled
by a ‘heritage boom’ (cf. Lowenthal 1998, Berliner 2005) in Vietnam’s
culture-scape, which was partly preceded by, and partly coincided with,
the religious boom since the economic reforms (from 1986).
Some mediums wanted to seek official recognition from the Bureau of
Religious Affairs qua religion, which in the Vietnamese context of Leninist
governmentality would necessarily result in a liturgical homogenization
and organizational hierarchization of the ritual community and practice
(cf. Endres 2012; Norton 2009; Vasavakul 2003; Salemink 2015). In
Communist-ruled Vietnam, official state recognition qua religion would
have the consequence of following the model of world religions and hence
unifying these extremely diverse practices by creating one singular liturgy
and a centralized hierarchical clergy, thereby creating ritual uniformity in a
literal sense. But Vietnam’s Bureau of Religious Affairs of the Party and the
Ministry of Public Security were reluctant to go down that road (as I know
from conversations with some representatives). After all, it would invite
human rights scrutiny in terms of freedom of religion, compelling the
state to create a semblance of official respect for the sovereignty of the
religious constituency. That avenue turned out to be a dead-end street.
When the avenue of official recognition as a religion was ruled out, the
preferred avenue became recognition as cultural heritage, with some
scholars campaigning for official recognition of spirit possession practices
as Intangible Cultural Heritage, preferably by UNESCO. While cultural
heritage and heritagization are still fairly new concepts with reference to
the Vietnamese situation, their political pedigrees are much older.
Following Regina Bendix (2009), Kirsten Endres used the term heritagi-
zation in her book on spirit mediumship [lên đồng], when she described
how both scholars and spirit mediums attempted to gain official accep-
tance for the practice by labeling it ‘heritage’ rather than ‘religion’ or—
worse—‘superstition’ (Endres 2012: 182). The alternating—and
sometimes contradicting—trends of secularization, religious suppression,

and heritage validation were a well-known pattern in post-independence
Vietnam, as Edyta Roszko (2010, 2012) shows in her study of the decrees
on religion and heritage in the Công Báo [Official Gazette of Vietnam]
from 1953 onward. For both Endres and Roszko, heritage validation of
religious sites, objects and practices work as political validation of such
sites and practices amidst Vietnam’s past and present secularist policies.
Both paths toward official state recognition—as religion or as cultural
heritage—refer to the same set of spirit possession practices, but invoke
diametrically opposed perceptions, different types of disciplinary exper-
tise, and very different state politics, predicated on the ‘modern’ distinc-
tion between the religious and the secular. This question of official
recognition of Mother Goddess worship was resolved in favor of the
UNESCO Avenue, which carries more national and international pres-
tige and fewer political risks for Vietnam’s Leninist Party-State. In spite of
such labels as superstition and fraud, UNESCO recognition would pre-
vent the State from suppressing it, as it would bring prestige in the global
arena to the practice itself and to Vietnam as a whole. These scholars
reasoned that with UNESCO recognition, the State would have a man-
date to preserve and to protect the practice. However, they did not con-
sider that with preservation and protection comes management and
intervention which, in spite of UNESCO professions about the primacy
of the ‘culture carriers’, privileges outside cultural experts and inevitably
disenfranchises the ritual constituencies. In other words, this avenue
toward official government recognition of lên đồng as Intangible Cultural
Heritage was predicated on a standard description of one version which
would be held up as a model. As much as the road toward official recogni-
tion qua religion, recognition as cultural heritage would standardize the
practices at the expense of the local communities and practitioners.
Spirit Possession, Heritage and Human Rights

Given my frequent earlier involvement, I was invited to present a paper
at a conference in Nam Đi ̣nh in northern Vietnam, co-organized by the
Vietnam Institute of Culture and Arts Studies (VICAS) under the
140 O. Salemink
Ministry of Culture, which was usually in charge of ICH submissions,

and by the provincial authorities. In the north of Vietnam, the temple
complex of Phủ Dầy dedicated to the pantheon of the supreme Mother
Goddess Princess Liêũ Hạnh is considered the center of the practice for
the whole country. In order to promote their agenda, scholars sympa-
thetic to lên đồng regularly sought to enlist the support of foreign schol-
ars, including myself, to that effect. The ‘international conference’ in
Nam Đi.nh was an example of such an effort: rather than a forum for
international scholarly exchange, it was a Debordian spectacle (cf. Debord
1994) performed for a domestic audience and for UNESCO, packaging
participation by international scholars like myself as support for the cam-
paign to recognition (Fig. 7.1).
Before the conference I asked a befriended organizer whether the pur-
pose of the meeting was to shore up a dossier for UNESCO to inscribe
Mother Goddess worship on the Intangible Cultural Heritage list, and my
Fig. 7.1 Preparing for a spirit medium possession ‘performance’ at the confer-
ence in Nam Đi.nh 2016
intuition proved correct. The dossier submitted in 2015 had been rejected
by UNESCO, but this ‘international’ conference was part of an attempt
to resubmit which, VICAS assumed, should be successful in 2016. This
turned out to be a correct assessment, as the ‘Practices related to the Viet
beliefs in the Mother Goddesses of Three Realms’ were inscribed in
December 2016.10 I feared that UNESCO recognition would standardize
lên đôǹ g, as suggested by Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett:
World heritage lists arise from operations that convert selected aspects of
localized descent heritage into a translocal consent heritage—the heritage
of humanity. (Kirshenblatt-Gimblett 2006: 170)
My deliberately provocative presentation in Nam Đi.nh surmised that

UNESCO recognition as ICH would turn the ritual performance into a
performative spectacle, emptying it of any religious content to do with
possession and communication with spirits. Instead, I argued, it would
create uniformity, as scholars and officials of the Ministry and of the pro-
vincial and district Departments of Culture would be in charge of polic-
ing the performance. They would be tempted to sanitize the practice by
suppressing any ‘superstitious’ acts while simultaneously seeking to valo-
rize the sites and practices economically by turning them into a tourist
spectacle (because that is what heritage does in the world’s largest eco-
nomic sector—tourism).
In my presentation I sketched the trajectory in Vietnam from supersti-
tion [mê tín dị đoan] via—legitimate—religious beliefs [tín ngư ỡng] and
culture [văn hóa] to, finally, heritage [di sản], and argued that historically,
from outright suppression and banning to secular labeling, the state itself
is the main threat to mediumship in Vietnam. I reminded the audience
that the main Government agency behind the Nam Đi.nh conference, the
Ministry of Culture, had sought to ban the ‘superstitious practice’ of Đạo
Mẫu [Mother Goddess worship] from heritage sites only a few years ear-
lier. Yet, now this ‘superstitious practice’ itself would be elevated to the
status of ICH. On one hand, this made sense, as spirit possession in
See https://ich.unesco.org/en/RL/practices-related-to-the-viet-beliefs-in-the-mother-goddesses-
10
of-three-realms-01064 (accessed 31 May 2017).

142 O. Salemink
Vietnam is a performative ritual practice related to various religious tradi-

tions, and as a ritual performance requires an audience not only of people
but also of spirits. On the other hand, reducing the performance to spec-
tacle performed by ‘folk artists’ empties it of its ritual content of com-
municating with beings in the other world (Fig. 7.2).
Therefore, I argued that heritage recognition would not protect, but
instead empty the practice of religious content and disenfranchise the
ritual constituencies, at a time that Đạo Mâ˜u is more popular, thriving
Fig. 7.2 Spirit procession during Nam Đi.nh conference 2016

and vibrant than ever. In other words, heritagization risks to empty Đạo
Mẫu of its ritual and religious core, thus depriving the ritual constituency
of its freedom to practice it as religion as their ‘human right’. The day
before the conference participants had visited the nearby ‘main heavenly
palace’ [Phủ Chính Tiên Hư ơ ng] in Phủ Dầy, where we were treated with
a spirit possession performance by the main medium of the temple, who
happened to be the daughter of the octogenarian temple mistress, Bà
Trần Thị Duyên (see Fig. 7.1). This elderly lady had lived through decades
of outright suppression of superstition and was now witnessing its recent
elevation to the status of heritage. She took the stage at the end of her
daughter’s performance to make a speech, and literally said on 5
January 2016:
Tôi mong rằng cuộc hội thảo này sẽ đem lại tu. ̛ do tín ngư ỡng [I wish that this
conference will bring religious freedom (lit. freedom of religious beliefs)]
My evocation of the words spoken by the temple mistress, namely that

she wanted religious freedom rather than heritage preservation, created
confusion at the conference, because the words of the temple mistress
had been witnessed by others and could not be denied. Moreover, they
carried weight because the conference was supposed to support her work.
Some Vietnamese officials sought to dismiss the relevance of these words,
but a similar problem arose when later during the conference some prac-
titioners were invited to speak, including the daughter of the temple mis-
tress. As an accomplished medium who had performed for the conference
participants before, she used the very same words—freedom of religious
beliefs—to describe the aspirations of herself, her colleagues, and her fol-
lowers, namely to be free from state interference (Figs. 7.3 and 7.4).
Another embarrassment at the conference was the glaringly obvious
disjuncture between the academically and politically clever metropolitan
scholars and officials from Hanoi on one hand, and the local officials and
researchers from the provinces whose presentations were steeped in the
language of decades of Leninist ‘newspeak’ on the other hand. Officials
and researchers from province down to district levels formulated their
contributions according to the format of ‘selective preservation’ which
highlighted ‘beautiful and representative’ elements in cultural practices
144 O. Salemink
Fig. 7.3 Spirit medium during procession ritual, Nam Đi.nh 2016
while combating ‘primitive, backward, unhygienic, superstitious’ along

with ‘social evils’ and culturally ‘alien’ elements (cf. Salemink 2003).
Oblivious to the discursive implications of their interventions, they hap-
pily reported how they would now preserve and manage lên đòng as an
authentic Vietnamese cultural practice while getting rid of superstitious
elements to do with spirits and possession. Thus as a political perfor-
mance, the conference did not quite work in the intended way, because
the inevitable ‘local voices’ adopted a language with rather chilling
Fig. 7.4 Spirit medium in front of the altar with sacrificial effigies, Nam Đi.nh 2016
Leninist connotations of earlier cultural policies that construed ‘New

Socialist Man’. They unwittingly negated the professed aim of the confer-
ence, namely proposing Đạo Mâ˜u as an authentic Vietnamese cultural
practice worthy of global recognition by UNESCO.
Whatever the concerns over the attitudes of the officials who in the
end would implement the cultural preservation policies on behalf of the
Vietnamese state, all conference participants knew that these were just
146 O. Salemink
minor bumps in the road as the wheels of UNESCO inscription had

already been set in motion. As with the 12 other Vietnamese ‘elements’
inscribed since 2008, the Vietnamese Government proved adept at play-
ing the UNESCO game. Lynn Meskell (2015) showed that UNESCO
inscription is a political game of gifts and transactions rather than based
on a ‘scientific’ evaluation of cultural and other merits. Vietnam knows
how to play this game well, so there was never any question that UNESCO
would be willing to accept and condone this new inscription on it global
ICH list during the 11th session of the Intergovernmental Committee
for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage in November–
December 2016 in Addis Ababa. Yet, in spite of the new-found cultural
heritage status of spirit possession, talk about human rights—and in par-
ticular religious freedom—emerged around it in Vietnam.
In June 2017 a video of a sermon by the popular Buddhist monk
Thích Trí Chơ n in Ho Chi Minh City was uploaded on Facebook.11 In
the sermon, the monk attacked Đạo Mâ˜u, and other forms of lên đòng
and spirit possession, as ‘superstition’, using the vocabulary of the Leninist
state. In the past, Vietnamese Mahayana Buddhism was open to include
other forms of worship in its rituals and on its premises, but more recently
a more Theravada-oriented Buddhism has emerged in southern Vietnam
which—much like the monotheistic religions governed by a ‘jealous
God’—seeks to purify Buddhism of ‘alien’ elements (Roszko 2019). In
response, the octogenarian Phủ Dầy temple mistress Bà Trần Thị Duyên
wrote an open petition to the Bureau of Religious Affairs and a number
of other Party, Government and media organizations in Vietnam
(Fig. 7.5). The three-page petition dated 7 June 2017 was also uploaded
on Facebook but has since been removed. In the petition, Ms. Trần Thị
Duyên claims to represent nearly 8000 temples around the country and
offers a brief history of state relations with and recognition of Đạo Mâ˜u
in Vietnam. She highlights in particular the UNESCO recognition of the
religious beliefs of thờ Mâ˜u [Mother Goddess worship12] in December
2016 and demands a clarification of the Buddhist Association of Vietnam
11
See https://www.facebook.com/tranviethieu.tran.3/videos/1430838216977847/, accessed 20
May 2019.
12
Denoting the same practice, Đạo Maˆ˜u has the connotation of a creed with a formal doctrine,
while Thờ Mẫu highlights the practical ritual aspects of the worship.
Fig. 7.5 Petition of spirit mediums to Vietnamese authorities

148 O. Salemink
about the authority of Thích Trí Chơ n to speak for Vietnam’s Buddhists;
a clarification about its stance regarding the ‘religious beliefs’ of Mother
Goddess worship; and an apology by the Venerable Trí Chơ n. The
Government eagerly sought to suppress this inter-religious dispute and
calmed down the emotions.
In other words, Ms. Trần Thi. Duyên, claiming to speak on behalf of
thousands of other spirit mediums and their followers, invoked interna-
tional recognition UNESCO as cultural heritage and the prestige afforded
to Vietnam, in order to validate the ritualized practice of spirit possession
as a legitimate religion [tín ngư ỡng], against the historical backdrop of its
labeling and hence suppression as superstition. Such a claim to the status
of religion became the basis for a supposedly UNESCO-authorized
appeal to the Vietnamese authorities to protect its status as a religion and
thereby honor its obligation under international law to uphold freedom
of religion [tu. ̛ do tín ngư ỡng]. Tellingly, whereas cultural heritage status
was governed via Vietnam’s Ministry of Culture, Ms. Trần Thi. Duyên’s
appeal for Đạo Mâ˜u to be respected and protected qua religion was
directed to Vietnam’s religious authorities, Buddhist associations
and media.
Rights, Heritage and the Human Subject

Paradoxically, UNESCO inscription as ICH turned the highly diverse,
ritualized practices of Mother Goddess worship and other forms of spirit
possession into a religion with its headquarters at the Phủ Dầy temple
and headed by its temple mistress, Ms. Trần Thị Duyên. Spirit posses-
sion practices in Vietnam were and are usually intermingled with ele-
ments of other religious traditions—Buddhism, Daoism, ancestor
worship—which did not require exclusive adherence, belief, or devotion.
We could understand these ritual practices as religious, but the practitio-
ners and their followers did not constitute an official religion. Yet, in her
petition, Ms. Trần Thi. Duyên referenced religious freedom, which is logi-
cally predicated on individual choice and hence an individualization in
terms of confessional interiorization. This individualization of religious
choice inevitably relegates religious beliefs to an inner, private realm, as

theorized by José Casanova (1994) and Charles Taylor (2007), and there-
fore constitutes a secularist proposition, in which religion is defined and
circumscribed as a field of action and thinking limited to individual belief
or collective religious action in the private realm. Yet, Ms. Trần Thị
Duyên Duyên demands recognition and respect for it in the public
sphere, in the name of both UNESCO-mandated cultural heritage and
UN-mandated human rights.
Both cultural heritage and human rights regimes imply an immanent
frame. The cultural heritage label is often affixed to religious sites, objects
and practices, but the criteria for such recognition are predicated on non-
transcendental criteria that buttress the uniqueness of the phenomenon
in terms of ‘outstanding universal value from the point of view of history,
art or science’.13 Thus, the cultural value of the phenomenon should be
universal and encompassing all of humanity, beyond any specific reli-
gious constituency. Regardless of whether the phenomenon is considered
or experienced as religious, its recognition as world cultural heritage
hence implies a secular gaze in the sense that its referent subject is ‘human-
ity’. Similarly, the referent subject of human rights is humanity and, as
Asad (2003) cogently argued, its immanent focus is the absence of suffer-
ing in a this-worldly life rather than a transcendentally mandated accep-
tance of suffering in expectation of an afterlife. An explicit connection
between the immanent conception of both cultural heritage and human
rights is made explicitly in the 2003 ‘Convention for the Safeguarding of
the Intangible Cultural Heritage’ which, in Article 2, states that ‘For the
purposes of this Convention, consideration will be given solely to such
intangible cultural heritage as is compatible with existing international
human rights instruments.’14
As the emergence and global proliferation of human rights and cul-
tural heritage regimes can be understood in terms of secularization, their
intersection with religious phenomena—including freedom of religion—
incorporates sites, objects, beliefs and practices that are experienced as
13
Convention Concerning the Protection of the World Cultural and Natural Heritage, article 1
(see https://whc.unesco.org/en/conventiontext/).
14
See https://ich.unesco.org/en/convention.
150 O. Salemink
transcendental by their religious constituencies into an immanent frame.

But paradoxically, human rights as well as cultural heritage discourses
simultaneously sanctify their objects as beyond critique or reproach: both
human rights and cultural heritage in the form of both World Heritage
and ICH are construed as sacrosanct, thereby sacralizing their referent
human subject: homo sanctus.
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8
Secularist Nativism: National Identity
and the Religious Other
in the Netherlands
Josip Kešić and Jan Willem Duyvendak
Introduction
If immigration continues, Islamic culture in the Netherlands will keep
growing—which I do not want—and we will end up living in country that
has not one million but many, many more Muslims adhering to an ideol-
ogy that directly opposes ours. Then Dutch identity will be lost… I want
to safeguard our identity, and this is why I want to put a stop to
immigration.1
This statement made by the Dutch far-right politician Geert Wilders is

illustrative of a discourse that has gained prominence in many European
countries across the whole political spectrum. Such discourses
problematizing Islam and Muslims have often been analysed through the
1
Geert Wilders, 2008, Parliamentary Debate about the internet film Fitna, available at https://
zoek.officielebekendmakingen.nl/h-tk-20072008-4880-4921.pdf, accessed 27 November, 2014.
J. Kešić (*) • J. W. Duyvendak

University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
e-mail: j.kesic@uva.nl; w.g.j.duyvendak@uva.nl

156 J. Kešić and J. W. Duyvendak
conceptual lenses of ‘secularism’, ‘Islamophobia’, ‘populism’ and ‘nation-

alism’, to name just a few. Whereas we acknowledge the relevance of these
concepts, we approach such discourses from a closely related yet different
conceptual angle. In our perspective, what is primarily at stake is not so
much the conflict with or between religions as such but the role of reli-
gion and secularism in constructions of the nation’s cultural identity.
More specifically, we regard the problematization of Islam first and fore-
most as a manifestation of a phenomenon that exceeds the debates on
secularism or Islam: nativisn, an “intense opposition to an internal minor-
ity on the ground of its foreign connections” (Higham 2011 [1955],
p. 3). As a subcategory of nationalism, nativism constructs various
minorities as a threat to the nation, for example, native elites (populist
nativism), black minorities (racial nativism) or welfare state profiteers
(socio-economic nativism).2 At least in Europe, Muslim minorities are
the main targets of this nativist logic. To capture conceptually this
dynamic between national self-understandings and enemy images when
revolving around religion and secularism, we propose to call this secularist
nativism: an intense opposition to an internal minority that is seen as a
threat to the ‘secular’ nation on the ground of its foreignness.3
Geert Wilders is secular nativism’s most recognizable mouthpiece
nationwide, if not internationally. However, his narrative, with slight
variations, has been perpetuated by many other Dutch politicians since
the early 1990s, including Pim Fortuyn, Frits Bolkestein, Ayaan Hirsi Ali
and Rita Verdonk. Public opinion-makers and intellectuals have also
helped produce this nativist twist on ‘the clash of civilizations’ narrative’,
including the late Theo van Gogh, Afshin Ellian and Paul Cliteur, to
name just the most prominent among the Dutch. The idea that Dutch
national identity and Islam are not only different but also incompatible,
antagonistic cultural entities has been used time and again by right-wing
politicians, most recently by Thierry Baudet. His party, the Forum voor
2
Each of these subtypes of nativism will be addressed separately and in depth in the book we are
currently working on with the working title The Return of the Native. Understanding Progressive
Nativism in the West. For the shorter version of nativism’s subtypes and the main argument, see
Kešić & Duyvendak (2019).
3
For a similar analysis yet with different concepts and more connected to debates on religion and
secularism, see van den Hemel’s ‘post-secular nationalism’ (Hemel 2018).
8 Secularist Nativism: National Identity and the Religious Other… 157
Democratie (from now, FvD), was founded in 2016, and obtained two
seats in the 2017 national elections and became the largest party in the
2019 provincial (and Senate) elections.
Hence, secularist nativism is a prevalent political phenomenon in the
Netherlands that we urgently have to understand better. In the following,
we first analyse the two main pillars of secularist nativism, followed by an
in-depth analysis of the role history plays in the discourses by secularists
nativists. In the conclusion, we discuss the political impact of secularist
nativism.
wo Pillars of Secularist Nativism: Gender/

T
Sexuality and Cultural Christianity
In the context of Dutch nativism, one of the main ways in which pro-
cesses of secularization and nativism are intertwined is through rendering
progressive gender and sexuality as the defining essence of the secular
nation (Balkenhol et al. 2016; Uitermark et al. 2014). The nativist the-
matization of issues related to gender and sexuality, especially concerning
gender equality and homosexuality should be interpreted as secular
notions taking on sacred dimensions. In countless discussions on the
Koran, honour killings, female circumcisions, genital mutilation, forced
marriages and domestic violence, Islam is disqualified by its oppression of
non-emancipated women and juxtaposed with the gender equality and
sexual freedom that is considered quintessentially Dutch. While the posi-
tion of women is central in debates about Islam in many European con-
texts, nowhere is the role of homosexuality more prevalent in nativist
imageries than in the Netherlands (Fassin 2010; Mepschen et al. 2010;
Schinkel 2017). The openly gay, anti-Islam populist Fortuyn contributed
to the reputation of the Dutch as being ‘pro-gay’. Enjoying success in the
early 2000s, Fortuyn capitalized on the deeply ingrained national self-
image of ‘tolerance’ by contrasting it with Islam, characterized as homo-
phobic. These depictions of Dutchness and Islam are just a recent
manifestation of the older, broader opposition between progressive
modernity and backwards tradition (Scott 2009; Schinkel 2017).
Gender and sexuality function in secularist nativism according to the

logic of the ‘typicality effect’ (Leerssen 1997), whereby one salient ele-
ment is presented as characteristic for the whole group or culture.
Secularist nativism employs gender and sexuality to emphasize differ-
ences between Dutch society and its Muslim minority, which are privi-
leged over possible similarities between the two, and over internal
differences within each entity. Therefore, this discursively constructed
image of Dutchness glosses over not only the past century’s long, hard
struggle for gender and sexual equality (a struggle unrelated to any
Muslim presence or absence), but also the sexism and homophobia that
persists in present-day Netherlands.
Along progressive sexuality and gender relations, a specific notion of
Christianity—we call Cultural Christianity—is another central pillar in
the discourse of secularist nativism. Here, Christianity should not be
regarded as a ‘substantive Christianity… not understood as a religion,
but as a civilization, as co-extensive with “the West”’ and deemed charac-
teristic for its constitutive nations by people and parties who are often not
religious themselves (Brubaker 2017). This de-substantialization means
that “references to a shared theological unity or to confessional identity
remain largely absent. Personal faith, or religious experiences are usually
fully absent from these discussions” (Hemel 2014 : 59).
FvD’s political discourse is a recent reiteration of this European wide
trope of Cultural Christianity. In a 2017 pre-election speech, for exam-
ple, its leader Baudet said that: ‘One does not have to subscribe to
Christianity’s metaphysical assumptions to still appreciate the idea of the
resurrection as the guiding motif of our civilization.’4 Such general
notions of nationhood are translated into more specific policy issues.
FvD’s online petition to ‘save’ Christmas is illustrative:
Christmas belongs in the Netherlands. But the NPO [Dutch public broad-
caster] wants to banish the term from TVs—and various schools have
announced that, in the name of diversity and inclusion, they will not cel-
ebrate Christmas. Our culture is under attack and our oikophobic, self-
4
Westen lijdt aan een auto-immuunziekte. Speech at party conference on 15 January 2017. Available
on the FvD website at https://forumvoordemocratie.nl/actueel/toespraakthierry-baudet-alv-
fvd-2017 (accessed February 1, 2017).
hating elites are enthusiastically participating in its degradation and

erosion. Forum for Democracy maintains that Christmas is something that
must be saved. This degradation of our traditions and our way of life must
stop. Our elites’ self-hatred—the oikophobia—must stop.5
Through his notion of oikophobia (the fear/hate of one’s home),

Baudet has repeatedly claimed that there is an ‘identity crisis of the West’:
‘Many problems we face today have to do with our inability to formulate
our identity vis-à-vis this great adversary that arrived here, the fact that
we do not know who we are.6 To solve the problem of ‘uprootedness’, he
proposes to ‘reinvent ourselves’ by re-embracing Christianity, which not
only embodies typical ‘Western values’ (such as freedom of speech), but
can also fulfil the fundamental need ‘of the Dutch people’ for cohesion
and meaning. More concretely, he advocates that Christianity should be
taught at all primary and secondary schools in the Netherlands. Asked
whether he himself is Christian, Baudet replied that he is an ‘agnostic
cultural Christian’.7
Cultural Christianity de-substantialises Christianity also by discur-
sively associating it with other religions (Judaism) and secular categories
(humanism and Enlightenment). A Geert Wilders’s (PVV) 2017 speech
is one example of innumerable instances. Here he warns that the alleged
EU policies to host Muslim migrants will ‘undermine the Judeo-Christian
and humanistic identity of our nations’ which are essentially ‘free and
civilised’.8 That even those who do foreground religious Christianity
embrace Cultural Christianity illustrates the latter’s hegemonic status.
The established centrist Christian Democrats (CDA) also emphasize that
“we are grounded in a tradition of Judeo-Christian values”: ‘Whether we
5
Stop de zelfhaat! Behoud het Kerstfeest. Available on the FvD website at https://forumvoor-
democratie.nl/petities/kerstmis, accessed 4 June 2018.
6
De Evangelische Omroep. De Tafel van Tijs, February 14, 2017. Available at https://portal.eo.nl/
programmas/tv/de-tafel-van-tijs/gemist/2017/02/14-de-tafelvan-tijs, accessed 17 July, 2017.
7
De Evangelische Omroep. De Tafel van Tijs, February 14, 2017. Available at https://portal.eo.nl/
programmas/tv/de-tafel-van-tijs/gemist/2017/02/14-de-tafel-vantijs, accessed 17 July 2017.
8
Geert Wilders, 2017, Speech at the MENF Congress in Prague. https://www.pvv.nl/36-fj-related/
geertwilders/9674-speech-geert-wildersinpraag-16-12-2017-menf-congres.html’, accessed 3 June,
2020.
want it or not, whether we believe [in God] or not, whether we attend the
church or not: The Netherlands is still in its philosophical foundation a
Christian country’.9 Another clear aspect of the de-substantialization
Christianity in the employment of Cultural Christianity is the entangle-
ment between the two pillars of secularist nativism. When Wilders is put
under pressure in a debate in Dutch parliament to concretely explain
what he means by ‘Judeo-Christian-humanist culture’, he replied by con-
trasting it to what he views as typical for the Islam: ‘It is a culture that
does not kill homosexuals’ and infidels, that ‘allows apostasy, and treats
men and women equally, and esteems the separation of church and
state.’10 Thus, the historically incorrect equation of Christianity with
both Judaism and humanism entails a triple conflation. First, it conflates
religious traditions which have often had an antagonistic relationship.
Second, it conflates Christianity with predominantly secular movements
(humanism and the Enlightenment) and ‘values traditionally associated
with secularism, such as the separation of church and state, freedom of
expression, gay rights, and feminism’ (Hemel 2014: 55) and individual-
ism. Thirdly, it conflates national identity with broader, transnational
categories of ‘the West’ and ‘Europe’.
Sacralization Through Historization

The nativist narrative not only portrays the national culture being under
threat by an enemy called Islam, but is also sacralises it, and therefore can
be seen as one of the “secular practices and values that can take on sacred
dimensions as the subject of worship” (Balkenhol, Hemel and Stengs,
this volume, p. 6). This sacral status of national identity can be inferred
from not only its thematic centrality in public and political debates—at
the expense of other major political concerns—but also from the deep
emotional investment in this topic. One of the main ways through which
the secularist self-image has discursively obtained its sacred status in
nativist discourses is through the historization of national identity. Below
9
Sybrand Buma: Verwarde tijden die om richting vragen. HJ Schoolezing, 4 September 2017, see
Elsevier Weekblad, 5 September 2017.
10
Parliamentary Debate, ‘Dynamiek in islamitisch activisme’, September 6, 2007. See https://zoek.
officielebekendmakingen.nl/h-tk-20062007-5260-5319.pdf, accessed 3 June, 2020.
we dissect this sacralization through historization by distinguising

between various emplotments of the nation’s temporal trajectories which
invoke either historical continuity or discontinuity.
The Narrative of Secular Emergence
The conflation as mentioned above between religions and between reli-

gious and predominantly secular categories relies to a large degree on its
historization. Frits Bolkestein, the leader of the Dutch liberal party
(VVD) and one of the earliest voices articulating secularist nativism in
the Netherlands, wrote: ‘Rationalism, humanism and Christianity have,
after a long history that includes many black pages, brought forth a num-
ber of fundamentally important political principles, like the separation of
Church and State,11 freedom of speech, tolerance and non-discrimina-
tion.’ In 2008, the same VVD included in its foundational document
that ‘the Dutch society’s origin is the Judeo-Christian tradition, human-
ism and the Enlightenment. These civilizational foundations […] are the
basis for our national identity.’12 Similarly, Geert Wilders of the populist
right-wing PVV also repeatedly historicizes the ‘Judeo-Christian and
humanistic identity of our nation’ against the religious enemy: ‘Together
we must resist Islamic totalitarianism. Because our civilization is not
Islamic. It is rooted in the heritage of Jerusalem, Athens and Rome!’13
Explicitly following Huntington, the Christian Democrat Buma (CDA)
argues that, not only are ‘we’ rooted in a ‘Judeo-Christian tradition’ in
which equality and freedom have always been an intrinsic part of, but
also that ‘modernity’ (democracy, humanism, Enlightenment) ‘is not at
odds with Christian ethics, but a result of it’ (Buma 2017, p. 36).14
11
Parliamentary Debate, ‘Dynamiek in islamitisch activisme’, September 6, 2007. See https://zoek.
officielebekendmakingen.nl/h-tk-20062007-5260-5319.pdf, accessed 3 June, 2020.
12
VVD, 2008. Beginselverklaring. See https://www.vvd.nl/content/uploads/2016/12/beginselverk-
laring.pdf, accessed 18 April, 2018.
13
Geert Wilders, Speech at the MENF Congress in Prague, December 16, 2017. See https://www.
pvv.nl/36-fj-related/geert-wilders/9674-speech-geert-wildersin-praag-16-12-2017-menf-congres.
html, accessed 3 June, 2020.
14
Sybrand Buma: Verwarde tijden die om richting vragen. HJ Schoolezing, 4 September 2017, see
Elsevier Weekblad, 5 September 2017.
In this narrative, which far-right wing to centrist parties alike subscribe

to, Dutch national identity (defined by liberal values embodied by first
and foremost progressive sexuality and gender relations, and Cultural
Christianity) is a secular identity yet historically linked to its Christian
past. However, Christianity does not merely precede secular national
identity on the historical timeline, it gives birth to it: the latter emerges
from the former. Their historical relationship is not temporal, but genea-
logical. The narrative of genealogical emergence—that is secularism’s his-
torical and spiritual indebtedness to Christianity—portrays national
history as a dynamic process in which different cultural dimensions are
intertwined. Yet, the implied harmony of this historically dynamic entan-
glement of multiple traditions invokes a rather static homogeneity of the
nation’s cultural identity because it foregrounds continuity and sameness
and downplays discontinuity and difference, all in function to enhance
the contrast with what nativists deem the enemy, Islam. The continuity
of national identity is partly invoked through Christianity appearing in
various forms on the nation’s historical timeline, first as the genealogical
source, later as its de-substantialised remnant functioning as a symbol of
cultural rather than confessional identity. The narrative of emergence
produces an irony: the invocation of Cultural Christianity defines the
Netherlands as a secular country, erasing its ‘real’ Christian practices in
both the recent past and present.
The Narrative of Perpetual Tolerance
Where in the narrative of emergence, Christianity is followed by secular-

ism (associated with liberal values), there is another narrative that also
invokes liberal values as the essence of Dutchness yet through other
means: religious diversity. The discourse on and in Amsterdam, function-
ing as a synecdoche for Dutchness, provides the clearest illustration of
this type. In innumerable speeches, mayors and aldermen of the Dutch
capital emphasize that the city has been a refuge for dissidents, particu-
larly religious dissidents, from its earliest days. Former mayor Schelto
Patijn spoke of the ‘Old age Amsterdam traditions of freedom and
liberty’, just as former mayor Job Cohen claimed that ‘anybody who is
aware of the history of Amsterdam knows that migration to our city is of
all times, creating a prosperous city.’ An official leaflet welcoming new
residents to the city reads:
During the 17th century, Amsterdam continued to be a safe haven.

Thousands of immigrants flocked to Amsterdam from the South, fleeing
war and religious persecution or just seeking jobs and higher pay […] Their
new neighbours dressed more flamboyantly, spoke foreign languages, and
practiced different religions. But Amsterdam may never have become a
world power in the 17th century without immigrants—and it wouldn’t be
the city it is today.
It is no surprise that Russell Shorto’s book Amsterdam: A History of the

World’s Most Liberal City—which posits an almost teleological history of
tolerance leading up to today’s liberal city—has been embraced by
Amsterdam’s political class and by Dutch nativists more generally.
Nevertheless, Shorto’s suggestion of a causal relationship between the sev-
enteenth century and today’s liberal city is highly questionable.
Instead of erasing or downplaying religion (as in the narrative of secu-
lar emergence or in the notion of Cultural Christianity), the narrative of
perpetual tolerance relies not only on one religion but on multiple reli-
gions. Emphasizing the presence of religions serves to prove the point
that their harmonious co-existence reveals a liberal attitude deemed a
Dutch essence. Where the narrative of secular emergence erases religion
as such, this variation erases the antagonism among religions. For exam-
ple, it glosses over the period that Roman-Catholics were second-rate
citizens, not allowed to publicly show their religiosity or occupy govern-
ment positions. This erasure takes place by avoiding interreligious con-
flicts within the included historical periods, and by excluding inimical
periods, such as the twentieth century pillarization when the Netherlands
was a deeply divided country along confessional lines. The narrative of
perpetual tolerance invokes a continuity between a distant past and the
present by excluding the relatively recent past.
The Narrative of Accomplished Progress
Where the narratives of secular emergence and perpetual tolerance depict

national history positively through the invocation of harmonious (trans)
historical continuity, the third narrative does so through representing the
nation’s past in terms of antagonistic discontinuity. An illustration of this
type of historization of the national past in the context of secularist nativ-
ism is the often quoted interview with Pim Fortuyn, the flamboyant
leader of the far-right Lijst Pim Fortuyn (LPF), murdered in 2002 and
voted the ‘Greatest Dutchman of all time’ in 2004. Referring to Islam,
he said:
I do not feel like repeating the emancipation of women and homosexuals

[…] I don’t hate Islam. I consider it a backward culture. I have travelled
much. And wherever Islam rules, it’s just terrible. All the hypocrisy. It’s a bit
like those old reformed Protestants. The Reformed lie all the time. And
why is that? Because they have standards and values that are so high that
you can’t humanly maintain them. You also see that in that Muslim cul-
ture. Then look at the Netherlands. In what country could an electoral
leader of such a large movement as mine be openly homosexual? How
wonderful that that’s possible. That’s something that one can be proud of.
And I’d like to keep it that way, thank you very much.15
When future politician Diederik Boomsma was pursuing his PhD

degree in the same institutional and intellectual environment as FvD’s
Thierry Baudet and Paul Cliteur (i.e. Leiden’s Faculty of Law, the cradle
of highbrow secularist nativism in the Netherlands), he wrote that
‘Emancipation is not out of fashion. Emancipation is accomplished’
(Boomsma and Price 2014).16 Several years later in the capacity of a
member of the Amsterdam local council for the Christian Democrats
(CDA), he would indirectly condone that the Dutch are superior to
15
De Volkskrant February 9, 2002. Pim Fortuyn op herhaling: De islam is een achterlijke cultuur. See
https://www.volkskrant.nl/nieuws-achtergrond/pim-fortuyn-op-herhaling-de-islam-is-eenachterli-
jke-cultuur~bee400ca/, accessed January 6, 2019.
16
Diederik Boomsma and Jonathan Price, NRC, 18 January 2014, Het keerpunt is bereikt: de eman-
cipatie is niet uit, maar gewoon af. See https://www.nrc.nl/nieuws/2014/01/18/het-keerpunt-is-
bereikt-de-emancipatie-is-niet-uit-maar-simpelweg-af-a1427928, accessed 3 June 2020.
others ‘nothing wrong to think that way.’17 As the progressive self-image is

supported by the entire political spectrum, it should not come as a sur-
prise that this idea of ‘national progress’ can be encountered among left-
wing politicians as well. Illustrative is an essay by the former chairman of
the Green-Left Party, Herman Meijer ‘Progressive patriotism’ (2011).18
For him, not the Muslims are regarded as a threat but right-wing nativists
who have the potential to poison the country’s liberal essence. To combat
this danger, the progressive-left should re-appropriate Dutch national
identity based on the national history’s leitmotif: ‘moral progress’, defined
as self-determination and emancipation and embodied in the nation’s
liberal values mainly around issues of gender, sexuality and religion (Kešić
and Duyvendak 2016). Meijer:
The twentieth century started with the emancipation of Catholics,

Calvinists, and the working class, and it ended with the emancipation of
women and gays. […] The progressive policy and legislation on issues such
as abortion, euthanasia, soft drugs, and homosexuality can be attributed to
the struggle of minorities. However, they have been accepted now almost
across the entire political spectrum […].19
Where others avoid conflict within and differences between periods of

national history, the narrative of ‘accomplished progress’ is predicated on
acknowledging the nation’s historical struggles. It views them not only as
a central part of the nation’s past, but it infers a rather self-congratulatory
self-image out of it, regarding both the historical process and its end
result. What makes the Dutch superior is not only their liberal, progres-
sive present, but also their capacity throughout the centuries to overcome
problems and to continually move into the right moral direction. More
than other narratives it regards national history as a discontinuous pro-
cess with conflicts, yet this serves to invoke a trans-historical essence that
finds its full realization in the present. Without idealizing the past (as it
includes many negative aspects one would deem un-Dutch), the
17
Diederik Boomsma, February 24, 2018, Twitter. https://twitter.com/DiederikBoomsma/sta-
tus/967404626181021697, accessed 3 June, 2020.
18
Herman Meijer, 2011, Verlicht nationalisme. Tijdschrift de Helling 24(3), 55–65.
19
Herman Meijer, 2011, Verlicht nationalisme. Tijdschrift de Helling 24(3), 55–65.
narrative of accomplished progress depicts a positive historical process

culminating in the ideal state of completion in the present.
The Narrative of Rebirth
The most explicit and politically relevant example of the Rebirth trope is
the far right-wing party FvD. Thiery Baudet’s victory speech after becom-
ing the biggest party in the provincial (and, indirectly, senate) elections in
the Netherlands (March 20, 2019) is a case in point as it invokes an ideal
past, a negative recent past/present and a rebirth (present-future). He
argues that the national past is part and parcel of the ‘greatest and most
beautiful civilisation the world has ever known’, referring to colonial
expansion and the ‘most beautiful’ arts of the past. However, this past of
cultural superiority is ‘almost gone’ due to its continual destruction in the
recent past by the leftist elites through the media, education, and immi-
gration and ecological policies: ‘[…] as all these other countries of our
boreal [white, JK&JWD] world, we are being destroyed by those very
people who should have protected us.’ Despite the enemy’s efforts to
undermine it, this historically grown superiority, the ‘greatest civilisa-
tion’, remains ‘inside of us and therefore cannot be taken away.’ In order
to ‘restore’ this unalienable national essence with ‘its traditions’, to ‘make
our country ours again’, Baudet programmatically proclaims his future-
orientated political aspirations, which again includes Cultural
Christianity:
Today we have chosen to combat again. As FvD members we know that

you don’t have to subscribe to the metaphysical foundations of Christianity
to nevertheless accept the idea of resurrection as the guiding motif for the
Western civilisation. The idea that something that was dead, can flourish
again, is our ground rule. Because we are the party of the rebirth […] we
are going to achieve a renaissance where our confidence [and pride] are
restored.20
20
Thierry Baudet, 2019, Victory Speech Senate Elections. https://www.trouw.nl/nieuws/spreektekst-
thierrybaudet-verkiezingsavond-20-maart-2019~be2a1539/, accessed 20 March, 2019.
Where in the other narratives the national past is presented rather pos-
itively, here it is pushed even further to the point of glorified superiority.
Moreover, this national superiority does not so much emerge from his-
torical development but is perceived as a trans-historical essence of a
static past: Western civilisation. If the narrative of accomplished progress
depicts the present as the pinnacle of cultural progress, the narrative of
rebirth diagnoses the present, due to its decease in the recent past, as the
nadir up to the point of near death. The future appears in two guises in
this narrative. First as an apocalypse, echoing Spencerian notions of inter-
ethnic competition and decadent degeneration: the coalition of the
nation’s two enemies (the leftists elites and Muslims) destroys Dutch cul-
ture and by extension the Western civilisation. But, second, the future is
also presented as a realizable utopia: the desire for and promise of a future
when the past’s superiority will rise again and the idyllic purity of native
homogeneity will be reinstalled.
onclusion: The Political Impact

C
of Secularist Nativism
As a fundamentally relational concept, nativism does not only entail
notions of self, but also entail notions of the antagonistic other, in the
present case the Muslim minority. How the nativist view exactly affects
the minority position is ambiguous: Muslims must adapt because they
are a cultural minority; at the same time, despite being a minority,
Muslims are perceived as a serious threat to the nation, if not to Western
civilization as a whole. Predicated on the belief in the fiction of a homog-
enous national community and fuelled by fears of threat and cannibaliza-
tion of their nation by Muslims, some secularist nativists propose forced
assimilation as the solution. For example, there is the idea that Dutch
Muslims must ‘become Dutch’, implying that such individuals are not
Dutch, despite being born in the Netherlands and possessing Dutch citi-
zenship. Government and social-scientific surveys often use variables
such as levels of secularism, inter-ethnic contacts and spouse choice to
measure migrants’ assimilation into the Dutch national community, just
as the acceptance of gender equality and homosexuality is regarded as

proof of successful assimilation (Schinkel 2017).
Muslim migrants are told to rid themselves of loyalties to their coun-
tries of origin in order to fully participate in and identify with Dutch
society (Duyvendak 2011, 2017). Their histories are not so much trivial-
ized or obscured but problematized, particularly concerning immigrants
(originally) coming from Muslim-majority countries are told to emanci-
pate from the burdening culture of their country of origin to become a
part of ‘modern society’. An example: Dutch parliament has decided to
discourage dual citizenship since it is seen as proof of lacklustre integra-
tion and loyalty, as being stuck in a past that must be transcended. This
framing of cultural difference—our ‘modern’ culture versus their ‘back-
ward’ culture/religion—not only suggests incompatibility but a clear
hierarchy as well (cf. Butler 2008). Cultural difference is understood in
terms of temporal difference. The Orientalist assumption at work is not
only that Islam’s position on the evolutionary time scale ‘lags behind’ the
‘modern’ West, but also that this Islamic past (which informs if not dic-
tates Muslims’ present) is a static, timeless past where Middle Ages and
the present are exchangeable. Where the idea of assimilation prompts the
Dutch natives to re-historicise national culture Muslims ought to assimi-
late in, for the latter assimilation entails a de-historization.
However, where nativism demands assimilation and promises accep-
tance into the national community, it simultaneously defers the success-
ful fulfilment of its solution. No matter how well Muslims (or secularists
from Muslim-majority countries) integrate—from accepting homosexu-
ality to openly claiming and embracing Dutch national identity—their
assimilation is never considered complete. When, for example, the Dutch
public intellectual and ex-politician of Turkish descent, Zihni Özdil,
explicitly identifies as Dutch and embraces Dutch symbols and history,
he is ridiculed and/or distrusted. Sociologist Willem Schinkel observes
that ‘[t]he problem of “passing,” [....] applies only to “non-natives” in the
nonliteral sense. This… means that to “pass” as “Dutch” or as “European”
is only up for continuous testing to those a priori considered as “different”’
(2017: 3). Nativists often assume that underneath the surface-level signs
of assimilation, Muslims’ still adhere more deeply to their own culture,
beliefs and loyalties. This recalls the suspicion Protestants once showed
towards Roman-Catholics in the Netherlands because they were assumed

to be secretly more loyal to the Pope than to the Dutch nation.
The consequence of the disbelief in the attainability of successful
assimilation of Muslims is an idea that has been often promoted by right-
wing nativists: territorial displacement to the lands of ‘origin’. Territorial
displacement as a geographic solution to a cultural problem is often sug-
gested in discussions on various (local) events (sexual harassment or petty
crime, often framed in terms of clashes between civilisations or religions)
or visible religious symbols (head scarves or mosques). Dutch citizens
who are framed as Muslims, are urged to ‘go back’ to where ‘they’ ‘belong’
or ‘came from’. Although it has not reached the status of official govern-
ment policy yet, the idea of territorial displacement has indeed become
more acceptable and normalized, evinced by the fact that the liberal-
conservative prime minister Mark Rutte (VVD) invokes it. Commenting
on a political demonstration in 2016 during which Dutch citizens of
Turkish descent waved Turkish flags, Rutte said that demonstrators
should ‘piss off’ (pleur op!) and instrumentalized this notion in the subse-
quent electoral campaign. The FvD took it a step further, promoting
territorial displacement physical exclusion as a way to deal with cultural
otherness. The party’s official website stated:
Our immigration policy should be oriented towards those we need here

and those whom we can receive (on the basis of cultural background
included). When integration fails, remigration is the best solution… there
must be a mandate for remigration as an alternative penalty… The
Netherlands wants to decide for itself whom to absorb. Immigrants with
extreme political ideas that are not in line with our Western civilization
should immediately be deported to their country of origin… [We] encour-
age remigration when integration (assimilation) fails.21
This is the radical consequence of secularist nativism. As we showed,

one of the main ways the secularist self-image has discursively obtained a
sacred status in nativist discourses is through the historization of national
identity. Whether presenting the national past in terms of continuity or
Forum voor Democratie, 2018, Immigratie en remigratie. https://forumvoordemocratie.nl/stand-

21
punten/immigratie-remigratie, accessed 4 February, 2018.

discontinuity, all the historicizing narratives invoke a sacred core of supe-

rior Dutchness represented by liberated sexuality/equal gender relations
and Cultural Christianity. Narratives such as the teleological extrapola-
tion of seventeenth-century Amsterdam’s liberalism to our days are not
only historically inaccurate. If we scratch below the surface, they don’t
always produce a very welcoming climate for immigrants either. By lay-
ing claim to a kind of perpetual liberalism, the Dutch are portrayed as
homogeneously progressive and secular (whitewashing the history of
empire and religious conservatism), while immigrants are depicted as
‘backwards’ and out of place in the ultra-liberal city and country. As it
turns out, the self-congratulatory embrace of progressiveness does not
necessarily include openness towards others, but is close to becoming a
mind-set that excludes Muslim immigrants and refugees who come to
disturb ‘our’ liberal enclave. In the discourse of far-right parties, liberal
values indeed play this exclusionary role, as also shown elsewhere
(Mepschen et al. 2010; Duyvendak 2011; Duyvendak et al. 2016). The
irony of secularist nativism is that it increasingly resembles what it regards
as its opposite.
References
Balkenhol, M., Mepschen, P., & Duyvendak, J. W. (2016). The Nativist Triangle:
Sexuality, Race and Religion in the Netherlands. In J. W. Duyvendak,
P. Geschiere, & E. Tonkens (Eds.), The Culturalization of Citizenship:
Belonging and Polarization in a Globalising World (Vol. 105). London:
Palgrave Macmillan UK.
Brubaker, R. (2017). Between Nationalism and Civilizationism: The European
Populist Moment in Comparative Perspective. Ethnic and Racial Studies,
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Butler, J. (2008). Sexual Politics, Torture, and Secular Time. British Journal of
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Western Europe and the United States. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
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of Citizenship. Belonging and Polarization in a Globalizing World. London:
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Duyvendak, J. W. (2017). Thuis: Het drama van een sentimentele samenleving.
Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press.
Fassin, E. (2010). National Identities and Transnational Intimacies: Sexual
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and the Public Sphere (Palgrave Politics of Identity and Citizenship Series).
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Imaginaries in a Globalizing World (pp. 249–263). Berlin: Guido Vanheeswijck,
de Gruyter.
Higham, J. (2011 [1955]). Strangers in the Land: Patterns of American Nativism,
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Kešić, J., & Duyvendak, J. W. (2016). Anti-nationalist Nationalism: The
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Uitermark, J., Mepschen, P., & Duyvendak, J. W. (2014). Populism, Sexual
Politics, and the Exclusion of Muslims in the Netherlands. In J. Bowen,
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Their Muslim Citizens (pp. 235–255). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
9
Dutch Tolerance in Black and White:
From Religious Pragmatism to Racialized
Ideology
Alex van Stipriaan
Early 2017, during the months leading up to local elections in the

Netherlands, the party of the reigning prime minister Rutte, the People’s
Party for Liberty and Democracy (Volkspartij voor Vrijheid en Democratie,
VVD), orchestrated their ‘intolerant of intolerance’ Amsterdam campaign.
In January of that same year Prime Minister Mark Rutte published an
open letter in the national newspapers stating among other things:
We feel a growing inconvenience when people abuse our freedom to mess

up things here, whereas they have come to our country particularly because
of that freedom. People who do not want to adapt, who run down our
habits and reject our values. Who bully gays, who boo at women in short
skirts, or who call ordinary Dutch people racists. I understand very well
that people think: if you fundamentally reject our country, I prefer you to
leave. I share that feeling. Act normally or go away.1
https://www.vvd.nl/nieuws/lees-hier-de-brief-van-mark/ (accessed 20-12-2017).
1
A. van Stipriaan (*)

Erasmus University Rotterdam, Rotterdam, The Netherlands
e-mail: stipriaan@eshcc.eur.nl

174 A. van Stipriaan
Adapt to our tolerance, because we don’t tolerate intolerance. Don’t

touch our values of freedom, don’t touch our women or our gays, and—
without mentioning him, but in the light of heated national debates on this
figure, there is no doubt it is him: don’t touch our national blackface Zwarte
Piet because we are not racist. That was the message of the nation’s political
leader. Now, the fascinating and at the same time complicating thing here
is, of course, that tolerance in a multicultural society like the Netherlands is
simultaneously perceived as the ultimate tool of a very liberal multicultural-
ism, as well as the ultimate tool of imposed integration by assimilation.2
This chapter will show how the phenomenon of Dutch tolerance has
shifted from a term primarily related to the religious sphere, which has only
recently been secularized, to one related to the cultural sphere. In particu-
lar, this chapter argues that a shift has taken place in which tolerance has
transformed from a discourse employed by those in power to something
that is to be expected from ‘others’. In particular this chapter focusses on
how this development has been related to issues concerning race.
What, in the changing roles tolerance has played in Dutch history, has
been the impact on issues related to skin colour? The recent heated
national debate around the Dutch blackface figure of Zwarte Piet is a case
in point. This article sees the debates around this polarizing blackface
tradition in light of the changing modalities of Dutch tolerance. But first,
this chapter sketches how tolerance has moved from a regulation of
Christian diversity to a hallmark of Dutch national cultural identity.
The Tolerance Shift

Probably even more so than windmills, tulips and wooden shoes the
Dutch are internationally known for their tolerance. This is also the shared
concept in which the majority of the Dutch population defines itself. It is
2
Duyvendak and Scholten (2011: 331) stress this typical paradox of Dutch multicultural society
when they state that ‘researchers and policy makers have in the Netherlands been joined in several
discourse coalitions’. Indeed, one of these discourse coalitions supported an integration paradigm
with multicultural elements, but at least two other types of discourses can be identified in the
Netherlands, one of more liberal–egalitarian nature and one more assimilationist. In spite of the
persistent image of the Netherlands as a representative of the multicultural model, it is in fact this
multiplicity of discourses that characterizes the Dutch case.
9 Dutch Tolerance in Black and White: From Religious… 175
generally perceived as part of a national culture existing at least since the

seventeenth century, Holland’s so-called Golden Age.3 A 2004 survey
among Dutch showed that they characterize their own individual identity
as primarily tolerant. This idea of the Dutch self has a long tradition, and
actually they think that the rest of Europe should adopt this as a core
value as well (Hoving 2017: 191–192). It is not surprising therefore, that
yet another, European, survey found that notions such as tolerance, accep-
tance, respect, recognition and citizenship receive much attention in
Dutch schools and, therefore, the Netherlands is among the European
countries which most explicitly reserve room for tolerance in education.4
Anthropologist Martijn de Koning calls Dutch tolerance a myth ‘in
the sense of being one of the holy grand narratives showing the genesis of
Dutch society and why it is such as it is’.5 His colleague anthropologist
Oskar Verkaaik adds that although the Dutch myth of freedom and toler-
ance contains ‘a certain degree of self-assurance’ it is not completely
untrue. However, it is only part of a reality, which he describes as ‘ritual
citizenship’ (Verkaaik 2009: 86). And cultural historian Willem Frijhoff
called the myth of tolerance part of the Dutch culture-nation, that is, the
emotional part of the nation state which contains a nation’s self-image. It
is part of the norms and behaviours and forms of agency which the Dutch
have symbolically appropriated as constitutive of their common identity.
However, another survey had shown that although two-thirds of the
Dutch held tolerance the most important core value of the Netherlands,
this was now declining rapidly and instead intolerance was increasing
massively, particularly directed towards foreigners and foreign influenc-
es.6 The question becomes how this shared myth of tolerance became
simultaneously inclusive and exclusive, integrating and segregating. In
3
Survey by NBTC, 2013 [https://www.communicatieonline.nl/nieuws/imago-onderzoek-nbtc-
toeristen-vinden-ons-tolerant-en-open] (accessed 20-09-2016).
4
The EU research project Accept Pluralism; Tolerance, Pluralism and Social Cohesion: Responding
to the Challenges of the 21st Century in Europe (2012) by the Robert Schuman Centre for
Advanced Studies, for which the Dutch part of the survey was done by Marcel Maussers, Thijs
Bogers and Inge Versteegt [http://cadmus.eui.eu/bitstream/handle/1814/23514/ACCEPT_
WP5_2012-28_Country-synthesis-report_Netherlands.pdf;sequence=1] (accessed 18-09-2016).
5
My translation [https://www.nieuwwij.nl/opinie/de-beleefde-tolerantie/] (accessed 18-09-2016).
6
2012 SIRE, the Association of Idealistic Advertising, started a campaign ‘Tolerance; thát will
improve the Netherlands’.
order to understand this double bind in our present, we need to shortly

revisit the history of tolerance in the Netherlands.
Historian Anton van der Lem states that the concept of tolerance
started to rise in the Netherlands since the mid-sixteenth century.
Actually, it was even a little before that when the revolution of the
Protestant Reformation was on the verge of breaking out. In between
Martin Luther’s radicalism and the dogmas of the Roman Catholic
Church, Desiderius Erasmus pleaded for tolerance, holding a sort of
middle position (Lem 2006; Kennedy 2017: 96–97). This tolerance,
which he also defined as syncretism, stressed unity instead of differences.
It was a strategy to avoid conflict and stimulate dialogue in order to rec-
oncile antagonistic positions (Veer 1995: 70–71). However, Erasmus’
tolerance included only Christians. Referring to Jews, for example, he
stated that hating Jews is a characteristic of being a true Christian.7 So,
tolerance started as an endeavour of reconciling opposing interpretations
within one religion, Christianity.
Since the end of the sixteenth century, when the Reformed church had
become dominant in the northern Netherlands and hundreds of thou-
sands of migrants with different Christian backgrounds as well as Jewish
refugees started to settle there, the notion of tolerance broadened. It came
to resemble more or less the typical contemporary Dutch concept of
gedogen, tolerating what is actually not allowed, or looking away from
things one actually does not like, such as necessary evils like drugs or
prostitution. Tolerance meant to put up with—or allow something or
someone against your wish, for the good of society. It had not yet much
to do with really accepting or respecting, let alone celebrating difference
(Lem 2006: 27–39). The historical development, therefore, of this rather
fundamental shift in the meaning of tolerance, from a pragmatic strategy
or arrangement in the socio-religious realm to a secular socio-political
ideology, seems to be worthwhile exploring a little further.
Tolerance is intrinsically related to a-symmetrical power relations,
because, generally it involves the inequality of a tolerating and a tolerated
party. This led historian Ernst Kossmann to conclude that in the strict
https://www.digibron.nl/search/detail/fd6c9551f6b2a6ca703babbd5579bf2a/tolerant-
7
maar-niet-voor-joden (accessed 17-12-2017).

sense of the word tolerance is discriminatory and anti-constitutional

(Kossmann 1987: 41). And that is not the only paradox. If tolerance is
allowing things or people which or whom one does not like or does not
agree with, you also have to tolerate those who don’t tolerate you. This
paradox was expressed in the seventeenth century by the French philoso-
pher and refugee living in the Netherlands, Pierre Bayle who stated that
‘Il faut tolérer tout le monde, sauf les intolérants’/we should tolerate every-
one, except for the intolerant (see Galenkamp 2012). So paradoxically
again, tolerance will always be limited: not too much, nor too little, in
order to satisfy as many people as possible to make society run smoothly.
Therefore, tolerance, which is based on a-symmetry, has a built-in dimen-
sion of relative exclusion and segregation. If a dominant group cannot
bear any more tolerance, segregation and exclusion seem to increase.
There are two dimensions to this pragmatic tolerance as a kind of pol-
icy. One is positive or what Dienke Hondius termed ‘passive tolerance’,
which is a conscious strategy aiming at promoting the welfare and the
socio-political status quo. The other is more negative, without a strategy,
almost aimlessly based on indifference, as long as the status quo is not
threatened. Hondius defined this as ‘passive intolerance’.8 Both, however,
have dimensions of exclusion and segregation.
The first seems to have prevailed during the times of the Dutch
Republic, until the end of the eighteenth century. Although calvinist
Reformed Protestantism was the official faith, albeit without being a state
church, there was a free choice of religion and no one could be prosecuted
in this respect (Lem 2006: 32). However, not all religions were equal by
law. For instance Catholics and Jews were excluded from public offices
and guilds, and not always could they experience their faith publicly. So,
religious pluriformity was allowed, as a condition or even an incentive for
peace, order, prosperity and social well-being. The limits showed when
some people with obviously too disturbing convictions were physically
excluded from society and banned or even killed.
The more negative or indifferent kind of toleration was based on the
adagium ‘I won’t bother you, as long as you don’t bother me’. Accepting
8
As opposed to active tolerance (acceptance after active argumentation) and active intolerance
(exclusion, elimination). See Hoving (2017: 196).
diversity as an—uneasy—given, without a strategy for the good of every-

one. It is actually evading the other. This is, according to political scientist
Paul Scheffer, what happened to late twentieth-century multiculturalism.
In a famous essay of 2000,9 he actually defined it as a ‘multicultural trag-
edy’, because of almost total indifference for the new ‘other’ by the estab-
lished native society. This indifference, by the way, concerned orthodox
Christians too, with their refusal to accept homosexuality, women’s rights
and other ‘exotic’ new norms in their rapidly secularizing society.
A mix of these two, again paradoxical, dimensions of tolerance can be
observed in the period in between the tolerance of early modern religious
pluriformity and the late twentieth-century secular multiculturalism. In
this period all religions were now recognized by law as equal, and new
ideologies, such as socialism, set in motion a process of secularization.
The socio-religious and political arrangement on which this was based
came to be known as the pillarization system. In this system, every reli-
gious or ideologically based group retreated to his own, a more or less
autonomous domain in society as much as possible, and avoided the
other. Only the political-cultural elites, who emphasized and institution-
alized the differences, functionally worked together, to make society
work. This system of ideological segregation became completely institu-
tionalized in social, cultural, political and to a lesser extent, economic
life. Toleration by segregation during this phase, obviously, was not an
answer to massive immigration such as during the Golden Age, or like
today. It was an answer to new ideological arrangements as well as to the
onset of secularization. The famous Dutch sociologist Van Doorn once
called the pillarization system ‘the most monumental embodiment of a
culture of segregation’, typified by the Dutch expression ‘a good fence,
makes a good neighbour’ (cited in Hooven 2003: 11). Importantly, this
system was also the foundation for sustaining the status quo in the colo-
nies, as will be shown hereafter.
From the 1960s to the 1980s the Netherlands secularized fast and
became associated with total openness, relativism and extreme tolerance,
or so it seemed. The age of Aquarius, however, soon turned into punk’s
‘No Future’ and the gradual rise of right-wing liberalism and political
This essay was published in the quality paper NRC Handelsblad on January 29, 2000.
9
extremism as a response to massive post-colonial and labour immigra-

tion. A politics of multiculturalism, characterized by the policy of ‘inte-
grating, while retaining one’s own culture’, was a late echo of that tolerant
episode, however, that was gradually limited in the 1990s and certainly
beyond the turn of the century.
Since then Dutch tolerance has shifted from something which is
granted by the dominant culture or by those in power, to something
which is demanded from ‘the other’. Telling in this respect is the popular-
ity of policies which are proudly described as Zero Tolerance. Tolerance
now is the non-negotiable, imposed acceptance, particularly by newcom-
ers, of a number of core values, among which is paradoxically again, tol-
erance. You are obliged to be tolerant! The result is that every deviation of
that norm of what is politically correct, is considered intolerant and is
refused. Historian James Kennedy (2001: 253) warns that ‘when a major-
ity culture turns tolerance into an ideology, forbearance starts to stagger’.
And Kennedy leaves no misunderstanding about the content of this
majority culture which has come into being since the 1990s in the
Netherlands: it is white, liberal and secular. This implies that Dutch toler-
ance has a particular colour to it, or in today’s terminology, the question
should be whether tolerance is a white privilege. To answer that a step
back in time is needed.
The Colour of Tolerance

When the first Dutch Constitution was composed in the revolutionary
years10 of 1796–1798, an overall majority of the representatives in the
National Assembly—as well as many writers and other intellectuals of
those days—was of the opinion that slave trade and slavery were not just,
and contrary to the Enlightenment ideals of freedom and the universal
10
In 1794/95 a revolution of so-called Patriots, who inspired by the democratic ideals of the
Enlightenment and the French Revolution, overthrew the government of the old elite led by stadt-
holder prince William of Orange. The Patriots were helped by an invading French army which
occupied the Netherlands. Until 1813 the Netherlands formed part of Napoleon’s empire, where
after much of the revolutionary ideas were done away with, or stored and a kingdom under a mon-
arch of Orange-Nassau was installed.
rights of man. Eventually, however, not a word was dedicated to slavery

in the final text of the constitution. Slavery was considered too important
to the colonial and to the Dutch position in international competition,
to do away with, even in the future (Paasman 1984: 215). The universal-
ity of freedom, equality and fraternity of all men did not include the
colonies,11 nor women for that matter (Paasman 1984: 215).
After the revolutionary period the new constitution of 1815 guaran-
teed again a large number of freedoms among which freedom of con-
science (religion). Afro-religions, however, such as winti in Suriname,
brua on the island of Curaçao, or obeah as it is called more generally in
the Caribbean, were forbidden and remained legally punishable until as
late as the early 1970s!12 The 1815 constitution also contained a rule of
nationality, which held that everyone born within the Dutch empire was
a Dutch citizen. However, again, the enslaved were excluded, because by
colonial law they were movable goods, legally not human beings. This
changed in 1827 when they were finally recognized by colonial law as
immature human beings, but still with hardly any rights whatsoever. And
though their treatment improved a little bit, it was still a far cry from
anything remotely resembling tolerance. Even after the abolition of slav-
ery in 1863 the formerly enslaved in the Dutch American colonies
remained second rate citizens. A new, liberal, constitution in 1848 had
already ruled that all native populations in the colonies were exempted
from any political rights associated with Dutch citizenship. So much for
enlightened tolerance and equality.
In Dutch law, nationality defined as place of birth has been gradually
replaced with nationality by blood, or rather ancestry, meaning that only
a third-generation immigrant could become a full rights citizen of the
Netherlands. A hybrid construction was created in 1892 when a new
Dutch nationality law was enacted, and from then on only children with
a Dutch father as well as natural children of a Dutch mother were Dutch
nationals (Staatsblad 1892: 268). At the same time the population of the
Dutch East Indies, today’s Indonesia, was divided into two ethnic
11
This concerned enslaved in Dutch Asia as well, however, in the following I will focus on enslaved
Africans in Suriname and the Dutch Caribbean.
12
Particularly in Suriname; in the Dutch Caribbean the juridical prohibition on dancing tambu
lasted until the 1950s.
categories: Europeans, including Indo-Europeans of mixed descent who

had been legally recognized by their European father, and the overall
majority of so-called Natives. Later a third category was created, the so-
called Foreign Orientals, consisting mainly of Chinese and Arabs. Only
the first category had full Dutch nationality with all citizenship rights,
the others were ‘Dutch subjects without being Dutch’, meaning without
such rights (Jones 2007: 59–60). This categorization was not introduced
in Suriname and the Caribbean islands, where a large part of the popula-
tion for a complex of reasons held no nationality at all, or another nation-
ality and the rest, particularly the formerly enslaved and their descendants,
were considered to assimilate as fast as possible into one single Dutch
linguistic and cultural community, of course, ruled by political profes-
sionals from the Netherlands (Jones 2012: 31). The Dutch national
anthem of those days had as its first two lines: ‘For those who have Dutch
blood flowing through their veins, free of foreign stains…’
So, from the very beginning of Dutch constitutional law the phenom-
enon of tolerance based on segregation, by not including every citizen in
the same juridical system, was reproduced again, in order to protect the
economic and political status quo. And if they were legally more or less
equal, they were supposed to stay in the colonies. In 1954, almost a
decade after Indonesia had declared its independence, the Dutch colonies
in the Americas, Suriname and the Netherlands Antilles, were upgraded
to the status of internally—mainly—autonomous parts of the Dutch
Kingdom, and everyone within that kingdom now had the same nation-
ality rights: ‘equal citizenship for all citizens’ (see Jones 2012: 40).13
Meanwhile, however, a new challenge to Dutch tolerance of inclusion
had occurred when, with Indonesian independence (1945–1949),14 hun-
dreds of thousands of Indo-Europeans and Indonesians decided to
migrate to the country of which they had been subjects.
A process started which showed that the pragmatic tolerance of before
was in its secular cultural-ethnic form more related to outright exclusion
13
Albeit the Netherlands remained responsible for a number of things such as foreign affairs, mili-
tary defense and guaranteeing financial and juridical order. This was laid out in the so-called Statute
of the Kingdom of the Netherlands.
14
Indonesian nationalists declared independence right after World War II in 1945, the Dutch rec-
ognized this only after 4 years of war and negotiations, in 1949.
and segregation than ever before. Sociologist Guno Jones (2012: 30) for-
mulated the process as follows:
In this process (which had symbolic, legal and policy dimensions), the idea
of the ‘Dutch citizen’ became increasingly ethnically connoted; […],
Dutch politicians held essentialist views on ethnic identities and were not
keen initially to accept Dutch citizens from the overseas territories on
Dutch territory. Contrary to accepted understandings of citizenship, these
political discourses on post-colonial citizens primarily illustrate the ‘alien-
age of citizens’.
Racially intolerant policies towards post-colonial immigrants started

with attempts to keep the numbers coming from Indonesia as low and as
white as possible. The Dutch government instructed their civil servants in
Indonesia to judge who was ‘suitable’ for residence in the Netherlands.
‘Pure’ Europeans, so-called totoks were not under discussion. Indo-
Europeans, however, were something else completely. The Minister of
Overseas Union Affairs and Overseas Territories, in accordance with the
views of Dutch Parliament, stated in 1951 that it was: ‘in the best interest
of the strongly Indonesia-oriented Indo-Dutch to accept Indonesian
nationality’ (Jones 2012: 30). In 1952 the head of the National Bureau of
Social Affairs, P.H.M. Werner, was sent to Indonesia to report on this
question and he made a division between ‘socially wanted and unwanted
Indo-Europeans’. To the second category belonged those immigrants
who were considered to be more Asian (‘Oriental’) than Dutch. Werner
and his committee were convinced that the latter would not make it in
the Netherlands and that would also apply to their children even after
training. Because, as the committee put it:
They will stay children from a tropical country with its inherent low work
pace and other specific Oriental characteristics and behavior, which in the
context of the Netherlands will not be economically applicable. There, [in
Indonesia] these characteristics and behavior are applicable indeed, because
there the nature of work and the work rhythm are conform their capabili-
ties! (Schuster 1999: 101–102).
The vice minister of Social Affairs Blom subscribed to Werners conclu-

sions and both were presented to social-democrat prime minister Drees
(Schuster 1999: 101–102). Eventually, however, Drees did not take over
the recommendations and gave orders to regulate the immigration of the
Indo-Dutch as good as possible, whether they are ‘tolerated’ or unwanted
(Schuster 1999: 109–111). Still this did not prevent government officials
to select, for instance in the case of those who applied for a special loan
to pay for their travel costs. In 1954 the minister of Social Affairs stated:
The government holds the view, that there needs to be a close scrutiny of
whether it is in the right interests of the persons concerned to come to the
Netherlands. In the majority of these cases, the answer to this question is
negative, so that the requested loan will not be granted (cited in Jones
2012: 36–37).
In the end, about 300,000 people from Indonesia settled in the

Netherlands and a massive policy was set in motion to assimilate them as
quickly as possible to Dutch society. One of the institutions used to this
end was the Central Committee Ecclesiastical and Private Initiative for
social care for the repatriated as they were called, although the majority
had never been in patria. One of their regulations was, for example, that
an Indo-Dutch family was only entitled to a house, instead of the com-
mercial guest houses they were first living in, when the social worker
reported that they had learned to behave as much as possible ‘like a typi-
cally neat Dutch family’, including no longer eating rice every day.15
Exactly the same discourse on exclusion and segregation or integration
by total assimilation started all over again a couple of years later, in the
mid-1960s. And it did not stop until the 1990s when ‘Islam’ became the
new indicator for Dutch tolerance. Again massive (post-)colonial immi-
gration was the motivation, this time from Suriname and the Caribbean.
Formerly, most of the so-called West Indian immigrants had predomi-
nantly been representatives of the colonial upper classes, lightly coloured
students, coming to the Netherlands to study who assimilated well and
15
[https://www.nrc.nl/nieuws/1990/02/07/tentoonstelling-over-opvang-oosterse-nederlanders-
6923027-a953207] (accessed 18-12-2017).
were not considered a problem. However, when members of other social

layers in Caribbean societies, often much darker, also settled in the
Netherlands, and did not, after a while, ‘return to their own country’,
hospitality showed to be less taken for granted and the limits of tolerance
were easily reached. Despite a positive, though mainly paternalistic exo-
tistic gaze of the white cultural avant garde towards black people during
the first half of the twentieth century, the latter did not find a job easily.
And hardly anyone protested when for another example, the mayor of
Amsterdam in 1937 closed down jazz clubs who hired black personnel
because he considered their behaviour and music a threat to decent young
white citizens, particularly women. It was unthinkable in those days that
a black person could make a career in the army, the government, or pri-
vate enterprise other than on the lowest layers, nor did the few black shop
keepers of those days succeed to hire white personnel.16 Both would
implicate a black person giving orders to whites. Except if he or she could
pass for white and had had a decent Dutch upbringing, in other words,
was completely assimilated, then anything was possible.
So from the early 1960s on, when Surinamese and Dutch Caribbean
workers, particularly those of Afro-background started to settle in the
Netherlands in increasing numbers—in 1963 there were around 13,000
and the yearly influx was 800–1000—government officials and members
of parliament started to express their concerns about the work ethics and
social ethics of these immigrants and started to investigate the ‘problem
of mixed relationships’ (Jones 2012: 41). Until then mixed relations
solely referred to marriages between Protestants and Catholics, now it
was also used for black–white marital relations. The Surinamese-Dutch
and the Antillean-Dutch became distinguishable non-Dutch minority
groups, despite having had full Dutch citizenship for generations and
having been subject to a Dutch colonial education system even longer.
They became so-called ethnic or cultural minorities, like any other non-
western migrant group. Culture became the instrument to differentiate,
including those born in the overseas parts of the Kingdom, however,
See for the history of these early Caribbean migrants in the Netherlands Oostindie et al.
16
and Kagie 2006.
colour (or ‘race’) was never far off. The tolerance of hosting citizens of the
former Dutch colonial empire was mixed up again with the segregating
policies of differentiating between a dominant cultural majority and a
number of cultural minorities by defining them under the same denomi-
nator as other non-western immigrants.
During the 1970s and early 1980s, minorities, in general, were
entitled by law to have and retain and sustain a culture of their own
(Jones 2012: 39). This was meant to be relativist and tolerant, but it
resulted in a very essentialist discourse of: this is who you are, and this
is who we are. For the first time, and very gradually, this was in rever-
sal returned by a black discourse, stimulated among other things by
American black power discourse, which had the same kind of essen-
tialist notions of this is who we are, and you are like that. This cultural
essentialist discourse has become instrumental in drawing boundaries
of the Dutch nation, and it seems to have become instrumental in the
black counter-discourse as well (Jones 2012: 39). The short-lived cul-
tural relativism has turned into rather essentialist identity politics,
both white and black.17
Black Pete: Blackface and/or Tolerance? In the Netherlands Sinterklaas/

Saint Nicholas is celebrated on the fifth of December. It is a national feast,
immensely popular, and one of the most important Dutch calendar feasts.
In the period leading up to the fifth of December, men dress up as Saint
Nicholas, with his typical red mantle, Bishop’s hat and staff, and a long
white beard. Sinterklaas visits public events and parades, and television
shows are dedicated to him. He also appears at tens of thousands of private
celebrations across the country. Saint Nicholas is accompanied by a num-
ber of ‘Black Petes’, helpers dressed in an attire that is inspired on a seven-
teenth-century page outfit. This figure is highly racialized: he is played by
white actors in blackface, with exaggerated red lips. They wear ‘Afro’ hair-
pieces, feathered hats, and often golden so-called slave earrings. They dis-
play clownesque behaviour and act like the typical buffoons known from
This was convincingly analysed by anthropologist Gloria Wekker in her recent White innocence;
17
Paradoxes of colonialism and race (2016).

the minstrel tradition. This figure has been under continuous critique
throughout the twentieth century, but since a young generation of black
antiracists has delivered a highly compelling critique the controversy about
whether or not the figure is racist has escalated.18
The underlying, more fundamental question, of course, is whether the pre-
dominantly white society is willing to become inclusive towards non-white
compatriots and is willing to mutually integrate together with post-colonial
newcomers into new post-colonial socio-economic and cultural arrangements.
On the other hand, there also may be a question of black tolerance at stake
here, that is, how much room, or actually mainly time, do Afro-Dutch grant
their white compatriots to change, and are they willing to change themselves
as well? Even though it hurts, and even though Afro-Dutch in a subaltern
position already have to live up to white demands all the time, and even
though they are often considered not even real compatriots at all.
A, mainly white, digital petition in 2014 not to change blackface Pete
at all was signed over 2 million times. An often-heard statement is, Black
Pete is not and cannot be racist, because we are not racist. This has always
been a tolerant nation and Pete never was meant to be racist. The oppo-
nents of blackface, obviously, perceive this as: the racists are deciding
whether something or someone is racist or not.
One in three of all Dutch citizens of any colour is now in favour of, or
has no objections to changing Pete.19 And that figure is still increasing,
although only slowly and gradually.20 Hard-core, mainly black opponents
of Black Pete state time and again that racism cannot be abolished
18
For an introduction into the history of this tradition, the current debate and a variety of solu-
tions: PIET, handboek voor een moderne sinterklaasviering (with summaries in English).
Rotterdam: Noturban, 2015.
19
https://eenvandaag.avrotros.nl/panels/opiniepanel/alle-uitslagen/item/draagvlak-voor-traditio-
nele-zwarte-piet-loopt-terug/ (accessed 20-12-2017).
20
Idem. In 2013, 89% was not in favour of change, in 2015 this had dropped to 80%, to 68 in
2017. Coming from something like 97% before 2010, the growth of the pro-change view in such
a long and immensely popular tradition might also be called substantial.
gradually.21 It is like being pregnant they say, either you are or you are not
racist. And they often add that even if Black Pete is abolished that does
not mean the fight is over. How about for instance reparations for the
harms done by slavery and its contemporary legacies. Their hard-core,
mainly white opponents state that they draw a line and will not tolerate
that ‘they’—which is everything and everyone from the ‘elites’ to Muslims
and migrants—will take away everything that is dear to ‘us’.
Politicians sow in this fertile land, and certainly not only populist poli-
ticians on the extreme right. In 2008 a former minister of the ruling lib-
eral party VVD, Rita Verdonk started a new party which she named Trots
op Nederland (Proud of The Netherlands). In her founding speech, she
stated that there is
an away-with-us stream who, for years now, wants us to believe that our
culture does not exist, that our norms and values are inferior to other cul-
tures. They even question the Sinterklaas feast, and they want to have mon-
uments commemorating slavery everywhere in order to portray us as bad
as possible.22
Many politicians have since repeated this point of view, including the
prime minister, as shown above.23 This is not the pragmatic and limited
tolerance of the early modern period anymore when the dominant reli-
gion allowed others to do their thing by paternalistically looking away,
all the while hardly changing themselves. Neither is this the tolerance of
the pillarized society, in which elites paternalistically ruled a segregated
21
For instance Stop Blackface/Kick Out Zwarte Piet, Stichting Nederland wordt beter, Zwarte Piet
Is Racisme, Nationaal Instituut Nederlands Slavernijverleden en Erfenis (NiNsee).
22
Een ‘weg-met-ons’ stroming die ons al jaren wil doen geloven dat onze cultuur niet bestaat en
die onze waarden en normen zelfs minderwaardig vindt ten opzichte van andere culturen. Ze
stellen zelfs het sinterklaasfeest ter discussie en willen overal slavernijmonumenten om ons als
slecht af te schilderen. http://www.refdag.nl/media/2008/20080404_Speech_Rita_Verdonk.pdf ]
(accessed 20-12-2017).
23
It does not seem to stop. Recently the present vice minister of Interbal Affairs member of the
Christian Democrat party CDA stated in the largest daily paper, De Telegraaf (03-03-2018, p. 6)
that he is fed up with attacks on Zwarte Piet and other Dutch traditions, he observes ‘a sort of
segregation on this theme. It does not contribute anything positive. If people in Amsterdam say
that in their neigbourhood Zwarte Piet should not be black, I will not make a problem on that.
However, in my village it does not happen. And do not say then that therefore we are
discriminating’.
country based on different ideologies, in which everyone retreated as

much as possible among his own sort. Neither is this the paternalistic
tolerance of segregation of late colonialism when the Dutch colonial
elites knew what was best for the colonized within the kingdom. Neither
is it the sex, drugs and rock & roll tolerance of the 1960s and 1970s;
nor is this the multicultural tolerance of the 1980s when ‘cultural
minorities’ were stimulated to retain and practise ‘their own culture’,
which would empower them to integrate in Dutch society from a posi-
tion of equality. Yet the idea of and self-identification with Dutch toler-
ance is stronger than ever. But what kind of tolerance is this and how
does it build upon or change the history of tolerance sketched above?
In order to understand this, this chapter has shown how being tolerant
has become an obligation imposed by a dominant majority on minorities
in a diverse—and confused—post-colonial society. Tolerance has become
an ideological, secular norm which differentiates between self and other.
If the other wants to integrate, meaning assimilate, s/he has to show that
s/he is as tolerant as the dominant group is. Tolerance is no longer put-
ting up with deviations from what is considered the norm. On the con-
trary, tolerance is the norm, and it is the minorities who have to put up
with that (Verkaaik 2009: 146–147; see Kennedy 2006). Secondly, this
chapter has shown that Dutch tolerance was always disciplinary and con-
tained elements of exclusion and regulation. These have morphed into
the domain of culture and ethnicity.
Conclusion
The meaning and colour of Dutch tolerance has changed enormously
over the centuries. During the sixteenth to eighteenth centuries, it was at
the core of a pragmatic top-down policy. The ‘others’ were religiously dif-
ferent from and inferior to the self-image of the dominant group, how-
ever, for the sake of socio-economic prosperity the latter put up with
those. There were conflicts, of course, but there was no missionary urge
to convince the other of one’s own religious superiority. Tolerance was a
future-oriented pragmatic arrangement supporting socio-economic prog-
ress and welfare. During the pillarized nineteenth and twentieth centuries
tolerance meant predominantly avoiding the other. Dutch society was

rather rigidly segregated between differing but equal religions as well as
contesting non-religious ideologies (liberalism, socialism), which kept
society balanced. Pillars were more missionary than in earlier centuries
and progress and future were defined often more in metaphysical terms
(heaven, labourers paradise, freedom) than in the pragmatic progress of
the Golden Age. Tolerance today has actually become a conservative anti-
religious ideology of almost fearfully protecting the emancipations that
have socio-economically and culturally been conquered or developed
since the Second World War. Tolerance now is the white, secularizing
dominant group telling the others to become like them—including the
celebration of the ideology of tolerance—or leave the country. Today’s
Dutch tolerance is the final settlement with the religious pillarization of
the past. Anti-religiosity seems to be at the core of Dutch modernity,
secularism has become sacred. The massive influx of a new religion, Islam,
is therefore experienced as anti-modern and a threat to what has only
recently been conquered: freedom from religion.24 Dutch fear of Islam is
the fear of their own religious past, says anthropologist Verkaaik (2009:
35). Religion is now considered as suppressing and limiting, whereas tol-
erance, reason, emancipation are at the core of this idealized secular self-
image of Dutch modernity (Verkaaik 2009: 115). This is a convincing
analysis of what is at stake in the Dutch Islam debate. However, Verkaaik
(2009: 120) is overdoing it when he states that the present confusion, or
what he so rightfully calls ‘the contemporary national bad mood’ is caused
by a frustrated pursuit for a secular society and not the pursuit of a ‘cream
white Netherlands’ (Verkaaik 2009: 35–36). It is not one or the other, it
is both. It is not for nothing that Dutch schools with a majority of Muslim
children are defined in a way similar to schools with a majority of chil-
dren of colour, namely black schools, as opposed to white schools. And
although the multiculturalism and diversity issue has been dominated for
24
This fear is among other things expressed in massive voting for anti-Islam political parties, but
also in a distorted image of the number of Muslims. A survey by Ipsos Mori in 40 European coun-
tries in 2016 showed an enormous gap between the experienced numbers of Muslims and the
reality in these countries. In the Netherlands respondents thought that almost one in five (19%) of
the population is Muslim, and that by 2020 this will have increased to 26%. The real percentages
are six and almost seven respectively. [https://www.rtlnieuws.nl/nederland/er-zijn-veel-minder-
moslims-in-nederland-dan-we-denken] (accessed 25-02-2018).
almost two decades by the Islam debate, race was never far off. And now
they both stand centre stage. The fight over a sometimes almost sacralized
Zwarte Piet is a case in point. Actually the race issue has been a steady and
ever-present emotion since post-colonial immigration started after the
Second World War (Cf. Wekker 2016). It is part of what I would call a
mental heritage from colonial times, based on inverse tolerance: I don’t
take you as you are, I make you into what I want you to be.
References
Duyvendak, J. W., & Scholten, P. W. A. (2011). Beyond the Dutch “Multicultural
Model” The Coproduction of Integration Policy Frames in The Netherlands.
Journal of International Migration and Integration, 12, 331–348.
Galenkamp, M. (2012). Locke and Bayle on Religious Toleration. Erasmus Law
Review, 5(1), 79–92.
Hooven, M. ten (2003). Op zoek naar een nieuwe inhoud voor verdraagzaam-
heid. In M. ten Hooven (Ed.), De lege tolerantie; over vrijheid en vrijblijvend-
heid in Nederland (pp. 11–36). Amsterdam: Boom.
Hoving, I. (2017). Writing the Earth, Darkly: Globalization, Ecocriticism, and
Desire. Lanham: Lexington Books.
Jones, G. (2007). Tussen onderdanen, rijksgenoten en Nederlanders. Amsterdam:
Rozenberg.
Jones, G. (2012). Dutch Politicians, the Dutch Nation and the Dynamics of
Post-colonial Citizenship. In U. Bosma (Ed.), Post-colonial Immigrants and
Identity Formations in the Netherlands (pp. 27–47). Amsterdam: Amsterdam
University Press.
Kagie, R. (2006). De eerste neger. Amsterdam: Mets & Schilt.
Kennedy, J. (2001). Oude en nieuwe vormen van tolerantie in Nederland en
Amerika. In M. ten Hooven (Ed.), De lege tolerantie; over vrijheid en vrijbli-
jvendheid in Nederland (pp. 244–255). Amsterdam: Boom.
Kennedy, J. (2006). Nederland als het meest progressieve land ter wereld. In
W. van Noort & R. Wiche (Eds.), Nederland als voorbeeldige natie
(pp. 105–118). Hilversum: Verloren.
Kennedy, J. (2017). Een beknopte geschiedenis van Nederland. Amsterdam:
Prometheus.
Kossmann, E. H. (1987). Politieke theorie en geschiedenis. Amsterdam:
Bert Bakker.
Lem, A. van der (2006). Tolerantie: Het gedoogbeleid in de zestiende eeuw. In

W. van Noort & R. Wiche (Eds.), Nederland als voorbeeldige natie (pp. 27–39).
Hilversum: Verloren.
Oostindie, G., Maduro, G. and Maduro, E. (1986). In het land van de over-
heerser, Deel II, Antillianen en Surinamers in Nederland, 1634/1667–1954.
Dordrecht: Foris.
Paasman, A. N. (1984). Reinhart: Nederlandse literatuur en slavernij ten tijde van
de Verlichting. Leiden: Martinus Nijhoff.
Schuster, J. (1999). Poortwachters over immigranten; het debat over immigratie in
het naoorlogse Groot-Brittannië en Nederland. Amsterdam: Het Spinhuis.
Veer, P. van der (1995). Modern oriëntalisme. Essays over de westerse beschavings-
drang. Amsterdam: Meulenhoff.
Verkaaik, O. (2009). Ritueel burgerschap; een essay over nationalisme en secular-
isme in Nederland. Amsterdam: Aksant.
Wekker, G. (2016). White Innocence; Paradoxes of Colonialism and Race. Durham:
Duke University Press.
Part IV
Images
10
Colonial Heritage and the Sacred:
Contesting the Statue of Jan
Pieterszoon Coen in the Netherlands
Markus Balkenhol
In 2012 the West Frisian Museum in Hoorn, in the Dutch province of

Noord-Holland, organized a public trial. The defendant was Jan
Pieterszoon Coen (1587–1689), an employee of the Dutch East India
Company and the first governor of Batavia. The charge: Coen is not wor-
thy of a statue because on his order nearly all of the 15,000 inhabitants of
the Banda islands had been killed in 1621. During the trial, witnesses
were heard and evidence in the form of objects, images, and audio frag-
ments was presented. The popular historian and ‘judge’, Maarten van
Rossum, presided over the trial, and 9651 museum visitors were the
‘jury’, casting 3012 votes, of which 63.9% were in favour of a statue, and
34.7 against.
At the time of his trial, Jan Pieterszoon Coen had been dead for over
300 years, which raises the question whether the trial was about Coen
(the person) or Coen (the statue). What, for instance, to think about the
statement in the exhibition’s trailer that: ‘He [Coen] is still looking out
M. Balkenhol (*)
e-mail: markus.balkenhol@meertens.knaw.nl

196 M. Balkenhol
on the square’? And what to make of the museum’s publicity stunt, a

mobile phone number on which one could ‘give Coen a phone call’? On
the answering machine, ‘Coen’ said: ‘Hi, this is Coen. I’m glad you called.
I can’t talk to you right now, but do leave a message after the beep.’1 The
curators, the historian-cum-judge, the actors, the host and the audience
were probably well aware that this was a game, much like a magician’s
audience knows that it’s ‘just a trick’. The question I want to ask, how-
ever, is why toying with magic was so fascinating. If the past is so clearly
secular, why even entertain the possibility that it might have a more
supernatural presence?
Coen/the statue escaped punishment, but others were not so lucky. At
the University of Cape Town in 2015, the politics student Chumani
Maxwele punished the towering statue of Cecil Rhodes by smearing it
with human faeces he had collected in the Black township of Khayelitsha.
With his action, Maxwele wanted to draw attention to the poor living
conditions in Khayelitsha, as well as to the over-representation of white
South Africans among the university staff. On 14 August 2017, protesters
punished the statue of a confederate soldier in Durham, North Carolina
by tearing it from its pedestal. As it lay on the ground, mangled from the
fall, the protesters spat at it, showed it their middle fingers, and kicked it.
Punishing things is nothing new. In ancient Greece, for instance,
things were held accountable for injuring or killing people and punished
accordingly. Plato states that:
if any lifeless thing deprives a man of life, except in the case of a thunder-
bolt or other fatal dart sent from the gods – whether a man is killed by
lifeless objects falling upon him, or his falling upon them, the nearest of
kin shall appoint the nearest neighbor to be a judge and thereby acquit
himself and the whole family of guilt. And he shall cast forth the guilty
thing beyond the border (as quoted in Hyde 1915: 700).
The possibility of putting on trial and punishing things also implied that
if for instance a murderer could not be found, the murder weapon could
1
Coen seems to have cancelled his subscription: when I tried to call him in August 2019 I was told
that this number is no longer in service.
10 Colonial Heritage and the Sacred: Contesting the Statue… 197
be punished instead. The punishment was typically to cast the thing

‘beyond the border’, so as to remove the pollution caused by the crime it
had committed, and thus restore the purity of the realm (Hyde 1915:
700). In the Middle Ages, it was not uncommon to excommunicate non-
humans, although there was a theological debate about whether humans
could excommunicate parts of God’s Creation (ibid.). The pistol used by
Balthasar Gerards to kill Stadholder Prince William of Orange in the
Dutch city of Delft in 1584 was executed on the scaffold (Stengs 2018a).
But the idea that things have a moral sense and agency is not only ancient
or medieval; it is part and parcel of ‘us moderns’, too (Latour 1993;
Latour et al. 2010). Look, for instance at the way one famous murder
weapon has been treated very recently in the Netherlands: the car that
was used in an attack on the Dutch Queen Beatrix in 2009, killing seven
and seriously injuring ten people, was considered so dangerous and pow-
erful that it could not be included in a museum collection (Stengs 2018a).
Historical knowledge is not straightforwardly secular. As Stephan
Palmié shows in his path-breaking book on Afro-Cuban modernity and
tradition, historical knowledge in the broadest sense ‘involves proposi-
tions about the role of the dead in the world of the living’ (Palmié 2002:
3). The term ‘proposition’ indicates that historical knowledge is ‘not at all
captured by objectivist conceptions of historical representations as mere
retrieval or correspondence theories of historical truth’ (ibid.). Whether
in the form of codified, institutionalized history or vernacular, embodied
memory, historical knowledge must be plausible so that particular claims
about the past are judged believable and accepted as truthful (Palmié
2002: 3). Of course, ghostly presences are regularly dismissed as figments
of the imagination; indeed, ‘nothing brings out positivism more quickly’
(Palmié 2002: 3). But as the vignette above shows, there is also a simulta-
neous fascination with, and even plausibility of presences not captured by
positivist demands for historical ‘facts’.
Kehinde Andrews, professor of black studies at Birmingham City
University and observer of the international controversies about colonial
statues, recently2 expressed a common complaint when it comes to
2
In a podcast for the Guardian newspaper, https://www.theguardian.com/news/audio/2018/
dec/04/bias-in-britain-the-truth-about-modern-racism
198 M. Balkenhol
statues: ‘It’s always an emotional debate. It’s never a rational, reasoned,

measured debate. … You can’t have this discussion in a reasoned way.’
Andrews rightly argues that this is because statues are often entangled
with people’s identity. To paraphrase Stuart Hall (2005), statues act as
mirrors in which people want to recognize themselves. But not all statues
achieve this ‘mirror-stage’, which raises the question why certain statues
do manage to evoke such strong emotions. In this chapter, I argue that
looking at how processes of secularization and sacralization become
entangled in conflicts about statues can provide a better understanding of
how and why some statues act in such a polarizing way.
Negotiating the Monstrous Hero

Already during his lifetime Jan Pieterszoon Coen was a controversial fig-
ure. The board of the East India Company, the Heren XVII, accepted his
uncompromising rule of Batavia as governor (1617–1629), but also
deemed it ruthless. The public whipping of his niece Sara Specx and the
execution of her forbidden lover Pieter Cortenhoeff was seen as excessive.
As a consequence, Coen’s memory, too, became contested. The twentieth-
century historians Annie and Jan Romein argued that because of these
brutalities Coen could not become a hero in a straightforward way: ‘the
popular imagination did not get a hold of this difficult figure’ (Romein
and Romein-Verschoor 1941: 256). However, this did not pre-empt
attempts at heroification, some more successful than others. Until half-
way the nineteenth century, Coen’s image was that of a man of great
achievements. In the second half of the nineteenth century, 250 years
after Coen’s death, the relatively young Dutch nation was looking for col-
lective symbols that might foster a sense of community, and Coen seemed
like a welcome figure that could embody the greatness of the Dutch
nation.3
3
This process of nation-building coincided with the competitive ambitions of European nations to
build and expand vast overseas empires. The figure of Coen thus perfectly expressed the combina-
tion of national and imperial ambitions at the time.
In the city of Hoorn, Coen’s place of birth, physically and symbolically

in the shadow of Amsterdam, politicians and influential citizens began to
lobby for a Coen statue in the 1880s. This would not only enhance the
status of Hoorn, they argued, but also provide a symbol of national pride
that would boost the process of nation-building. The Nieuwe Hoornsche
Courant wrote in 1884:
The birth day of Coen should be turned into a national day of commemo-
ration. By this we mean the following: the entire country [Vaderland] must
display their reverence of the memory of this man, who, as fourth governor-
general of Dutch East India has won the city and the kingdom of Jacatra
with the sword.4
Later that year, the Courant reiterates that the significance of a statue is
not limited to Hoorn, but that it would be a national symbol.
[We desire] not only, not even in the first place, a statue in Coen’s birth
place (Hoorn); although this is certainly desirable. No, that day of com-
memoration must be a national one, in the sense that the entire people
participates in it.5
Their call was widely received, and even Members of Parliament sup-
ported the initiative. The annual commemorations enjoyed great popu-
larity, and the highest representatives of the state (except the Queen,
which led to raised eyebrows in Hoorn) attended the unveiling of the
statue in 1893, complete with tableaux vivants, horse races, an ‘illumi-
nated gondola ride’, and fireworks (Fig. 10.1).6
But even among this general enthusiasm, there were a number of criti-
cal voices. Jan Karel Jacob de Jager, registrar of Parliament and later direc-
tor of the Mauritshuis museum, wrote that Coen,
4
Algemeen Handelsblad, 14 February 1884. All translations from the Dutch by Markus Balkenhol.
5
Algemeen Handelsblad, 16 February 1884.
6
See https://www.oudhoorn.nl/kwartaalblad/artikel.php?id=00765, accessed 26 November 2019.
200 M. Balkenhol
Fig. 10.1 Announcement of the unveiling of the statue of Jan Pieterszoon

Coen, 1893
who, in order to safeguard the Company’s monopoly, did not even shrink
back from the complete depopulation of the Banda islands, and smeared
his own name and that of the Dutch nation, in this part of the Archipelago,
with a virtually indelible blood stain (Jonge 1862: 79).
Others, too, wrote about the cold-blooded extinction of an entire popu-

lation and concluded that Coen’s hands were ‘smeared with blood’
(Snijders 2012: 60). The national newspaper, Algemeen Handelsblad,
published a two-part series on Coen in 1887 that reflected these criticisms:
There are concerns when we are asked about our love for a man who
thwarted the opponents of the Company, whether Dutch or English,
Javanese or Bandanese. The whip raised against Sara Specx [whom Coen
had lashed for premarital sex] make us turn away and cover our ears; the
destruction of Lonthor and Poeloe Run offend our current notion of jus-
tice; the merciless extirpator of all forms of debauchery in East India
[Indonesia] has a certain trait of cruelty in his face, which is only softened
by the man’s own flawless biography.7
Regardless of these ‘concerns’, the column argues, Coen should be

remembered first and foremost for his selfless commitment to a greater
good, namely the ‘elevation of his people in East India’. One does not
have to cherish such a man, the column concludes, but ‘paying him rever-
ence means honouring greatness’. Clearly, the national cause here trumps
the consideration of the violence that was part and parcel of that
very cause.
Historians in the twentieth century disagreed about Coen’s status, and
how to evaluate his brutal reign in East India. Herman Theodor
Colenbrander, who collected important archival material on Coen,
enthusiastically judged him a diligent, loyal man and an exemplary Dutch
Calvinist. He concluded:
Power never manifests itself without breaking impotence (onmacht) and

causing wounds. Without the hero of these pages Dutch East India would
not have existed (see Buijs 2014; Colenbrander 1934: 448).
Algemeen Handelsblad, 28 August 1887.

7
202 M. Balkenhol
The fascist politician and historian Carel Gerretson (1884–1958)

embraced Coen in his book Coen’s Eerherstel (Coen’s redemption) as a
national hero, while the Bandanese, in his eyes, had sealed their own fate:
The Bandanese received the punishment they had brought upon them-
selves by failing their duties (see Buijs 2014; Gerretson 1944: 46–47).
Annie and Jan Romein were more critical. They dismissed the ‘colonial
historians’ who ‘carefully cultivated’ Coen as a legend, and somewhat
disdainfully called Coen’s grave in Jakarta a ‘pilgrimage site’. They
conclude:
He [Coen] laid the foundations of a colonial empire … and he was

rewarded – next to the contested ton of gold – with the curse of thousands
of wretches. Those who want to see the former as his purposeful deed, may
also accept the burden of the latter (Romein and Romein-Verschoor
1941: 284).
Discussion of this entanglement of national pride and colonial violence

was rekindled in the late twentieth century. One of the most prominent
instances of public critique was the installation Adventures of the Nieuw
Hoorn by the New York artist Lisa Fromartz, as part of the Bontekoe-year
in Hoorn in 1994.8 The Adventures consisted of six enormous paintings
that were displayed on iconic buildings in Hoorn such as the West Frisian
Museum, the monumental Hoofdtoren, and the Oosterkerk. The images
showed scenes from Coen’s reign in Batavia, for instance, his silhouette
towering over a devouring inferno and skulls. As Fromartz explained in
an interview in the national newspaper NRC, with the paintings she
wanted to ‘point out that the VOC’s wealth came about through con-
quest and domination’, and that ‘all of these processes set in motion then
are still at work now’.9
8
Willem Ysbrandtszoon Bontekoe (June 2, 1587–1657) from Hoorn, a skipper for the Dutch East
India Company, whose journal of his voyage to East India on the vessel De Nieuw Hoorn became a
best seller in the seventeenth century. In the 1990s the city of Hoorn sought to attract tourists by
brandishing historical heroes such as Bontekoe.
9
NRC Handelsblad, 9 May 1994. https://www.nrc.nl/nieuws/1994/05/09/amerikaanse-maakte-
buitenschilderijen-geinspireerd-7224143-a1196322, accessed 29 April 2019.
Today, the discussion has become part of the wider memory politics
around the question of how to deal with Dutch colonialism and its vio-
lence. Since the early 1990s, black grassroots organizations have launched
initiatives to publicly remember slavery in the Netherlands. Many of
them had settled in the Netherlands in the wake of Surinamese indepen-
dence in 1975,10 and began to actively search for their position as Dutch
citizens in the Netherlands. Although they are formally Dutch, they
encountered various forms of discrimination, restricting their access to
work, housing, education, and political representation. Invoking slavery
as a historical responsibility of both the Dutch government and society at
large offered a way to address these concerns, and to build social and
political pressure on the government to act.
In recent years, a younger generation of Dutch citizens of Caribbean
descent who are born in the Netherlands has started to organize as a
political movement. While the central rallying point has been their pro-
test against the blackface figure of Zwarte Piet (Balkenhol et al. 2016;
Helsloot 2012; see Stipriaan, this volume), the debate about the colonial
past is now much broader and includes ethnographic and art museums
(Balkenhol and Modest 2019), school curricula, and traces of slavery in
the urban space (Hondius et al. 2014). In the wake of this postcolonial
controversy, the statue of Coen, along with the many streets and places
named after him, has once more been a focus of critique.
When the statue was accidentally pushed off its pedestal by a crane
driver in 2011 (Fig. 10.2) a group of residents of Hoorn demanded to
transfer it to a museum rather than placing it back. The city council
debated the demand but decided to put the statue back on the pedestal,
along with a critical note referencing the Banda massacre. The ‘trial’
described above was an attempt of the museum to address these
controversies.
The museum’s idea to organize a ‘trial’ suggests the desire for closure
and the reinstatement of justice, albeit purely symbolic. However, the
museum’s verdict did not end the public trial. In 2017 it was back on the
agenda when an antifascist organization vandalized the statue in an
attempt to draw attention once more to Coen’s cruelties. In the
10
Suriname was a Dutch colony from 1667 until 1975. A plantation colony located on the north-
ern coast of South America, it was an important part of the Dutch Atlantic Empire.
204 M. Balkenhol
Fig. 10.2 Empty pedestal of the Coen statue, 2011. © Vereniging Oud Hoorn
meantime, other colonial figures had become subject to scrutiny, includ-

ing Michiel de Ruyter, Piet Hein, and Johan Maurits.11
Iconoclasts and Idol Worshippers

Still, the trial continued. On Wednesday 17 January 2017, the newspa-
per De Telegraaf12 published an article about what the commentator saw
as the ‘falsification of history’. As the article argued:
11
Michiel Adriaenszoon de Ruyter (1607–1676), admiral in the Dutch navy and Piet Hein
(1577–1629), lieutenant-admiral in the Dutch navy and commander at the West Indian Company
were instrumental in building the Dutch Atlantic Empire. Johan Maurits (1604–1679), Count and
Prince of Nassau-Siegen, and governor of Dutch Brazil. Controversy enveloped in particular the art
museum Mauritshuis, forcing it to reflect more critically on his role in the Dutch Empire.
12
In terms of readership De Telegraaf is the biggest newspaper in the Netherlands. It generally
expresses a right-wing conservative perspective.
Now it is Maurits’ head that has to roll. Earlier it had already been the turn
of Jan Pieterszoon Coen, Michiel de Ruyter, Peerke Donders and the
Golden Carriage.13 Historians are fed up: who will be the next victim of
this absurd falsification of history?14
In the article emeritus professor Piet Emmer, a contested conservative

historian of Dutch colonial slavery who famously compared the Middle
Passage with a present-day transatlantic flight, demands that an end be
put to ‘rewriting history’. That night, Emmer was a guest in the daily
television talk show De Wereld Draait Door (The world turns/gets mad)
dedicated to the topic ‘beeldenstorm’ (iconoclasm). Statues of Jan
Pieterszoon Coen, Emmer argued, should not be removed because that
would ‘polish away’ (wegpoetsen) history:
Let’s be honest. Presently we would not build a school or a statue for Jan
Pieterszoon Coen, or name it after him. But on the other hand, it is part of
our colonial past. That colonial past, certainly in the 17th century, was
accompanied by a lot of violence. I think it is pointless to continually
change things that today appear wrong to us, to change street names, to
change statues. Of course, it happens, think of, I believe, ISIS in the Middle
East, who want to destroy an entire city dating from the pre-Mohammedan
era; think of the Nazis who wanted to change all Jewish names. Come on,
we don’t want to belong with them! The best thing to do, as I said before,
is to leave those statues, and talk about them. I think that is the best solution.
In his plea, Emmer sketches a ‘we’ with specific characteristics: rational,

reasoned, and looking for a constructive conversation. This ‘we’ is
13
Petrus Norbertus Donders (Tilburg (Nederland), 27 October 1809 – Batavia (Suriname), 14
January 1887) was a catholic missionary in Suriname who was beatified in 1982 for the miracle of
curing a child of bone cancer in 1929. Discussion arose when Herman Fitters, resident of Tilburg,
published an opinion piece entitled: ‘Donder op! Standbeeld van Peerke Donders kan niet meer.’
(Sod off, statue of Peerke Donders is impossible). See https://www.bd.nl/tilburg-e-o/respect-voor-
peerke-donders-maar-dat-beeld~a1b6bf73/?referrer=https://www.google.com/, accessed 19
November 2019. The Golden Coach (1898) is a vehicle used by the Royal Family to ride to the
state opening of Parliament on the third Tuesday of September each year. The coach has been the
focus of decolonial critique because of its side panels displaying colonial subjects labouring and
kneeling in front of the Queen.
14
De Telegraaf, 17 January 2018, https://www.telegraaf.nl/nieuws/1550210/stop-de-vervalsing,
accessed 22 Oktober 2019.
206 M. Balkenhol
contrasted with a fanatic, violent, and irrational ‘other’. ‘We’ are civilized,
‘they’ are wild. This wildness not only implies that ‘they’ are incapable of
reason, but that this incapability is manifest first and foremost in their
belief in the power of things. ‘They’ think that history changes if statues
disappear and streets are renamed. But, Emmer explains: ‘If those people
[sic, he means statues] are being removed, that will not change the past.’
This is an oft-heard retort to people who argue for the removal of statues.
They are, the argument goes, taking statues too seriously, and imagine
that by removing them, the past itself might change. But this is their
problem, not the statues’, according to this reasoning: it is their belief
that a piece of stone or bronze holds some kind of power over the past
and themselves. As a consequence, they argue, if you really believe that
things can do this to you, you are essentially an animist: somebody who
believes that things are alive and wield supernatural powers! Of course,
Emmer says, this is nonsense. This is not us—‘we’ know better! ‘We don’t
want to belong with them!’ The debate, then, is not only about the past
but about the power of images. Should one believe in their power or not?
There are a few things to note in Emmer’s statement. First, the case is
somewhat more complex than the simple binary between ‘us’ and ‘them’
Emmer seems to suggest. In fact, it is quite remarkable for a historian to
assert that removing statues and changing street names is something only
Nazis and religious fanatics do. Emmer should know that historically this
is the rule rather than the exception, and not at all reserved for violent
fanatics. Indeed, in the Netherlands there is a national commission with
specified regulations dealing with naming and renaming streets on a daily
basis, and this always requires careful and complex deliberations. In
Germany, a massive number of Adolf Hitler squares, streets, stadia, and
so on were renamed after the Second World War. In the Netherlands, too,
an Adolf Hitler-Allee turned back into Kloosterweg, and in Amsterdam a
square returned to its prewar name, Jonas Daniël Meijerplein, to name
just two instances. Moreover, even in the Middle East the so-called
Islamic State is not the only party who tore down statues; think for
instance of the iconic photograph of American soldiers tearing down a
large statue of Saddam Hussain after the fall of Baghdad in the second
Gulf war. Looked at in historical context, removing Coen’s statue, or
renaming J. P. Coen streets, schools, and tunnels would be nothing spe-
cial, really.
What is more, there is no reason to believe, as Emmer does, that his-
tory would be at stake because of the removal of a statue. Historical fig-
ures such as the Confederate General Lee, or Jan Pieterszoon Coen, will
not disappear from the history books because their statues are being
removed. Volumes have been written about Coen, and they will not van-
ish with the statues. If anything, the conflicts around the statue have led
to new publications, including the present one (see also Goor 2015).
Conversely, a name such as Anton Mussert, the founder of the National
Socialist movement in the Netherlands, does not just disappear from his-
tory simply because there are no statues for him. As historian Karwan
Fatah-Black, also present in the talk show, countered: ‘This is not how we
learn history, is it? We don’t learn history by looking at street names, do we?’
The second dimension of Emmer’s argument is crucial for the argu-
ment I develop here. It concerns his employment of religion, that is his
reference to religious fanatics and fanatic anti-Semitists. Emmer’s
avowedly secularist stance (‘we are not religious fanatics’) glosses over the
processes of sacralization in which the statue of Coen is entangled. This
began already with the unveiling of the statue in the nineteenth century,
when it was inaugurated by its supporters as a quasi-sacred object. Mayor
Zimmerman of Hoorn, for instance, claimed during the unveiling in
1884 that Coen ‘is our pride, citizens of Hoorn, who, even though our
city no longer plays a role in history, nonetheless keep sacred and in high
esteem the memory of so much that once made Hoorn great and power-
ful’ (Zimmermann as quoted in Snijders 2012: 60). Similarly, the former
mayor of Hoorn and then-minister of the colonies, Baron van Dedem,
said that ‘Coen’s statue is safe in the midst of his city and his tribesmen.
As long as Hoorn, as long as Western Friesia, as long as the Netherlands
does not forget their history, this place will be honored as sacred ground’
(Dedem as quoted in Snijders 2012: 61).
Historian Emmie Snijders argues that ‘today it is difficult to imagine
that [Van Dedem’s] way of relating to Coen’s statue. … A significant num-
ber of Horinesians [citizens of Hoorn], Western Friesians, and Dutch have
not forgotten their history, but that is precisely the reason why this statue
is no longer honored as sacred ground. It has become the subject of intense
208 M. Balkenhol
discussions in which emotions can run high’ (Snijders 2012: 61).

According to Snijders, the fact that the statue is debated in heated discus-
sions, and that emotions run high is a sign of its profanization. This
implies that for the statue to be sacred it should be above such profane
discussions. In contrast to this analysis, I would argue that the fiercest
conflicts erupt not about profane objects, but those considered sacred.
One might even say that it is precisely the intensity with which the Coen
statue is being discussed, indeed the willingness by some people to either
destroy or defend it (using violence, if necessary), that points to the entan-
glement of processes of sacralization and heritage formation (Meyer and
de Witte 2013). The statue has become what we have termed in the intro-
duction to the volume a ‘secular sacred’, that is ‘a person, object, image,
representation, or place in which secular and sacred ideas, feelings, emo-
tions, motivations, experiences, perceptions, intertwine, conflate and
conflict’ (this volume).
To some extent, this entanglement of secular and sacred dimensions
applies to statues in general, at least potentially, so a short detour is
needed here.
In the field of memory studies, a distinction is often made between
historiography on the one hand and memory on the other. On the one
hand the scientific, distant, and critical attitude towards the past, and on
the other the embodied, subjective, and passionate experience of the past.
According to this definition, statues fall into the ‘memory’ category.
Political scientist Kevin Bruyneel (2017: 36), for example, writes in a
recent article about dealing with statues:
The argument [against the removal of statues] has, at least, one fundamen-
tal flaw. Removing monuments does not erase history because monuments
are not about history. They are about memory.
In practice, these categories usually overlap. An archival document, for

example, can be of great value for historical research, but it can also be
valued as a historical object independently of the content. Consider, for
example, the American Declaration of Independence, an important text
for historians and philosophers. At the same time, this piece of paper as
cultural heritage can also develop huge attraction. To speak with the
Dutch historian Johan Huizinga (Huizinga 1948: 564 ff.), it is a ‘histori-

cal sensation’ to imagine that this piece of paper was touched by the
founding fathers. It means that people, including historians, become
emotionally involved in history. As Huizinga put it: ‘I am too much in it,
in history, it is no science for me, it is life itself ’. Although history and
memory cannot be separated in practice, there are nevertheless different
registers in which people relate to the past.
Knowledge of the past is always a reconstruction, and therefore con-
structed socially and culturally. In this reconstruction, sources or histori-
cal ‘facts’ are important, but equally important is that people are convinced
of the factuality of these facts. In other words, authentication is needed
to convince a public, academic or broad, of the truth and credibility of
historical sources and their interpretation (Port and Meyer 2018). A
source alone does not say much, it is the context in which it is placed that
makes a source meaningful to people.
This authentication can be done in various ways. In memory studies,
history or historiography generally means formalized, usually critical, sci-
ence of the past. This focuses on retrieving and interpreting data for a
reconstruction of the past. Here authentication works according to scien-
tific criteria, such as source references, embedding in existing scientific
literature, and peer review. Even though the results are a social construc-
tion and therefore not objective or neutral (Trouillot 1995), they are veri-
fiable and therefore, in principle, also refutable.
Social, collective, or cultural memory is another register of authentica-
tion. Here, too, people must be convinced of the authenticity of a histori-
cal ‘fact’, but scientific criteria play a less important role. Where
historiography is about documenting and understanding the past, mem-
ory is about making it available to experience. Memory therefore derives
its authenticity more from the extent to which the past is made tangible,
for example, by exhibiting and making historical objects accessible. It is
about making history come alive, that is, the goal is to let people literally
touch the past. So in theory you could say that history creates critical,
contemplative distance to the past, while memory wants to bridge that
distance and bring the past to the present.
With statues this second dimension is in the foreground. A statue
expresses a certain appreciation of a historical fact but does not claim
210 M. Balkenhol
factuality as such. Unlike monuments, statues express first and foremost

a positive evaluation of a person or an event. Certain aspects can be mag-
nified, with historical accuracy not always being the most important
(Stengs 2018b). The expression ‘putting someone on a pedestal’ literally
and figuratively refers to the positive appreciation of someone or some-
thing from the past. This can be historical persons, but also allegories as
in the case of the statue of liberty in New York. They all have in common
that they express a positive appreciation. That is why there are piles of
books about Anton Mussert, but no statues.
Statues do something different than historiography. They are meant to
make the past come alive and to establish an embodied relation with the
audience. As Caroline van Eck has argued:
Speaking to statues or paintings, kissing or beating them, claiming that

works of art in their turn look at the viewer, talk or listen to them, move,
sweat or bleed; or feeling love, desire, or hatred for images: all these reac-
tions to works of art are part of a large complex of viewers’ responses in
which artworks are treated not as the inanimate objects they really are, but
as living beings, whose presence is felt to be genuinely akin to that of a liv-
ing being (Eck 2010: 3).
Of course, not all statues achieve this effect; it is a potential the success or
failure of which needs to be understood in the specific context in which
it does or does not unfold. Moreover, statues are usually put up to create
a sense of positive appreciation among the audience. But if lifelikeness is
indeed achieved and the statue does in fact act like a human being, it is
difficult to keep it under control. As the Coen statue perfectly shows,
responses range from disgust to veneration. The point here is of course
not to judge these responses, but to point out that both responses are part
of a process of sacralization. The sacred, I might reiterate here, does not
necessarily derive its sacredness from veneration alone, but often also
from destruction, mutilation, and humiliation.
So what about Emmer’s rather firm stance on the ‘religiosity’ of the
so-called iconoclasts? Emmer’s stance is a dismissive one. In this view,
religion equals fanaticism and is not of our time. This dismissive stance is
spelled out further in an article by journalist Willem Pekelder about
postcolonial critique entitled ‘the church of hate’, in which he shares

Emmer’s view. He calls postcolonial critics a ‘new church’ that relentlessly
blames him, a white man, for the ‘sins’ of his ancestors:
The new church is even more merciless than the God of the Old Testament.
For He says in the Second Commandment: ‘For the sins of the parents I
will punish the children, and also the third generation, and the fourth.’
This way the Old Testament at least limits the wrath.15
The tenor of both Emmer’s and Pekelder’s arguments is that the

Netherlands has been secularized, and it does not wish to revert back to
old moral authorities like the church. They portray postcolonial critique
as an inquisition. Neither Emmer nor Pekelder is really interested in the
sources and goals of this ‘iconoclasm’. With their characterization of
critique as fanaticism, they gloss over the ways in which architecture,
monuments, and statues reproduce social orders by imposing particular
world views. As George Bataille argued in his famous article on
architecture:
the great monuments raise themselves before us like levees, countering all
troubling elements with the logic of majesty and authority: it is in the guise
of cathedrals and palaces that the Church and State speak to and impose
silence upon the masses. It is clear, in fact, that these monuments inspire
social compliance and often, real fear. The storming of the Bastille exempli-
fies this state of affairs: it is difficult to explain the motivation of the crowd
other than through the peoples' animosity toward the monuments that are
their true masters (Bataille 1929).
This means that, as Bhakti Shringarpure has argued, monuments and

statues are not just symbols or forms of representation, but they also
‘have the ability to command, prohibit, exclude, or dominate’
(Shringarpure 2012).
But equally importantly, Emmer and Pekelder do not explain why, in
their view, these statues are necessary to know the past. In fact, it is quite
surprising that they, defenders of scientific knowledge, should embrace
15
Trouw, 12 May 2018, p. 4 ff.
212 M. Balkenhol
statues. According to Bruno Latour, precisely the destruction, erasure,

and defacement of statues is ‘the ultimate touchstone to prove the validity
of one’s faith, of one’s science, of one’s critical acumen, of one’s artistic
creativity[.] To the point where being an iconoclast seems the highest
virtue, the highest piety, in intellectual circles’ (Latour et al. 2002: 16).
Could it be that ‘we moderns’ are just as interested in the metaphysical
presence of our ancestors as we are in scientific ‘facts’? It seems that his-
torical facts alone are insufficient to bring our ancestors to life.
Coen made an appearance not only in the exhibition at the West
Frisian Museum. Later that year Coen was a ‘guest’ at ‘Welcome to the
Golden Age’, an educational talk show for primary schools (ages nine to
twelve). He was interviewed ‘live’ by the host Dorine Goudsmit (played
by Plien van Bennekom), and bragged about his adventures: ‘It was a
marvellous time’. One can be dismissive of this theme-park approach to
history, but, I have argued in this chapter, the fascination for the past’s
magical presence needs to be taken seriously in order to understand
its power.
Conclusion
I started this contribution by noting a fascination and play with the pos-
sibility that the dead might have a supernatural presence that exceeds
positivist historical knowledge. Statues in particular can unfold a power
that touches people and evokes strong emotional responses. In this pro-
cess they are often anthropomorphized, and no longer treated as lifeless
objects, but as animated beings that are being treated as though they
were human.
Yet even though everyone, apparently, likes to play with magic, this
game is highly political. That is, the belief in magic is often mobilized as
a tool to demarcate and police group boundaries. Common sense states
that ‘we’ do not believe in images. In fact, ‘we’ are not religious at all.
From that perspective, people who feel hurt by statues are not part of
‘our’ civilization. But this perspective conceals the much more complex
social agency of objects such as statues. The idea that they influence
human practice and thought cannot be chalked up to an imagined
primitive other, whether antiracist, progressive, or nationalist. Neither

those who feel hurt by statues nor those who feel hurt by their removal
are adherents of an imaginary kind of naïve, almost childish belief in the
animation of objects. If the belief in images is a characteristic of wildness,
it is not a wildness alien to Western enlightened modernity, but rather an
important ingredient that enables community, including that of the
nation (Verrips 1993).
But why are not all statues being treated in this way? For instance,
what to make of the fact that the statue of Coen only recently entered this
animated state, whereas other colonial statues have already been attacked
in the 1960s?
There is no general rule or model that can predict which statues evoke
such responses. Rather, the answer lies in an ethnographic analysis that
shows precisely how, and in which social, political-economic, and histori-
cal situations the sacredness of an object is produced.
This has important implications for how Europeans, including those
with African ancestry, are able to deal with the colonial past. Doubtlessly
it is important to raise historical awareness of slavery and colonial vio-
lence through education. But the case of statues also shows that improv-
ing our knowledge about the colonial past alone will not do. The
passionate destruction, defacement, and embrace of statues are much
more than a Habermasian ‘discursive space in which individuals and
groups associate to discuss matters of mutual interest and, where possible,
to reach a common judgment about them’ (Hauser 1999: 61). These pas-
sionate engagements with statues are difficult to capture in the term
‘rational deliberation’, so central to Habermas’s theory. Indeed, they show
the limits to such an approach.
If we understand statues themselves as a secular sacred, that is ‘a per-
son, object, image, representation, or place in which secular and sacred
ideas, feelings, emotions, motivations, experiences, perceptions, inter-
twine, conflate and conflict’, we can gain a better understanding of why
people kick them, defecate on them, and destroy them, or why they feel
that they need to defend them with their lives. This, again, is not to say
that people naïvely mistake statues for human beings, but rather that
statues and images act like social agents in that they influence social
relations.
214 M. Balkenhol
This, as we argue in the introduction to this volume, ‘resonates with

the idea of religion as an outward form that exerts influence beyond reli-
gious contexts as such, but intersects with politics and society at large. …
The ‘secular sacred’ indicates a starting point in the middle of this entan-
glement in order to understand how public spaces, images and bodies are
constituted, contested in new ways.’
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Meyer, B., & Port, M. van de (Eds.) (2018). Sense and Essence. Politics of
Authentication, Aesthetics of Persuasion and the Cultural Production of the Real.
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Palmié, S. (2002). Wizards and Scientists: Explorations in Afro-Cuban Modernity
and Tradition. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
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beschaving: Nederlandse gestalten uit zes eeuwen. Amsterdam: Querido.
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216 M. Balkenhol
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11
Rooted in the Sacred? On Mark Rothko,
Tears Flowing, and Enargeia
Herman Roodenburg
The modernist, octagonal chapel has no images of Christ or other holy

figures weeping. Yet, as its visitors’ books reveal, quite a few feel the tears
welling up. Inside, they are faced with fourteen purplish-black paintings
hung on the building’s eight bare walls—that is all. Somehow, the huge,
abstract canvases move the viewers to tears (Fig. 11.1).
Art historians know the building well: this is the Mark Rothko Chapel
in Houston, Texas. One of them, James Elkins, even gave it a major role
in his Pictures & Tears, a fine historical perspective on people crying in
front of paintings (Elkins 2001). The chapel opened in 1971, a year after
Rothko committed suicide in his studio in New York. Its founders, the
French-born art collectors John and Dominique de Menil, were inspired
by three Catholic churches in France—the Chapelle du Rosaire de Vence,
Writing this exploratory essay, I have profited greatly from the comments of Christien Smits
(especially) and of Yannis Hadjinicolaou, Matt Kavaler, and the editors of this volume.
H. Roodenburg (*)
e-mail: herman.roodenburg@meertens.knaw.nl

218 H. Roodenburg
Fig. 11.1 Rothko Chapel, 1970–1971. Massachusetts Institute of Technology,

photograph by G.E. Kidder Smith
famously decorated by Henri Matisse, and two other ones, decorated by

Fernand Léger and others: the Eglise Notre-Dame de Toute Grâce in Assy
(Haute Savoye) and the Sacré Coeur in Audincourt (Doubs) (Barnes
1989: 33). But the Houston philanthropists intended their chapel as an
interfaith venue: ‘a sacred space, open to all, every day.’1
Neither a regular sanctuary nor a regular museum, the Rothko Chapel
offers an intriguing example of the secular sacred, of how the sacred and
the secular, far from excluding each other, may actually converge, emo-
tions and even flowing tears included. How does this work? What is
going on?
Their sacred setting certainly plays a role. Though not a religious man
himself, Rothko already hinted before De Menils approached him that a
chapel’s respectful, contemplative silence would heighten the viewer’s
The usual phrase used by the tourist organisations, adopted from the (now revised) chapel’s
1
website.
11 Rooted in the Sacred? On Mark Rothko, Tears Flowing… 219
engagement and response (Barnes 1989: 43–44; Chave and Rothko

1989: 4–5, 188–189). But the fourteen paintings have their own role.
Like most of his classic, abstract canvases, all done in the 1950s and
1960s, they radiate a curious, effective force.
People have shed tears in front of other abstract paintings. Even
Mondrian’s Composition in White, Black and Red (1936) and his Broadway
Boogie Woogie (1942–3) made some viewers weep (Erftemeijer 2018:
196). There are also plenty of beholders who, viewing a Rothko, never
felt a tear coming and said so (while others, one suspects, just claimed
they did). Nonetheless, as the accounts recorded by Elkins and other
authors on Rothko testify, crying in front of a Rothko became a fre-
quently occurring and significant phenomenon. Remarkably, the first
accounts already date from the 1950s, when Rothko’s real fame was yet
to come.
What makes his viewers cry? As I hope to show, part of the paintings’
emotional force may be explained by their semi-sacred rhetoric. To put it
differently, there is rhetoric to his abstract forms and shapes that rouses
the beholder’s emotions, because it feeds on proven pictorial practices of
the past. It still draws on the affective brushwork of painters such as
Titian or Rembrandt, on the way they handled the materiality of texture,
color, tonal gradation, or light and shadow. Basically, Rothko makes the
spectator view his pictures through the devotional eyes of men and
women looking at Titian’s, Rembrandt’s, and kindred painters’ brush-
work in the past.
Such religious legacies have been highlighted before, perhaps most
prominently by the art historian Hans Belting. As he argued, ‘Concepts
of belief live through in pictorial concepts, and pictorial practices once
started as belief practices.’ (Belting 2006: 7–8, 10). The anthropologist
Birgit Meyer agrees. Quoting Belting, she pointed to the ‘long-standing
religious roots of contemporary pictorial practices.’ Our attitudes toward
pictures are still rooted in Christian repertoires (Meyer 2011: 1034–1036).
Rhetoric, the eloquence of the brush, is clearly one of the pictorial
practices involved. The following pages take a closer look at its affective
eloquence, at its vividness or enargeia, to use the accepted rhetorical term.
Originally, the Greek notion of enargeia (Lat. demonstratio or evidentia)
denoted the talents of poets and orators to move their audiences. In the
220 H. Roodenburg
Middle Ages, it also included the talents of preachers, painters, or sculp-

tors. Most of the medieval texts speak of demonstratio, indebted as they
were to an anonymous Roman treatise, the Rhetorica ad Herennium, writ-
ten in the first century BC. In contrast, early modern authors preferred
the term evidentia, employed by Cicero and Quintilian. Their treatises
were only recovered fully in the fifteenth century (Rosen 2000; Plett
2012; for an anthropologist’s use of the term: Balkenhol 2018: 249).
Coming Alive
As the chapel’s guards and attendants informed Elkins, most of the visi-
tors just took a glance at the fourteen panels and left. Others stayed lon-
ger, sitting down on the benches in the middle or meditating on cushions
lying on the floor. Those, however, who were clearly, visibly moved
responded differently. Carefully viewing the canvases, moving to and fro,
they took their time—an essential dimension (Elkins 2001: 10).
What they and others before and after them must have felt is that the
images somehow came alive—a fine instance of Bildakt, to quote Belting’s
colleague Horst Bredekamp. As the term implies, images may directly
affect the beholder’s thoughts, feelings, and doings. In the act of viewing,
in the very process, a latent inner force of the image is unexpectedly
awakened (Bredekamp 2010; see also Fehrenbach 2010; Hadjinicolaou
2014: 167–168). In the epilogue to his Theorie des Bildakts Bredekamp
even cited one of Elkins’ tearful viewers. Entranced by the fourteen cha-
pel paintings waiting in Rothko’s studio, the woman felt physically drawn
into them—as if her eyes, moving across the textures of the paint, were
both looking and touching (‘as if my eyes had fingertips’) (Bredekamp
2010: 331–332; Elkins 2001: 2–3). Her viewing and weeping were a
cross-modal, intersensory experience, merging the senses of sight and
touch and engaging the body, her walking around, as a whole.2 As the
philosopher John Krois, a Cassirer scholar, put it provokingly, ‘for images,
you don’t need your eyes’ (Krois 2011).
2
Embodiment perspectives are rarely applied to modern art, but see: Crowther (1993) and
Verrips (2009).
What were Rothko’s own thoughts on this? Generally, he hated to talk

about his art, like he hated the art critics of his day. But through the years
he dropped a number of interesting hints in conversations and a few lec-
tures. And he noted his views on painters and painting in general in a
manuscript that only intimates knew about. Composed in the early
1940s, it was only found years after his death.
Born as Marcus Rothkowitz in 1903, the young Rothko grew up poor
and Jewish in present-day Latvia. At the age of ten, in 1913, he emigrated
with his mother to the United States, where they joined his father and
older brothers. His Jewish childhood years played a minor role in his
work. As a child, he attended cheder (Jewish elementary school). But soon
after his father died, in 1914, he completely abandoned the faith (Rothko
and Rothko 2015: 253–254). More than fifty years later, in 1967, he
even confessed: ‘My relation with God was not very good, and it has got-
ten worse day by day’ (quoted in: Elkins 2001: 204). Even so, in conver-
sations at the end of his life with the art historian Henk van Os, a
well-known expert on late medieval art, he showed a lively interest in the
German mystic Meister Eckhart and his ideas on ‘nothingness,’ on nul-
leitas. A year or so earlier, Os had spotted Rothko’s Red, White, and Brown
in the Kunstmuseum Basel. Struck by its ‘silence,’ as he remembered, he
felt ‘as if nailed to the spot’ (Os 2012: 69).
Rothko’s abstract canvases were undoubtedly more contemplative,
more inner-oriented, rather than strictly religious. As he agreed in 1954,
they were ‘related to the realms of the spirit and conceived as contempla-
tive experiences’ (Barnes 1989: 44). Accordingly, the viewers’ emotional
absorption in his paintings came first.
Though the art critics used to range him among the New York abstrac-
tionists—painters such as Willem de Kooning, Barnett Newman, Jackson
Pollock, and Robert Motherwell—he already held in 1943 that his pic-
tures were not intended ‘either to create or to emphasize a formal color-
space arrangement’ (Rothko 2006: 39). He said so again in 1956,
bumping into one of the critics. As he told the man, ‘I’m not interested in
relationships of color or form or anything else.’ He had a higher aim: ‘I’m
interested only in expressing basic human emotions—tragedy, ecstasy,
doom, and so on (…).’ Indeed, ‘the fact that lots of people break down
and cry when confronted with my pictures shows that I communicate
222 H. Roodenburg
those basic emotions.’ ‘The people who weep before my pictures,’ he

ended the encounter, ‘are having the same religious experience I had when
I painted them, and if you say, you are moved only by their color relation-
ships, then you miss the point’ (Rothko 2006: 119–120).
The conversation is often mentioned in the literature, but three things
may be emphasized here. First, as noted above, people were already cry-
ing in front of a Rothko in the mid-1950s, at a time when critics still
missed the paintings’ emotional force. Second, Rothko calls the weeping
of his viewers (and perhaps his own, when painting the pictures?) a reli-
gious experience. The tears are, according to Rothko, not just any, but a
kind of spiritual, a kind of sacred tears. And, third, the poet, orator, or
preacher shedding tears is a well-known figure in the history of rhetoric.
‘If you want me to weep,’ Horace already urged the readers of his Ars
Poetica, ‘you must first feel grief yourself ’ (Horace 1991, II: 101–102). In
other words, the tears to be roused among the audience should first mani-
fest, be fully and visibly lived, in the orator’s body. Since the late Middle
Ages, such self-affection had been a requirement of all sacred rhetoric,
Catholic or Protestant. And it equally marked the New York Actor’s
Studio, Lee Strasberg’s school of method-acting, started in the 1950s and
nurturing talents like Marlon Brando, Robert de Niro, to mention only a
few (Kremer 2007; Plett 2012: 115, 169).
On other occasions, Rothko also spoke of the viewers’ absorption,
their intimate engagement with the image. For example, he admired
Matisse’s l’Atelier rouge with its overwhelming ‘purgatorial gloom,’ as a
religious author put it. He studied it closely in the MoMa in 1949, not-
ing tellingly that when you looked at it, ‘you became that color, you
became totally saturated with it’ (quoted in: Gage 1998: 261; Madden
2000: 187). Formal color-space arrangements definitely interested him.
But immediacy, the beholder’s affective-bodily absorption, clearly aroused
his fascination with the Matisse: the kind of latent immediacy defining
the image act. As he wrote, ‘I am involved with the human element. I
want to create a state of intimacy—an immediate transaction.’ Hence the
huge, the life-size or more than life-size, formats of his paintings: ‘Large
pictures take you into them. Scale is of tremendous importance to me—
human scale’ (Rothko 2006: 128). It was far from a bolt-of-lightning
experience (Elkins, rather confusingly, speaks of beholders feeling the
wind knocked out of them). As with the chapel’s visitors, those who were
truly moved, the intimacy takes time, concentration and, moving-to-

and-fro before the picture, even kinesthesia to develop. To quote Rothko,
‘A picture lives by companionship, expanding and quickening in the eyes
of the sensitive observer’ (Rothko 2006: 57). Considering such complete
focus and intimacy, one may perhaps speak of a second practice of self-
affection, performed not by the painter but by the viewer.
But what does he or she see? What, in the broadest outlines, may be
said to constitute Rothko’s affective rhetoric? Basically, the forms and
shapes marking his classic canvases of the 1950s and 1960s are a few dif-
ferently colored rectangles, floating against an undivided, indeterminate
background. Straight edges, let alone any clear lines, are missing. The
rectangles’ edges are frayed and irregular, which is precisely why they
seem to float, to slightly move. At the same time, when the beholder
closely follows the edges, the shapes seem to interact. They seem to near
and then again to move away from each other in a spaceless space. Light
and dark contrasts, a luminosity here and there emanating from the col-
ored forms and shapes, further enhance the viewer’s feelings of losing
control—feelings that have been expressed in religious terms, of catching
a glimpse of God, the absolute or just ‘nothingness,’ but also in less
sacred, less weighty terms, such as the ‘stillness’ felt by—the practicing
believer—Henk van Os.
Rothko’s rhetoric, then, revolves around the enargeia, not of any fig-
ures depicted but just of the materiality, of the blotches of paint applied
to the canvas. Even those may move the viewer, may even elicit tears. But
it was not a new rhetoric. Early modern painters like and Titian and
Rembrandt already developed such material vividness, lending a new
dimension to the affective-devotional rhetoric that had emerged before,
in the fifteenth-century Low Countries in particular. It is no coincidence
that Rothko greatly admired Rembrandt’s art.
Enargeia: Moving Figures

Although reported infrequently (why would one record one’s own or
other people’s crying?), we can safely assume that many fifteenth-century
believers shed tears in front of a devotional image, whether a painting, a
224 H. Roodenburg
woodcut or sculpture. Praying and contemplating over the images were

part and parcel of the period’s belief practices, of the believers physically
‘doing’ their emotions, to quote cultural historian Monique Scheer, in a
Bourdieuan, performative sense. Correspondingly, one might construe
the images and all the other devotionalia involved—from candles, herbs,
and rosaries to prayer books and prayer nuts—as the things they did their
emotions with (Scheer 2012).3 It was all part of their self- or
auto-affection.
In fact, when they were doing their devotional practices they were
expected to weep. They should weep their ‘tears of compunction’—tears
of sorrow and fear (sorrow over one’s sins, fear of God’s anger) that might
transform, catching finally a glimpse of God’s grace, into tears of love and
joy (tears of loving God mixed with tears of joy at the prospects of heaven)
(Gerrits 1986; cf. Elkins 2001: 152–153). This doctrine of compunction,
already outlined by Gregory the Great, deeply informed the wide-spread
affective piety of the time, especially in the north. ‘After 1430,’ as a spe-
cialist wrote, ‘it was scarcely possible to dam up the river of tears in
Netherlandish painting’ (Thürlemann 2012: 57).
Clearly, the believers’ engagement with the images and the other arti-
facts was inherently affective, their emotions producing and emerging
from the engagement (Randles 2017). The well-to-do had their own
devotional images—the so-called Andachtsbilder, the half-length ‘close-
ups’ of a bleeding, red-eyed Christ, a grieving Virgin or a weeping Mary
Magdalen (Fig. 11.2). Like the Sorrowing Virgin, discussed by Elkins,
these were the smaller images. Painted around 1490 in the workshop of
Dieric Bouts, the panel measures some 30 by 40 cm (Elkins 2001,
155–158). Pictures like these, placed on a table or little house altar in the
home, could be quietly contemplated, wept upon or kissed from close by.
Less wealthy believers wept over cheaper devotionalia, such as wood-
cuts or simple crucifixes. There was an abundance of all such images,
both in the churches and at home, tangible testimony to the period’s
wide-spread affective piety, with its defining focus on the humanity of
3
Scheer interestingly relates her Bourdieuan approach to Alva Noë’s enactivist and similar embod-
ied theories of cognition. But as Joerg Fingerhut points out, these theories tend to neglect the
images’ resistance, their agency or Bildakt (see Fingerhut 2018: 189–90). On ‘doing emotions with
things,’ see Downes et al. (2018: 22).
Fig. 11.2 Aelbert Bouts, The Man of Sorrows (oil on oak, 37.9 × 26.5 cm). Harvard
Art Museums/Fogg Museum, The Kate, Maurice R. and Melvin R. Seiden Special
Purchase Fund in honor of Seymour and Zoya Slive
Christ, his Passion in particular (see, for instance, Southern 1953; Walker
Bynum 1989; McNamer 2010). But other than the Andachtsbilder, a pri-
vate and relatively late phenomenon, most of the paintings depicted the
Gospel scenes with multiple figures, multiple tears included. One of the
genre’s masterpieces is Rogier van der Weyden’s Descent from the Cross.
The artist’s contemporaries already praised the five translucent tears trick-
ling down Mary’s face, with one of them about to drop from her chin—a
fine detail of the enargeia involved.
226 H. Roodenburg
Art historians have studied the fifteenth-century Passion paintings

extensively. But they have long neglected a vital aspect: the painters’ own
affective rhetoric, their striving for the highest vividness in evoking the
biblical events (but see Parshall 1999). They could all draw on the com-
pelling rhetoric of the late medieval vitae Christi. Emerging in the thir-
teenth century and spreading the wave of affective piety in the first place,
these widely circulating vitae depicted Christ’s life on earth to the small-
est detail. More than that, evoking his Passion—his being beaten,
scourged, crowned with thorns, and finally nailed to the cross—the texts
inflated all the cruel and bloody minutiae. And where details were miss-
ing (the Gospels’ own account is terse), they basically invented them, all
with the aim to rouse the believers’ tears of compunction through their
compassion (Marrow 1979).
The Passion paintings and sculptures, along with the period’s Passion
sermons and Passion plays, followed suit. It was a question of ante oculos
ponere, as the Rhetorica ad Herennium, still highly influential, explained.
The Gospel scenes had to be put as vividly as possible before the mind’s
eye. Preachers, painters, sculptors, and the protagonists of the Passion
drama’s actors had to transport their audiences to the biblical past, as if
they were physically there, watching Mary cuddle her child or watching
the crucifixion, with Mary and the other holy women grieving at the foot
of the cross. Appealing to all the viewers’ senses, their sense of touch with
all the cruelty depicted in the first place, the Netherlandish painters
invented pictorial rhetoric that could indeed move their viewers to tears.
Somewhat grudgingly, even the aging Michelangelo uttered his admira-
tion. While his countrymen could not elicit a single tear, the painters in
the north made the faithful weep (Hollanda 1928: 15–16). Starting as
belief practices, to quote Belting, the painters’ pictorial practices initiated
forceful rhetoric that was to stay.
Painters of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries would continue
and—already anticipating Rothko’s abstract rhetoric—expand the tradi-
tion. Basically, the late medieval devotional painters sought to rouse the
beholder’s emotions through the rhetorical actio of their holy figures—
their compassion-evoking postures, gestures and, most prominently, their
tearful facial expressions. They filled their scenes with well-delineated and
readily identifiable figures. The violence, the bleeding wounds, and the
ugly, grinning faces of Christ’s tormentors of Christ did the rest. In con-
trast, painters like Titian and Rembrandt sought to enhance the enargeia
of their work by lending the paint, the picture’s mere material make-up,
a vividness of its own.
Enargeia: Moving Matter

In his fine book Das unklassische Bild the art historian Werner Busch
discusses a rather neglected pictorial tradition, that of a loose group of
painters moving away from the classical-idealist art theories of their time.
He confined himself to the late Titian, the late Rembrandt and, after
1800, to Constable and Turner. But the group was certainly larger than
that. As Busch noted, he could have included Velasquez. The same holds
for El Greco, who worked under Titian in Venice, and it holds for the
so-called Rembrandtists, a group of pupils and contemporary painters
who lastingly adopted the master’s style. Both they and El Greco have
been studied from a similar perspective by Yannis Hadjinicolaou (Busch
2009; Hadjinicolaou 2016; Bredekamp 2010: 265–268).
To briefly summarize Busch’s argument, in contrast to the canon
defended in the art treatises, these non-classical painters doubted the
notion of a disegno interno, of the artist working from a premeditated idea
in the head. Accordingly, they also doubted the corresponding studio
practices—the artist’s materialization of his disegno interno through a
series of preparatory sketches leading to a final result, the disegno esterno,
copied onto the canvas. Typically, Titian and Rembrandt hardly left such
drawings. Instead, as revealed by the pentimenti, their own immediate
corrections into the wet paint, they essentially let themselves guide by
their brushes, by the inner dynamics of the image taking shape under
their hands (Busch 2009: 18–19).
Most relevant here are Busch’s and Hadjinicolaou’s investigations on
Rembrandt and the Rembrandtists. Rothko greatly admired the Dutch
painter. Rembrandt, he noted, enlarged human emotionality to the plane
of a ‘universal emotionalism.’ When we think of a picture’s humanity, we
undoubtedly think of the type of emotionality Rembrandt achieved—a
tragic emotionality, as Rothko believed, resting on ‘pain, frustration, and
228 H. Roodenburg
the fear of death.’ It may have been a vestige of Christian myth, with its
notion of suffering as an instrument of salvation (Rothko 2004: 35–36,
96; see also Rothko 2006: 38).
More than likely, Rothko recognized Rembrandt’s affective rhetoric, a
major focus of the master himself. In one of the few comments on his
own art, Rembrandt emphasized his striving for beweeglijkheid, the com-
mon Dutch term for enargeia, employed by poets, preachers, and painters
alike.4 As the Rembrandt specialists agree, beweeglijkheid had a twofold,
both a descriptive and a performative, meaning. It alluded to the motions
of the figures depicted, to the vividness of their postures, gestures, and
facial expressions, and to the figures’ ability, through their vividness, to
move the viewer’s emotions (Weststeijn 2008: 234).
But unlike the late medieval painters, Titian, Rembrandt, and the
other non-classical painters did not confine their striving for vividness to
the figures rendered. As argued by Busch and Hadjinicolaou, they created
an additional, material enargeia through their handling of the paint—
their use of color, tonal gradation, light, and shadow or, bringing in
touch, their using impasto or scratching in the still fresh paint. As
Hadjinicolaou writes, especially here, in their focusing on the paint, on
its sheer materiality, Rembrandt and the Rembrandtists already antici-
pated the New York abstract expressionists (Hadjinicolaou 2016: 228).
Matter was not dead but alive to these painters. In line with their anti-
idealist views and answering to the contemporary conception of natura
naturans, of nature’s generative power, they employed what cultural his-
torian Pamela Smith has described as a wide-spread artisanal epistemol-
ogy. Matter, in the eyes of its adherents, was ‘like a living being one had
to come to know through intimate and bodily acquaintance.’ As Smith
established, the artisans’ manuals produced at the time ‘are full of direc-
tives about this type of discernment by listening, tasting and smelling,
which is very hard to describe in words, but instead is known in the body’
(Smith 2004: 2010; Roodenburg 2014).5
4
The term may be a sixteenth-century coinage. For its various uses before Rembrandt, see
Roodenburg (2016: 658).
5
There is an interesting affinity here with present approaches of embodied or enactive cognition,
Alva Noë’s (and others’) in particular; for an accessible introduction, see Noë (2009).
Essentially, Titian and the other painters sought to shape formless mat-
ter, the prima materia, by closely following nature and allowing chance,
the unforeseen, to do its work. They trusted their brushes and palet knives
to guide the way, trusted each stroke of paint to generate the next. Not
surprisingly, Rothko also cherished the unforeseen. Comparing his float-
ing rectangles to actors on the stage, he cautioned that neither the action
nor the actors can be anticipated. The artist should have ‘faith in his abil-
ity to produce miracles when they are needed.’ This is his most important
tool, fashioned ‘through constant practice.’ ‘The picture,’ in other words,
‘must be for him, as for anyone experiencing it later, a revelation, an
unexpected and unprecedented solution’ (Rothko 2006: 58–59).
Again answering to the natura naturans conception, of making form-
less matter come alive, the non-classical painters preferred to leave their
brush strokes or the scratches of their palet knives unfinished. In contrast
to the canon, its ideal of the clear and precise line, they just created their
shapes and forms, the human figures included, by applying blotches of
paint—nature has no lines.6 In the same way, valuing tonal gradation and
chiaroscuro, the variation of light and shadow, they preferred subdued
yellows and browns in their work, grading into other earth colors such as
green and red. Instead of the canon’s clear lines (and its cherished
vanishing-point perspective), they left it to their darkly colored and con-
toured shapes, emerging from an indeterminate, monochrome back-
ground, to lend their scenes depth and life. Nature, then, unfolded in the
painter’s handling of the brush and it could do so again in the beholder’s
careful viewing of the picture. Not surprisingly, with matter thus coming
alive, with the scene’s enargeia also given material form, the viewer’s emo-
tions are directly engaged. The pictures compel the beholder to imagina-
tively complete the shapes with their blurring lines and colors. Even the
depicted figures’ body parts—their hands, arms, and lower legs—were
often simply suggested through a few unsettled strokes of the brush
(Fig. 11.3). Kinesthesia, viewing the painting both at a distance and up
close, was another vital processual element, heightened through
6
Of course, the differences between the two approaches were often differences in degree. A famous
instance is Vermeer, who by applying glazes over impastos, used to soften the contours of the
objects depicted.
230 H. Roodenburg
Fig. 11.3 Rembrandt van Rijn, Saint Bartholomew, 1657 (oil on canvas,
122.7 × 99.7 cm, detail). Putnam Foundation, Timken Museum of Art
Rembrandt’s famous use of impasto. The result was a state of emotional

immediacy and intimacy comparable to what Rothko’s pictorial rhetoric
accomplished some three centuries later.
Conclusion
At the end of his book, Elkins quotes an astute entry from one of the
chapel’s visitors’ books. As the man or woman wrote, viewing the darkish
paintings you start scanning the canvas surface ‘for something concrete,
visible, some touchstone to hold onto amid the rushing wave of color.’
Eventually, pushed to the limit, you may find ‘solace’ in the paintings’
textures, the brushstrokes or the running paint. Indeed, what Rothko
offers the viewer in his ‘ever-so-slight variation of color, blotches, lighter
zones’ are ‘small, controlled inklings of hope’—a proof of God, as the
visitor believed. But it is a fading glimpse of God, the visual markers may
or may not emerge. His own absorption, Elkins added, was quite identi-
cal, though he did not share the person’s religious take (Elkins 2001:
203–204). Somehow, the fourteen chapel paintings can move religious
and non-religious visitors alike.
What seems to resonate in the ways religious and non-religious inter-
act with Rothko’s canvases, is an attentive way of viewing, a sensory,
cross-modal openness to Rothko’s vivid forms and shapes. In this respect,
one might see his large, abstract canvases as a new-style, secular variety of
the late medieval Andachtsbilder. Both his pictorial and the beholder’s
viewing practices have their contemplative, religious roots, a long-time
history developing first around the enargeia of the figures depicted but
shifting later, with the non-classical painters, to the enargeia of matter, of
just the blotches of paint applied. In the meantime, the Rothko chapel
seems to attract thousands of tourists each year, which is undoubtedly
putting an end to any state of emotional intimacy. Museums have become
the new pilgrimage sites, as the complaint goes. But that is another reli-
gious legacy, one that was already complained about by those praying,
contemplating, and crying over the Andachtsbilder.
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Barnes, S. (1989). The Rothko Chapel: An Act of Faith. Austin: University of
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Belting, H. (2006). Das echte Bild. Bildfragen als Glaubensfragen. Munich: Beck.
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Chave, A., & Rothko, M. (1989). Subjects in Abstraction. New Haven, CT and
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Crowther, P. (1993). Art and Embodiment: From Aesthetics to Self-Consciousness.
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Elkins, J. (2001). Pictures & Tears: A History of People Who Have Cried in Front
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Part V
Bodies
12
Disgust and Difference: Conflicting
Sensations of the Sacred
Jojada Verrips
Case History
On 3 July 2016, when I was cycling in the Dominicusstraße in Berlin-
Schöneberg close to where we lived for almost half a year, my attention
was suddenly drawn by something that was written on a glass container
along the roadside. In huge black letters, somebody had painted the fol-
lowing slogan on this container: ‘SCHEISS ZIGEUNER’ (shit Gypsies).
I was flabbergasted to read this disgusting qualification. Though I had
seen all kinds of debunking and discriminating texts and graffiti in the
public space of Germany’s capital, I had never come across one like this
and I immediately took a picture of it (Fig. 12.1). A similar one was
painted on a wall near a church not far away (Fig. 12.2). Each and every
Thanks to Birgit Meyer, Johannes Fabian and the editors of this volume for their critical, but
constructive, comments on earlier versions of this essay.
J. Verrips (*)
University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
e-mail: j.verrips@uva.nl

238 J. Verrips
Fig. 12.1 Corner Dominicusstr.—Fritz Elsasstr., Berlin, 3 July 2016
time I passed the container and wall I felt anger and disgust as well as the
urge to remove the discriminatory text. Apparently others had felt the
same, for on 21 July I noticed that somebody had blackened the word
‘ZIGEUNER’ and added an ‘E’ after ‘SCHEISS’ (Fig. 12.3) expressing
his or her disgust and revulsion.1 On the same day I observed that the
1
This ‘somebody’ might have been an elderly lady who is well known in Berlin for her crusades
against right-wing slogans in the public realm of the city and her being arrested by the police for
her cleansing activities time and again (Volkskrant 20/10/2016).
12 Disgust and Difference: Conflicting Sensations of the Sacred 239
Fig. 12.2 Dominicusstr., Berlin, 3 July 2016
wall near the church had been newly painted (Fig. 12.4). Two days later
the word ‘SCHEISSE’ on the container was crossed out a bit and under
the blackened word was again written ‘ZIGEUNER!’ (Fig. 12.5) this
time even with an exclamation mark! When I saw this I realized that a
small war had started between two anonymous citizens, one with an
apparent disgust of Gypsies and the other with a disgust of the slogan.2
On 29 July I noticed that phase 4 of this mini-war had begun, for I saw
that the word ‘SCHEISSE’ had been painted greenish and the word
‘ZIGEUNER’ black again (Fig. 12.6). Remarkable fact: on the container
stood a tray with two paint rollers as a kind of invitation to paint over (or
2
In spite of the fact that the designation ‘Gypsies’ (as well as ‘Zigeuner’ and ‘Tsiganes’) got a negative
connation -reason why the L’Union Rom Internationale (IRU) in 1971 started to officially use the
term ‘Rom’- I will nevertheless use it, because I do not always know to what specific sub-category or
-group they belong, such as Roma, Sinti, Ursari, Kalés, Lowara or Kalderash. Moreover, not all
Gypsy groups want to be called ‘Rom.’ See Clébert (1970: 46–49) and Commission Nationale
(2015: 251–261) for an overview of the various categories of Gypsies one can meet in Europe.
240 J. Verrips
add?) new insults at the address of Gypsies (Fig. 12.7). In the evening the
tray had disappeared (Fig. 12.8). The next day, 30 July, I observed that
the Gypsy hater had been active again. This time with a slogan degrading
the Arabs to ‘shit’ on the glass container next to the one on which she or
he had ventilated his disgust of Gypsies in the first place (Fig. 12.9). On
the cleansed wall near the church the same revolting disqualification
could be read (Fig. 12.10). Since we had to leave Berlin the following day,
I was not able to find out whether the mini-war had a follow-up in the
days to come. But when we for a short visit returned to Berlin in December
2016 it became clear that somebody in the meantime had blackened the
insult at the address of the Arabs (Fig. 12.11). Since then the war seems
to have ended, for in November 2017 the garbage bins still showed the
unchanged traces of it (Fig. 12.12). Only in December 2018 they were
not visible any longer, for the containers had been cleansed or replaced by
new ones (Fig. 12.13).
The Anthropology of the Wild (in the) West

That it does not concern a unique case, but one in an almost endless
series, is shown, for example, by the following passage from an article by
Bogner (2018) on the discrimination of Gypsies in Vienna: ‘A rather new
242 J. Verrips
aspect are the “Roma-Rauss” (“Away with the Roma”) slogans that…since
2016 again and again appeared on advertisements, election posters and in
metro-stations.’ Sinister fact: the two s’s in ‘Rauss’ were typographically
the same as the ones used by the German SS. Similarly shocking slogans
(such as ‘Scheiß-Zigeuner ihr gehört alle weggeräumt’ (‘Shit-Gypsies you
have to be deported all’) or even ‘Scheiß-Zigeuner. Ihr gehört vergast’

(‘Shit-Gypsies. You have to be gassed’) can be found on the Internet.3 As
3
On the Internet one can find a host of special sites that offer the opportunity to ventilate negative
stereotypes of and/or experiences with Gypsies. Also telling in this connection is this observation
by Gypsy blogger Jacques Debot: ‘La violence des propos à l’égard des Roms, Tsiganes et Gens du
Voyage sur le réseaux sociaux Facebook et Twitter ne semble connaître aucune limite. Appels au
244 J. Verrips
the last example I want to mention the gruesome statement painted in

2016 on the wall of a school visited by Gypsy and Jewish kids in Montreuil
(France): ‘Extermination totale de tous ces sales cafards de Roms, au plus
vite, Juden verboten, sales Juifs…’ (‘Total extermination of all dirty Rom
cockroaches, as soon as possible, forbidden for Jews, dirty Jews…’).4 My
case history as well as the examples given fit very well what I once called
‘The Anthropology of the Wild (in the) West.’ I roughly defined this
research line as follows. It implies the study of how people manage to
survive by living together or resisting/fighting each other on the basis of
classification, evaluation and fantasizing yielding the following possibili-
ties: (1) veneration and even sacralisation, (2) incorporation and
meurtre, au tir à balles réelles, à l’interdiction des transports en commun, comparaisons avec les
singes, les rats, la vermine, accusation de propager des maladies sont diffusés quotidiennement,
repris, partagés, approuvés, applaudis’ (see his blog Romstorie: La vie des Roms et des Gens du
Voyage d.d. 28/12/2015).
4
Compare this with the lyrics of the outlawed German neo-Nazi rock band Landser: ‘In der Oder
und in der Neisse/Nacht für Nacht die gleiche Scheisse/Im kalten Wasser Zigeunergewühl/
Gelangen an’s Ufer und schreien „Asyl!“/Zigeunerpack – jagt sie alle weg – ich hasse/diesen Dreck!’
integration on an equal basis, and/or (3) discrimination, stigmatization,

marginalization, dehumanization and, where deemed necessary, decima-
tion and elimination of the Other (Verrips 2011: 207). It was especially
the latter ways of negatively relating to fellow human beings in the
Western, so-called civilized world that I put centre stage in this anthro-
pology of the Wild (in the) West. That is, all sorts of uncivilized, wild
or—maybe it is better to say—barbaric behaviour towards others per-
ceived as beings of another, lower kind who form a threat to the social
246 J. Verrips
order one clings to. According to Slavoj Žižek one often fantasizes about
these disgusting and therefore despised others as being the (potential)
thieves of our goods and pleasures,5 the rude disturbers of our peaceful
lives and more, providing a reason why one wants them to radically
change their nomadic way of life or, even better, to disappear. For ages,
Gypsies have been a tragic example of this kind of stereotypical represen-
tations of, and fantasies about others whom one classifies and evaluates as
not being able to form part of an orderly society.6 The slogan on the glass
5
See Verrips (2001: 343/344). In a sense the idea of the limited good, as described by Foster (1965)
for so-called peasant societies, plays an important role here.
6
This is deeply rooted in enlightenment philosophy. Kant, for instance, distinguished in the intro-
duction of his Kritik der reinen Vernunft also a nomadic reason -nomadische Vernunft or as Röttgers
calls it vagabundierende Vernunft. This type of reason Kant disliked very much, because nomads like
Gypsies ‘despise all kinds of constant cultivation of the soil,’ married among one another, spoke a
kind of secret language and refused to allow themselves to be incorporated in a civilized and seden-
tary world, reason why they formed a serious threat to societal order (Röttgers 1993; Verrips 2011).
A striking example of a well-known Dutch politician -at the beginning of the last century even the
container in the Dominicusstraße is another nasty example of dehuman-

izing them, in this case by their association with or, even worse, reduction
to nothing less than shit, that is, something that generates in general
(strong feelings of ) disgust.
The Phenomenon of Disgust

It is exactly this sensation of disgust and its role in all kinds of socio-
cultural arenas (now and in the past) as well as the disqualification of
others (whom one cannot perceive as equals) as being nothing less than
shit that I want to deal with in this essay. The role disgust plays in draw-
ing boundaries and constructing hierarchies in the socio-cultural realm
prime minister of the Netherlands- who despised Gypsies (as well as Jews) and wished them to
disappear, was Abraham Kuyper.
248 J. Verrips
Fig. 12.11 Corner Dominicusstr.—Fritz Elsasstr., Berlin, 14 December 2016
Fig. 12.12 Corner Dominicusstr.—Fritz Elsasstr., Berlin, 26 November 2017

Fig. 12.13 Corner Dominicusstr.—Fritz Elsasstr., Berlin, December 2018
seems to be grossly neglected by sociologists and anthropologists. During

the last two decades a number of monographs on disgust appeared (see,
e.g., Miller 1997; Menninghaus 1999; Wilson 2002; Kick 2003;
Nussbaum 2010; Korsmeyer 2011; Kelly 2011; McGinn 2011; Herz
2012; Delville et al. 2015), but almost none of their authors had anthro-
pology or sociology as his/her background.7 Miller, professor of law at the
University of Michigan, signalled the great importance of disgust as a
boundary-maintaining mechanism as follows: ‘Disgust helps define
boundaries between us and them and me and you. It helps prevent our
way from being subsumed into their way. Disgust, along with desire,
7
I traced two ethnological journals that published special issues on disgust: ‘Anatomie du dégoût.’
Ethnologie Française 2011/1 (Vol. 41) and ‘Igitt. Ekel als Kultur.’ Innsbrucker Zeitschrift für
Europäische Ethnologie 2015. Though Mary Douglas does not explicitly deal with the phenomenon
in her study on purity and danger (1966, see Miller 1997: 43–45), it is clearly implied in her
notions pollution and impurity.
250 J. Verrips
locates the bounds of the other, either as something to be avoided,

repelled, or attacked, or, in other settings, as something to be emulated,
imitated, or married’ (1997: 50).8 How disgust finds a great companion
in aggression towards people deemed to be disgusting shit, I will discuss
in greater detail below. First I want to pay attention to the ideas about
disgust and the disgusting as they were developed by Karl Rosenkranz in
the middle of the nineteenth century in his book Ästhetik des Häßlichen
([1853] 1996). Rosenkranz considered the disgusting (‘das Ekelhafte’) to
be a sub-category of the repugnant (‘das Scheußliche’), which he again
subsumed under the general category of the unpleasant (‘das Widrige’).
For him, the sensation of disgust was triggered by (the process of ) decom-
position (‘Verwesung’). The disgusting referred to a non-form (‘Un-form’),
that is to say to a dissolution or disintegration of a form caused by physi-
cal or moral decay. He speaks in this connection of
‘Kulturverwesungsabschnitzeln,’ a fantastic term, but difficult to trans-
late. ‘Cultural decomposition scraps’ might be a possibility. Such prod-
ucts are important sources of intensely felt disgust, especially when they
form a complex mixture. Rosenkranz pays special attention to shit
(‘Dreck’ and ‘Kot’) as something highly repulsive, a reason why people
use these words to turn human beings, objects and even events they expe-
rience as revolting into ‘Nullitäten’ one should get rid of the sooner the
better (Rosenkranz [1853] 1996: 252–260).9 It is this kind of antisocial
nullifying that was implied in the inscriptions on the glass containers in
the Dominicusstraße anno 2016.10 This way of categorizing and
8
Compare this with what the philosopher Daniel Kelly wrote: ‘Ethnic boundary markers are often
highly emotionally charged, and attitudes and behaviors associated with ethnocentrism, xenopho-
bia, and prejudice often follow the logic of disgust, depicting out-group members not just as wrong
or different, but as tainted, contaminating, even subhuman’ (2011: 7).
9
During the reign of the Nazis the reduction of certain categories of people, such as the Jews and
Gypsies, to excrements reached a tragic height in concentration camps like Auschwitz-Birkenau,
sometimes described as a kind of anus mundi (Werner 2011: 180–184). See for the persecution of
the Gypsies by the Nazis, for example, Kenrick and Puxon (1972), Geiges and Wette (1979),
Lucassen (1990) and Lewy (2000).
10
See in this connection the revealing study of Alan Dundes (1984) on the inclination of Germans
-in spite of their obsession with immaculacy or cleanliness- to use a wide range of scatological words
and expressions in almost every sphere of life (cf. Werner 2011: 24/25; Breuer and Vidulić 2018:
6; Havryliv 2018: 28). See Inglis for an illuminating theory about ‘the conditions of possibility for
the mobilisation of resources of faecal and other forms of corporeal symbolism by one group
against another’ (2002: 219).
evaluating human beings in the public space can best be understood as

sacralisation in a negative sense. Let me explain why I think that this
introduction of the sacred, which normally is associated with the divine,
the holy and the pure, in short something positive, is fully justified and
relevant for a deeper understanding of the offending disqualification of
both the Gypsies and the Arabs I came across in Berlin.
The Ambiguity of the Sacred

The etymology of the word ‘sacred’ leads us back to the Latin word ‘sacer’
which according to WordSense.eu/Dictionary (on Google) has the fol-
lowing double meanings: ‘Sacer: 1. Sacred, holy, dedicated to a divinity,
consecrated, hallowed... 2. Devoted to a divinity for sacrifice, fated to
destruction, forfeited, accursed... 3. Divine, celestial... 4. Execrable,
detestable, horrible, infamous, criminal, impious, wicked, abominable,
cursed…’ In the Latin/Dutch dictionary edited by Harm Pinkster (2007)
one finds the same double meanings, but herein the ‘divinity for sacrifice’
mentioned under 2 in the WordSense dictionary is specified as ‘a deity of
the underworld.’11 The painter of the utterly negative slogans on the glass
containers and the wall turned the Gypsies and later on the Arabs into a
kind of sacred human beings in the second sense of the adjective sacred,
that is, into repulsive, decaying and disgusting entities, nothing less than
shit ‘fated to destruction’ or ripe for being sacrificed to a deity of the
underworld in order to make the upper-world clean and pure again, an
age-old way of dealing with others one cannot accept as fellow human
beings. In order to make clear that this is no exaggerated or even empty
statement, I want to underpin it with some material from the Bible, more
specifically the Old Testament. Since I have a special interest in references
to disgust and shit (and in its wake to impurity and destruction) I
skimmed the Dutch ‘Statenvertaling’ from 1637,12 the first translation
based on original texts, for in this translation these words still occur,
whereas in later ones they were almost everywhere replaced by ‘nicer’
11
Mary Douglas, for instance, formulated the ambiguity of the word sacer as follows: ‘…in some
cases it may apply to desecration as well as to consecration’ (1966: 8).
12
I grew up with this translation that is still in use in a number of orthodox Calvinist churches in
the Bible Belt of the Netherlands.
252 J. Verrips
synonyms.13 The term disgust (‘walging’ and related words such as ‘walg,’
‘walgen,’ and ‘walgelijkheid’) can be found in the books Leviticus,
Numbers, Job, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and Zechariah. Though the temptation
is great to present several passages in which both disgust and/or shit pop
up, I will limit myself to two salient passages in which these words occur.
The first is Leviticus 26:30 that reads as follows in the ‘Statenvertaling:’
‘En Ik zal uw hoogten verderven, en uw zonnebeelden uitroeien, en zal
uw dode lichamen op de dode lichamen van uw drekgoden werpen; en
Mijn ziel zal aan (van) u walgen’ (Italics JV). In The New American
Standard Bible, this passage is translated as follows: ‘I then will destroy
your high places, and cut down your incense altars, and heap your remains
on the remains of your idols; for My soul shall abhor you’ (Italics JV). The
second is Ezekiel 6:3, 5: ‘Daartoe zullen uw altaren verwoest, en uw zon-
nebeelden verbroken worden; en Ik zal uw verslagenen nedervellen voor
het aangezicht uwer drekgoden. En ik zal de dode lichamen der kinderen
Israëls voor het aangezicht hunner drekgoden leggen, en Ik zal uw been-
deren rond uw altaren strooien’ (Italics JV). In English this passage reads
as follows: ‘And your altars shall be desolate, and your images shall be
broken: and I will cast down your slain men before your idols. And I will
lay the dead carcasses of the children of Israel before their idols: and I will
scatter your bones round about your altars’ (Italics JV). In the two Dutch
quotations from the ‘Statenvertaling’ the God of Israel is speaking about
what He will do with the statues and altars of the ‘drekgoden’ (literally:
‘shit-Gods’) and all the people who made themselves impure by worship-
ping these polluting deities instead of Him.14 In early German transla-
tions of the Bible, for instance, the Biblia Pentapla attributed to Johann
Otto Glüsing and published in three volumes (1710, 1711 and 1712),
one frequently finds the equivalent term ‘Dreckgötter.’15 Also very
13
A comparison of the passages in the Dutch ‘Statenvertaling’ wherein disgust (‘walging’) was used
with the same passages in several German and English translations taught me that in the first the
following words were used: ‘Abscheu,’ ‘(sich) ekeln (vor),’ ‘verabscheuen’ (synonyms ‘sich ekeln,’
‘hassen’) and ‘Abneigung haben,’ and in the latter that the word disgust does not occur as such.
Instead, the following words are used: ‘loathe oneself,’ ‘abhor,’ ‘reject’ and ‘loathsome.’
14
In the ‘Statenvertaling’ the word ‘drekgoden’ or ‘shit-gods’ occurs 48 times.
15
The Biblia Pentapla is a unique work, for it presents the Roman Catholic, Lutheran, Protestant,
Hebrew and Dutch translations of the Bible next to each other, so that one is able to compare them.
The term ‘Dreckgötter’ is only used in the Protestant translation of the Old Testament, not in the
interesting in this context is, for example, the following German publica-
tion from 1730 containing translations of the four great prophets Isaiah,
Jeremiah, Ezekiel and Daniel: Die heilige Propheten Alle, Nach der fürtre-
flichen Ubersetzung und mit den Vorreden, auch Rand-Glossen D. Martin
Luthers… (The holy prophets all according to the excellent translation
and with the preface, also marginal notes of Martin Luther). In the com-
ments on the worshipping of idols in Ezekiel words like ‘Dreck-Götzen’
(‘shit-idols’) and ‘Dreck-Götter’ (‘shit-gods’) are used all the time. What
I deem remarkable is that the God of Israel in early Dutch and German
translations of the Bible speaks of other gods as ‘shit-gods’ or ‘shit-idols’16
in a similar way as the slogan-painter in Berlin did with regard to others
whom he or she disliked and despised, that is, Gypsies and Arabs. Even
more remarkable I find the fact that this God not only behaved as an
angry, blasphemous iconoclast, but also as a killer of all the unfaithful
who made both themselves and the landscapes in which they brought
sacrifices to disgusting gods sacred in the negative sense.17 The Bible (and
in its wake the Christian tradition based on it) offers in a certain sense
next to a humane also a rather aggressive divine model for how to think
about and behave towards people perceived as infidels, heathens or non-
Christians (and their religious material culture and holy places and
spaces). They are just like their deities in a certain sense also nothing less
but disgusting, impure, polluting shit18 and therefore in the last instance
other ones. Luther spoke in his translation of ‘Götzen’ in the sense of ‘Abgott’ (or ‘idol’). The pop-
ping up of ‘Dreckgötter’ in later editions of the Bible might be a direct consequence of a more
precise translation of the word used in the original texts. According to Bergmann & Schart it
concerns the noun šiqûș meaning, amongst other things, ‘Dreckszeug’ (‘shitty things’) as designa-
tion for idols (2012).
16
In the French translation of 1744 of the Luther Bible one finds the expression ‘dieux de fiente’
(‘shit-gods’).
17
The English scholar of biblical literature Yvonne Sherwood extensively sketched in great detail the
blasphemous iconoclasm of the God of Israel as it occurs in Ezekiel in her brilliant study ‘Biblical
Blaspheming’ (2012).
18
The pernicious perception of Gypsies as being impure and shitty people polluting each and every
environment they enter is nowadays as widespread as it used to be in the past. See, for example,
https://www.20min.ch/schweiz/romandie/story/Roma-lassen-Abfall-zurueck-Volksseele-
kocht%2D%2D-12711549. However, it is important to know that Gypsies perceive non-Gypsies
in a similar way and that they have their own complex ideas of purity and cleanliness the latter do
not know anything about (see Sutherland 1975: Chap. 8; Rao 1975: 149–155, Okely 1983: Chap.
6 and Mroz 1984).
254 J. Verrips
fated to be ruthlessly sent away and even killed. Though I cannot fall back
on solid empirical evidence that indisputably proves that the slogan-
painter in Berlin was directly inspired by the kind of negative representa-
tions of idol worshippers in early German Bible translations, I nevertheless
think that the genealogical roots of his or her hatred towards Gypsies and
Arabs, at least partly can be found in the aforementioned Christian tradi-
tion. One might interpret it as a kind of secular echo of a more outspoken
religious past. The fact that Christianity is based on holy texts explicitly
containing an intolerant and destructive model towards other believers
forms, at least in my view, in combination with the recent rebirth and rise
of new secular nationalisms and the occurrence of similar models within
Judaism and Islam, an important source of the great conflicts that we wit-
ness in the world today, Europe being no civilized exception. Since this
model springs from a learned (and not so much inborn) disgust of others
one might say that this sentiment (or emotion) in the last instance forms
a terrifying kind of double-edged sword, for, on the one hand, it helps
people to form rather solidary groups, for instance religious, ethnic and/
or national ones, but on the other, it at the same time sharpens boundary-
building and -defending, if need be with sheer violence as happened, for
example, during the Balkan wars in the nineties of the last century. Of
course, there are also other factors that play a role in these processes, such
as greed and the image of the limited good, not to speak of poverty,
inequality and geo-political circumstances to mention just a few. But for
the moment I want to stress the significance of disgust for processes of
in- and exclusion, for the desire to live in what the Germans call ‘a heile
Welt,’ a world without people of whom one thinks that they (will) dis-
turb and pollute the (wo)menscapes and environments one is part of and
one lives in. All over the world, we are faced with efforts to protect these
‘scapes’—not seldom with brute force—against putative spoiling intrud-
ers, often perceived as flows or swarms, by building fences (of barbed
wire) and walls, or with efforts to cleanse or purify them when these
‘sacred’ trespassers succeeded in finding or making holes in these obsta-
cles (cf. Sibley 1995: Chaps. 4 and 5).19
Recent examples of places where walls were built to separate Gypsy camps or settlements from
19
non-Gypsy neighbourhoods are Usti Nad Labem in the Czech Republic (1999), Berehove in the
Ukraine (2012) and Wattrelos in France (2015).
Agamben’s Homines sacri

For readers familiar with the work on the homo sacer by Giorgio Agamben
everything I said so far might sound rather familiar, even as a kind of
summary of his ideas with regard to the type of being (the bare life) he is
putting centre stage. There indeed is an important overlap between his
homines sacri and my type of sacred human beings, for instance, their
grim fate of always being manoeuvred into the position of an outsider or
outlaw, but also a crucial difference. Let me try to sketch succinctly where
our perspectives differ. In his study, Agamben wants to solve the riddle of
the homo sacer, a bad and impure figure in Roman law, whom the people
have judged on account of a crime and whom one might kill—though
not as a sacrifice—without being condemned for homicide (1998: 71).
According to him this tragic figure—a banned outlaw who was excluded
from both the ius humanum and the ius divinum and thereby reduced by
sovereigns to what he calls ‘bare life’—has started to play an essential role
in modern bio-politics, for example, that of the Nazis in the last century
who treated Jews as well as Gypsies20 as a kind of homines sacri who could
ruthlessly be exterminated. In his opinion it would be a great mistake to
mobilize ‘the theory of the ambivalence of the sacred’ as it was developed
by William Robertson Smith at the end of the nineteenth century and
elaborated thereafter by such great scholars as Henri Hubert, Marcel
Mauss, Emile Durkheim, Rudolph Otto and Sigmund Freud to under-
stand the phenomenon of the homo sacer. In this theory, the double-
sidedness of the sacred, as something that can at the same time refer to the
divine and the accursed or polluted, is connected with rules of purity and
impurity. Agamben disqualifies this approach of the sacred, without seri-
ously paying attention to it scornfully as ‘a scientific mythologeme’ (Ibid.:
75), not usable to shed light on the figure of the homo sacer in its classical,
original sense as well as his occurrence in a modern, bio-political shape
two millennia later. As a matter of fact, Agamben spends only three pages
on the insights of the scholars mentioned to reach this bold conclusion
20
Agamben refers two times to the killing of Gypsies by the Nazis (1998: 155, 179).
256 J. Verrips
(Ibid.: 75–79).21 Instead of putting their ideas regarding the sacred aside
and clinging stubbornly to a rather narrow, almost nominalist sort of
meaning of the words sacer and sacredness, Agamben could have gained
from including the perspectives he so easily rejects.22 That would have
enabled him to put a dimension into the spotlight that he very explicitly
does not want to acknowledge as relevant, that is, the family resemblance
between the disgusting, modern, bio-political practices of getting rid of
unwanted human beings by putting them in camps and eventually killing
them (as, e.g., implemented by the Nazis) and bringing a sacrifice of a
specific type. However, in Agamben’s view the representation of, for
example, the Holocaust as a kind of sacrifice is beside the point and the
result of what he calls ‘an irresponsible historiographical blindness.’ Jews
as well as Gypsies were for him homines sacri that might be killed, but
were not sacrificed. Their death was neither the consequence of a death
penalty nor sacrifice, but simply the concretization of their capacity to
being killed inherent to being a Jew or Gypsy as such. In my view,
Agamben takes a position that blinds to the fact that the injunction to
not sacrifice a homo sacer implies that one cannot recognize the kind of
family resemblance I just mentioned. Doing so, by contrast, is important
for a better understanding of the role of perceptions of purity and impu-
rity in the cleansing of the social order. Concentrating on the reduction
of certain categories of human beings to ‘bare life’ and on how this reduc-
tion eventually might lead to their destruction, Agamben fails to pay
detailed attention to at least two important things. First, he neglects to
describe and analyse the (ideological) reasons of the sovereign powers and
their supporters for their draconic decisions to label certain people as
deportable and killable, or the kind of worldview that inspires them to
classify specific Others as trespassers, intruders, parasites, vermin, bad,
21
The chapter on the ambivalence of the sacred in Part Two (Agamben 1998: 75–81) is both scien-
tifically and technically weak. Not only the lack of presenting convincing arguments for the blunt
rejection of their approaches, except that they are not based on the meaning Agamben gives to the
term sacred as formulated in the quote from a classical juridical text, is striking, but also the fact
that there are mistakes in the quotes from Robertson Smith’s work and lacking references to the
literature mentioned as relevant for a better understanding of the phenomenon of the homo sacer.
22
Another topic that escapes Agamben’s attention by rejecting the work of Durkheim on the sacred
is that of the ‘sacrality of the person’ (introduced by him in 1898, see Joas 2015: 81–86), in a sense
the positive conceptual counterpart of the banned homo sacer.
impure and polluting entities or…shit. Second, due to his narrow and
nominalist definition of the sacred, he overlooks the fact that the prac-
tices used to free the world of all these disturbing beings or elements show
age-old sacrificial traits or traces of the religious in secular settings.
Sacrificial Echoes in Secular Times

In this connection, I think that it can be fruitful to take notice of what
Henri Hubert and Marcel Mauss have said about the phenomenon of
sacrifice in their brilliant ‘Essai sur la nature et la function du sacrifice’
([1898] 1964) that Agamben pushes aside in one sentence as irrelevant
for a better understanding of the deplorable fate of the homo sacer (1998:
77). According to them all forms of sacrifice ‘…are the same in essence
(…) the outer coverings of one single mechanism’ (Hubert and Mauss
[1898] 1964: 18). And it is this mechanism or scheme that they deal with
in their essay. They define sacrifice as follows: ‘Sacrifice is a religious act
which, through the consecration of a victim, modifies the condition of
the moral person who accomplishes it or that of certain objects with
which he is concerned’ (Ibid.: 13). Subsequently, they outline this scheme
or basic structure in which specific actors and acts play crucial roles. The
important actors are the sacrifier, the sacrificer and the victim. The sacrifier
might be an individual or a collective of persons either wishing to get near
to the sacred in a positive sense (e.g., a deity or God) or …to get rid of
something sacred in the negative sense, that is, an impurity of himself/
themselves or of specific objects in his/their possession (e.g., houses or
land). The sacrificer is the one who actually performs the sacrifice for the
sacrifier, for instance, a priest or another religious specialist. The victim,
finally, is the subject or object that has to be destroyed in order to either
get in close contact with the sacred world and its supposed inhabitants
(Gods, deities, spirits or powers) or to radically expel disgusting pollution
and impurity of people and/or things one values very much.23 In fact,
23
In the case of expelling pollution and impurity the victim is often a real or symbolic scapegoat, a
sacrificial being Agamben refuses to associate –in my view erroneously- with his homo sacer, because
it is forbidden to sacrifice it. See in this connection Brittnacher (2012: 218–222) who follows
258 J. Verrips
Hubert and Mauss lay bare the basic scheme (or structure) of all sacrifices
and distinguish two types: (a) sacrifices of sacralisation and (b) sacrifices of
de-sacralisation. In both cases one sees ‘…the same sacrificial procedure,
in which the elements not only are identical, but arranged in the same
order and moving in the same direction’ (Ibid.: 58). What I deem impor-
tant is that especially the sacrifices of de-sacralisation as outlined by Hubert
and Mauss can be helpful in understanding what happens in case of sym-
bolic and actual manifestations of violent ethnic cleansing we are con-
fronted with nowadays. The basic scheme followed and the same sort of
actors and acts can be signalled in these cases too. Only explicit religious
justifications of the cleansing processes, implying the killing of thousands
of victims that are qualified as disgusting polluters of cherished socio-
cultural environments, are often not given by the violent sacrificers, such
as soldiers and rebels, and the sacrifiers, for instance, political leaders of
nations and ethnic groups.24 However, this should not lead to closing our
eyes for the continuous upsurge of age-old techniques or symbolic forms
grounded in the realm of religion to stigmatize, or even to get rid of
people, animals and things that are perceived as a threat to the secular
societal order.
Final Remarks
The basic scheme underlying sacrifices, especially sacrifices of de-
sacralization as revealed by Hubert and Mauss seems to also underlie many
manifestations of very scary outbursts of violence in our global world now-
adays and the mistreatment of people who, for instance, try to escape an
often gloomy economic and/or political situation by voting with their feet
and illegally crossing borders (cf. Sibley 1995: Chap. 3). The role which
learned disgust, and in its wake the degrading of others to shit (as in the case
of the Gypsies I started with) plays in these outbursts and mistreatment
should not be underestimated and be therefore the object of much more
Agamben’s line of argumentation with regard to Gypsies in a way I find inconsistent and therefore
unsatisfactory.
24
Clear cases wherein religious justifications of gruesome and terrifying cleansing practices are
presented are the so-called Islamic State and Boko Haram.
research. To what kind of tragic developments this sort of depreciation and

dehumanization of fellow citizens in the last instance might lead was shown
by the Nazis (see Werner 2011: 180 ff.). Mini-wars against reprehensible
slogans on glass containers and walls reducing human beings to a kind of
‘sacred waste,’ to use a concept coined by Irene Stengs (2014), can be seen
as a kind of social hygiene in the public space, aiming to find something of
a road towards a better world.25 However, I am afraid that it will be difficult
to find a fitting, humanitarian solution for the problem I signalled in this
essay. One of the reasons for this rather sad perspective is the fact that
human beings are highly ambivalent creatures or walking bundles of con-
tradictions able to transform from good (civilized) into evil (barbarian)
beings and vice versa or being both at the same time. With populist-nativist
movements striving for ‘pure nations’ on the rise in Europe and elsewhere,
our future looks grim. Nevertheless, it is my hope that my anthropology of
the ‘Wild (in the) West’ paying close attention to all kinds of barbaric and
therefore disquieting phenomena may contribute to be on our guard.
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13
United in Competitive Mourning:
Commemorative Spectacle in Tribute
to King Bhumibol Adulyadej of Thailand
Irene Stengs
King Bhumibol Adulyadej, the ninth king of the Chakri dynasty, died on
13 October 2016 in Siriraj Hospital in Bangkok. During the final months
of the king’s hospitalization people had been gathering in growing num-
bers in front of the hospital to pray for his health and recovery. Many of
the well-wishers were wearing bright pink shirts, a reference to the pink
jacket the king himself had been wearing that Tuesday in November
2007, when he was released from another period of hospitalization.1 In
Thailand, each day of the week is astrologically associated with a specific
colour and pink is the colour of Tuesday. Donning pink had become a
ritualized tribute to the ailing king.
1
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-thailand-king/thais-wear-auspicious-pink-to-help-
hospitalized-king-recover-idUSKCN12B0EA?il=0 (accessed 25 September 2019). For the signifi-
cance of Siriraj Hospital as a site of worship, see Rotheray (2010).
I. Stengs (*)
e-mail: Irene.stengs@meertens.knaw.nl

264 I. Stengs
Immediately upon the king’s demise, the colour of paying tribute

changed to black and white, the Thai colours of mourning since the Fifth
Reign (King Chulalongkorn, Rama V, 1868–1910). The government,
the military junta headed by self-appointed PM Gen. Prayuth Chan-
ocha, announced a one-year mourning period, with an emphasis on the
first and last months. In the first month, voluntarily or not, restaurants
refrained from serving alcohol, performances were cancelled, as were all
kinds of festive celebrations. Wearing black and/or white was declared
compulsory. Within twenty-four hours, the Thai nation had turned black
and white, black being prominent: the public sphere was marked by
compliance with this colour code (see Figs. 13.1, 13.2 and 13.3). On
Facebook, the effects of the code were revealing: personal cover photos
had been replaced by black-and-white images of the king. In addition, as
it would not be respectful to have one’s own portrait appearing so close to
that of the monarch, people deleted their profile photos, a gesture that
left—or, perhaps more precisely, created—‘black holes’. The intimidating
consequence was that those who had not done so yet stood out.
In that first month of mourning various witch-hunts took place against
people who, in the eyes of others, whether online or offline, had not suf-
ficiently complied with the code of mourning.2 Apparently, in a sphere of
compulsory mourning, a visual absence of the mourning code entailed
the risk of being interpreted as an act of contempt for the king. Thailand
being the country with the most rigid and severe lese-majesty law in the
world (‘Article 112’), such could be a serious offence. According to the
law, the king is ‘enthroned in a position of revered worship and shall not
be violated’ (Streckfuss 2010: 108). Moreover, the law strictly forbids
insulting the king, stating, as translated by Haberkorn: ‘Whoever
defames, insults, or threatens the King, Queen, the Heir Apparent or the
Regent, shall be punished with imprisonment from three to fifteen years’
(2016: 227). With the interpretation of the law increasingly widening,
any critical utterance about the king—or about royalty in general, includ-
ing the kings and queens of previous dynasties (some of them
semi-mythical) and even the king’s dogs—may be interpreted as insulting
2
Such vigilant actions, although incidental, must be placed in a broader context of policing-citizen
initiatives in ‘defense of the monarchy’ (see Haberkorn 2016).
13 United in Competitive Mourning: Commemorative Spectacle… 265
Fig. 13.1 Identification and dress code check point at the entrance of Sanam
Luang, Bangkok July 2017
or defamatory. Because, in the words of Streckfuss, ‘insult lies in the eye

of the beholder’, anyone in Thai society might fall victim to accusations
of lese-majesty (ibid: 126) and, conversely, ‘[a]ny individual can file a
complaint of alleged violation of Article 112’ (Haberkorn 2016: 228).
Consequently, ‘public comment on the monarchy can only be one of
praise’ (Streckfuss 2010: 126). I suggest, however, that to fully under-
stand the present workings of the lese-majesty law, these observations
need to be taken a step further: over the last fifteen to twenty years, ‘prais-
ing the monarchy’ has become a pressing requirement for almost any-
thing present in public space, whether that be objects, persons or actions.
Or, to put it differently, the sphere of reverence and worship of the king,
is such that any absence of praise may be understood as an insult or a
display of contempt.
266 I. Stengs
Fig. 13.2 Billboard commemorating King Bhumibol, Bangkok 2018
Fig. 13.3 Food counter with mourning stickers, Bangkok July 2017
In the prevalent Thai royalist-nationalist ideology, the massive engage-

ment with the mourning rituals is not a direct consequence of the lese-
majesty law, but naturally flows from the undisputed love and respect all
Thai are supposed to feel for their semi-divine (samuthithep) king. Thai
historian Thongchai Winichakul calls this an ideology of hyper-royalism:
‘The royalist logic that a Thai must naturally be a royalist, therefore a
non-royalist must not be a Thai, is not absurd in Thailand. As this ideol-
ogy is widespread, it generates the climate of fear in which the non-
conformist individuals must learn to live in silence and anonymity’
(2014: 80).3 The mourning colour code’s exclusionary and inclusionary
effects position the massive compliance with the code clearly within the
above royalist-nationalist framework.
The power of expression of this royalist-nationalism, however, tends to
reach far beyond the Thai border. Since long it has served the orientalist
romanticism prevalent in much of the international popular press to
explain the exalted expressions of veneration from the special relationship
between the Thai people and the monarchy, Bhumibol in particular.
Although recently more critical reflections on the monarchy may be dis-
cerned, these rather concern Thailand’s present king, Vajiralongkorn
(Rama X, r. 2016-), who has not accrued the same degree of respect as his
father. For Thailand and the rest of the world alike, the images of massive
gatherings of people in black carrying portraits of Bhumibol have been
both an expression and proof of a nation unified in grief and love for their
great monarch.
Providing an ethnographic perspective on a selection of the many
mourning rituals, this chapter aims to shed light on the engagement of
3
A concrete example of what this ideology may result in, is presented by Tyrell Haberkorn’s article
on what she calls ‘hyper-royalist parapolitics’, a politics in which every individual is sovereign in
protecting the king. A 2012 proposal to review Article 112, presented by the critical lawyers group
Khana Nitirat, evoked many threatening reactions, ‘suggesting that the members of Khana Nitirat
were not Thai and should leave the country’, or were ‘less than humans, describing them as dogs or
aliens’. Others called for intervention of the military, some even suggesting that soldiers should
make them ‘disappear by throwing them from helicopters’, ‘having them and their families neck-
laced and burned alive’, or ‘beheaded and their heads put at stakes in front of the entrance of the
Thammasat University’. No action was undertaken against the individuals who posted such treats
(2016: 234–235).
268 I. Stengs
so many Thai with the period of mourning. A secular-sacred divide

that either emphasizes enforcement by the prevalent royalist-national-
ism or the sacrosanct qualities of the king will fall short for under-
standing the breadth and depth of the mourning rituals. In order to
overcome this opposition, I will introduce the notion of ‘competitive
mourning’ to flesh out the processes that accelerated, magnified and
intensified many of the mourning activities. From this perspective, the
violence directed at so-called incompliant others, as well as people’s
participation in elaborate mourning initiatives, appear as two sides of
the same coin: both hint at a ‘competition in mourning’ fuelled by the
above moral (sacred) and legal (secular) frameworks. Highlighting the
entanglement of coercion and competition in analysing the extensive-
ness of the mourning rituals, I seek to move beyond a perspective that
naturalizes the ‘love of the Thai for their king’, while taking care not to
frame participation in the rituals in terms of falseness or insincerity,
because imposed.
From the royalist, as well as the orientalist romantic perspective, the
Thai have always venerated their kings. Yet, as the next section will dem-
onstrate, there is a specific historical dimension to the veneration for
Bhumibol, which sets it apart from the worshipping of earlier Siamese
kings or from early twentieth-century kings, that of Rama VI (r.
1910–1925) and Rama VII (r. 1925–1935) in particular. I will therefore
start with a short digression on the sacralization of kingship during the
ninth reign, highlighting the role of royal rituals in the production of
the sacred.
The Sacralization of Kingship

Thailand has been a constitutional monarchy since the absolute monar-
chy was overthrown in 1932. The country holds a notorious record in
terms of numbers of coup d’états followed by new constitutions: two of
each in the twenty-first century alone (2006 and 2014 respectively).
Since the 1950s, the position of the monarch has gradually made a
remarkable political come-back, eventually relocating the monarchy in
the centre of the Thai political constellation. Over the decades, a hagiog-
raphy has taken shape in which King Bhumibol, who had been on the
throne since 1946, is depicted as the nation’s ‘protector of democracy’
(Thongchai 2008) and ‘pillar of stability’ (Stengs 2009: 232) in a politi-
cally turbulent and precarious society. Although, officially, the king/mon-
archy is ‘above politics’, Bhumibol has shown himself to be a strong
monarch, regularly intervening in politics. Since the second half of the
twentieth century, a process of sacralisation of kingship has taken place
that Thongchai has captured as ‘neo-royalism’ (2008) and later ‘hyper-
royalism’ (2014), an exalted idea of kingship that has its roots in Buddhist
perceptions of the king as a dhammaraja or ‘righteous ruler’. Such a king
is said to rule in accordance to the ‘Ten Kingly Virtues’: charity, morality,
self-sacrifice, rectitude, gentleness, self-restriction, non-anger, non-
violence, forbearance and non-obstruction (Dhani 1946: 95). In this ide-
ology, Bhumibol’s adherence to the Ten Kingly Virtues accounts for his
barami, a charismatic, moral authority with auspicious qualities.
In Thongchai’s perspective of neo-royalism, the king is perceived as
‘being sacred, popular and democratic’ (2008: 21). Crucial for this ideol-
ogy to take root has been the development of a ‘deification industry’
aimed at enhancing Bhumibol’s perceived barami. As various authors
have suggested (Bowie 1997; Gray 1986; Stengs 2009; Tambiah 1977;
Thongchai 2008, 2014), the deployment of royal rituals has been central
in promoting the monarchy. This reminds of Christel Lane’s work on
ritual in the Soviet-Union, where she draws attention to the significance
of rituals as tools of ‘conscious cultural management’ (1981: 45).
Following Lane, we can see how the Thai royal rituals are part of a larger
‘system of rituals’ and of ‘a sustained and general campaign’ (ibid.: 3),
aimed at enhancing and intensifying nationalist, royalist and Buddhist
values and norms, which all can be captured in the idea of a unanimous
veneration for the monarchy, and for Bhumibol in particular.
For one part, the royal ritual repertoire entails rituals in which the king
engages in religious, auspicious merit-making activities, such as con-
structing temples, donating robes to monks and the ‘seasonal changing of
the clothes of the Emerald Buddha’ in the main temple of the Grand
Palace complex. Some rituals are Buddhistified Hindu-Brahmin court
rituals with adaptations made by King Mongkut (Rama IV, r. 1851–1868).
270 I. Stengs
These ritual reformations did not, as argued by Tambiah, entail ‘dimin-

ishing of the brahmanical features (…) but of interpolating and adding
Buddhist sequences to them’ (1977: 227, italics in original). To a percep-
tion of the king as divine, Mongkut added that of the ideal Buddhist
monarch as the source of the kingdom’s prosperousness and well-being,
and defender and protector of the Sangha, the Thai brotherhood
of monks.
Another category of royal rituals, also firstly introduced by Mongkut,
does not resort to ancient court ritual, but is influenced by European
customs (Riggs 1966: 105). Such rituals, therefore, were regarded as ‘sec-
ular’ and, by implication, more modern, by the British and the French
colonial powers in particular. Such rituals involve, for instance, nation-
wide celebrations of the king’s birthday and coronation anniversaries.
These ‘modernizations’ were part of Mongkut’s strategy of countering
European allegations of ‘oriental despotism’, which otherwise might have
legitimized colonialist intervention (Gray 1986: 262–263). Celebrating
events in the life of the king truly was a novelty, since the Thai state so far
only had celebrated anniversaries of events in the life of the Buddha
(ibid.: 265).
The twentieth century saw the introduction of other ‘secular’ rituals,
celebrating the 1932 revolution (National Day), the first constitution
(Constitution Day), Labour’s Day and New Year. A significant change
and, with the wisdom of hindsight, an indication of what was to follow,
was the transfer of National Day from 24 June to 5 December, Bhumibol’s
birthday. Again, foreign pressure played an important role: The United
States, in its campaign against communism in Southeast Asia, supported
a strong royalism, countering any celebration of ‘left-wing’ revolutionary
triumph, among which the abolition of the absolute monarchy (Thongchai
2014: 84). Twenty years later, in 1980, National Day would become
Thailand’s Father’s Day; in 1976, the birthday of Queen Sirikit, presently
the queen-mother (12 August), had already been designated National
Mother’s Day. In short, Western ‘secular’ celebrations were converted
into nationalist royal celebrations.
Since then, Thailand has been celebrating the monarchy in a seemingly
ever-expanding number of ever-grander annual royal festive or commem-
orative days and jubilees. Bhumibol’s reign has been celebrated in Silver,
Golden and Diamond jubilees of both the king’s birthdays and number
of years on the throne. In addition, each ‘auspicious completion of a
twelve-year-cycle’ was celebrated with exceptional festive events, as was
for instance Bhumibol ‘breaking the record of the longest reign in Thai
history’ (in 1988). It would be virtually impossible to sum up all the spe-
cial occasions of the other members of the royal family that have been
celebrated over the years. Altogether, the Thai ‘system of royal rituals’
encompasses a vast and expanding spectrum of ritualized moments,
activities, places and events, varying from national holidays (royal birth-
days, royal jubilees), playing of the royal anthem4 (the preamble of films
in cinemas), daily royal news broadcasts, royal religious duties, and the
endless (re)production of royal statues, portraits, works of art and monu-
ments, to mention the system’s most important ritual components. The
conceptualisation, in terms of a system of rituals to be distinguished from
earlier Hindu-Brahmin and Theravada Buddhist forms of veneration of
kingship, is justified by the system’s everyday mass-mediated presence, in
combination with the expansion and standardization, both in textual and
visual forms, of the monarchy’s benefits for the nation, resulting from
Bhumibol’s righteousness and perseverance in particular. In terms of
royal ritual, the mourning period of an entire year dedicated to this king
has been the culminating episode.
The Sacredness of the Secular State

During the year of mourning, hardly any person would appear in public
without at least a tiny visible sign of mourning. T-shirts, cars, magazines,
lottery tickets and websites were decorated with black ribbons, black
wrist ties, images of the king, or the Thai figure 9 (referring to King Rama
4
The royal anthem (Sansoen Phra Barami) is not to be confused with the national anthem. The
royal anthem is played when members of royal family arrive or depart as well as in a selection of
designated contexts, such as before the start of a film or theatre performance. In cinemas, the
anthem is always accompanied by royal portraiture, for long mainly portraits of Bhumibol.
Bronwyn Isaacs observed an interesting change in the aesthetics of this cinematic portraiture, mak-
ing the king appear ‘less as a man and more as a spirit’. To capture this development, Isaacs intro-
duces the notion of ‘cinematic shrine’, see http://www.americananthropologist.org/2019/04/26/
media-circulation-of-images/.
272 I. Stengs
IX). In addition, countless kilometres of black and white mourning gar-

lands decorated the entrances, fences, walls and roofs of department
stores, railroad stations, government offices, schools, banks, shops, indus-
trial estates, petrol stations, markets and temples, together with myriads
of black-and-white versions of established portraits of the late king. Many
of these expressions of mourning were accompanied by the slogans, both
in Thai and English, ‘I was born in the reign of King Rama IX’ and ‘May
I be your humble servant under your feet in the eternal cycle of rebirth’5
(Fig. 13.4).
With the transition of (public) everyday life into a permanent emana-
tion of mourning, commemorative ritual had become predominant in
Fig. 13.4 Street art ‘we were born in the reign of King Rama 9’, Bangkok
July 2017
5
Another, not that literal, translation of this text is ‘I will forever be your humble subject/servant’.
So far, I have not found any official version for its translation. The intensive debates at the time
about the correctness and origin of the phrase is a topic of research in itself, but would lead to far
away from the central issues this chapter seeks to address.
Fig. 13.5 Building-to-let-advertisement-cum-mourning board, Chiang May

July 2017
public space (Fig. 13.5). It is my argument that for an understanding of

some of the ritual processes at work, and the ways these confirmed and
furthered the sacredness of the king, and by implication, as will be dem-
onstrated below, that of the nation, a focus is needed on the pivotal role
of the administrative state structure. Thailand’s present-day administra-
tive structure was established during the reign of King Chulalongkorn. In
a similar vein as the introduction of the first ‘secular royal rituals’ by
Mongkut, the transformation of the feudal Siamese polity into a modern
bureaucracy has to be placed in the context of the threat of high imperial-
ism, which for Siam coincided with the Fourth and Fifth Reigns
(Mongkut and Chulalongkorn). The intellectual architect of the king-
dom’s administrative reforms was Chulalongkorn’s brother, Prince
Damrong Rajanubhab (1862–1943), Minister of Interior from 1892 to
1915. According to the prince’s personal recollections ‘Chulalongkorn
274 I. Stengs
reminded Damrong of foreign threats to Siam at the time and thus

encouraged him to undertake the reform. If Siam did not quickly tidy up
its provincial administration but carelessly left it in such a mess, the
country would be in danger. Siam might lose its independence’
(Thongchai 1994: 145). The gist of the reforms, generally referred to as
the Chakri Reformation, was the centralization of control by the Bangkok
administration over such areas as finance, justice and education by grad-
ually displacing the local autonomy of tributaries and provinces. In fact,
the Bangkok rulers largely implemented the style of governing of neigh-
bouring colonial regimes, which made the centre actually a colonizing
power. Colonialism as an external pressure and as a regime model offered
the kingdom an opportunity to consolidate itself as an integrated
nation-state.
In the prevalent royalist-nationalist perspective, King Chulalongkorn
appears both as the saviour of Siamese independence and as the founding
father of the modern Thai nation state. Since the creation of the latter was
the voluntary act of this legitimate, virtuous king, the present Thai state
can only be good. In fact, the legitimacy of the modern secular state is
placed within the framework of a Theravada Buddhist cosmology, with
the virtuous, righteous ruler, the king, as its apex. Since his death on 23
October 1910, Chulalongkorn is annually commemorated in collective
ceremonies that follow the administrative state structure. On this day,
Chulalongkorn Day, another national day modelled after European cus-
tom, representatives of governmental (provincial, district, subdistrict and
village) and semi-governmental institutions (educational, railroads, bank-
ing and communication) of the modern state whose origins go back to
the Fifth Reign, will pay respect to this great, modernizing Thai king, to
express their gratitude to their founder (see Stengs 2009). The main ele-
ment of the ritual is the presentation of memorial wreaths at a statue or
portrait of the king. This annual wreath-laying ceremony is conducted
simultaneously in the entire country, at all provincial, and most district
and subdistrict administration centres.
Following the same organizational path, the sacredness of the Thai
state structure is celebrated in many other monarchy-related rituals. In
interpreting these rituals, I take my inspiration here from Clifford Geertz’s
(1980) classical work on the pre-colonial Balinese ‘theatre state’. Geertz
distinguishes two opposing forces in societies that are dictated by what he

calls ‘the myth of the exemplary centre’ (…) ‘the theory that the court-
and-capital is at once a microcosm of the supernatural order—“an image
of (…) the universe on a smaller scale”—and the material embodiment of
the political order. It is not just the nucleus, the engine or the pivot of the
state, it is the state’ (1980: 13). According to Geertz, the politics of such
states are governed by a centripetal force of exemplary state ritual and a
centrifugal force of state structure (ibid.: 18).
Though the limitations of Geertz’s entirely symbolic interpretation of
the meaning of royal rituals have been widely acknowledged, in particu-
lar his depiction of almost unrelated elite and commoners’ worlds, and a
‘too close parallel between the divine order and the politics of the people’
(Schulte Northolt 1993: 295), his perspective provides insight into the
ways present-day rituals that celebrate the Thai monarchy produce sacred-
ness. The rituals that form the further empirical content of this chapter
appear to follow Geertz’s two structural forces: a centripetal force draw-
ing people’s attention and bodies towards the moral centre and a centrifu-
gal force unfolding along the lines of the administrative state structure:
from the capital to provincial capitals and other provincial bodies, to the
district and sub-district, and finally, village levels.
There are good arguments to understand the Grand Palace-cum-
Bangkok in terms of an exemplary centre. During the year of mourning,
Bangkok’s sacred heart, the field (Sanam Luang) in front of the Grand
Palace and Temple of the Emerald Buddha complex, provided the centre
stage for large collective commemorations. At this location, we may
observe the centripetal force of Geertz’s exemplary centre at work. Fifteen
days after the king’s demise, the Grand Palace, where the king’s body was
lying in state in the Throne Hall, opened to the general public to enable
mourners to pay their respect to the royal remains, initially allowing in a
maximum of 10,000 people per day, but much, much higher numbers in
the last months before the cremation. The government facilitated travel-
ing to the capital by providing free special buses and trains for mourners.6
6
A colleague observed a social dynamic in which especially women in rural communities were
subject to a mild peer pressure to join their local groups in travelling to Bangkok. Such pressure to
go together also was the case for people in certain jobs, in particular in the civil service and larger
private companies.
276 I. Stengs
To protect people from the sun and rain during waiting, most of the
pedestrian area of the Sanam Luang had been transformed into a long
tent, with sections of about hundred chairs each and large fans for cool-
ing. Each section had its own screen hanging from the ceiling, showing a
wide variety of well-known footage on the life and works of Bhumibol.
The day I joined the ritual (7 July 2017), the time to be spent in the tent
was not too long: about forty-five minutes. Volunteers provided us with
bottles of water, cooled, perfumed wipes and banana cakes. Then, in a
strictly organized way—Bangkok Metropolitan Police officers giving
amplified instructions—our section and the one in front of us were
guided across the street that separates the Sanam Luang from the palace-
temple complex, to enter the latter. In the temple, we were guided along
a designated route following the roofed, muraled temple walls, which had
been closed to tourists for the purpose. Here, periods of waiting alter-
nated with moving forward at very high speed, almost running. The
atmosphere was one of good spirits. People where chatting, taking selfies
and occasionally close-ups of details of the murals (Fig. 13.6). The walk
across the open area between the temple and the Throne Hall, a space
with trees and palace buildings, definitively was a photo occasion. Upon
arrival in the vicinity of the Throne Hall, the sphere became quieter. We
were all given a plastic bag to put our shoes in. The adjacent walls and
fences were full of wreaths (phuangmala). There was no time to look at
these in detail and taking pictures was no longer allowed. An elaborate
shrine dedicated to Bhumibol had been established next to the entrance
to the narrow stairs leading up to the actual hall. The tribute ritual was
over before I knew it. In a highly efficient manner, in sections of about
sixty people, we prostrated ourselves with our faces in the direction of the
throne where the king’s coffin stood out of view, behind the throne. Then
we made a specific saluting gesture (thawai bangkhom), to leave immedi-
ately to an exit at the right side of the building, down the stairs into an
area where we could put on our shoes and return the plastic bags.
With the week of the cremation ceremonies approaching (the Grand
Palace would close on 7 October), the lengths of the queues broke record
upon record, in the end people lining up for twenty-four hours before
reaching the Throne Hall. In the final weeks, the palace even opened
24/7. By 6 October 2017, nearly thirteen million people had filed
Fig. 13.6 Queuing mourners in the Temple of the Emerald Buddha, Bangkok 7
July 2017
through the Throne Hall.7 The logistics of the endeavour had been
massive, comprising both security checks and checks for compliance with
all details of the dress code: black long skirts, long trousers, long sleeves
and black shoes. Together, the bodies in black transformed the heart of
the nation into an overwhelming spectacle of mourning. As such, this
7
Altogether, an exact number of 12,739,531 people, https://www.bangkokpost.com/thailand/
general/1337852/13m-people-paid-respects-to-late-king (accessed 25 September 2019). Yet, we
cannot jump to the conclusion that 18.4% of the total population joined in the farewell ritual. The
few people that I spoke while waiting in line to reach the throne hall where all there for the second
time. Take for example this elderly woman from Hat Yai (900 km South of Bangkok), whose three
adult children lived in Bangkok. We met at the charity food market next to the Sanam Luang, all
stalls run by volunteers. This was her second visit. Both times, she took the government-sponsored
train, arriving in Bangkok in the early morning, subsequently paying respect to the royal remains.
Before returning to Hat Yai she would stay two nights with her daughter. The colleague mentioned
in note 6 reported to have spoken people who had come for a third or even fourth time.
278 I. Stengs
spectacle reconfirmed the promoted national Thai self-image as well as

the romanticizing orientalist image of the country prevalent abroad.
Mourning by Numbers
The week following Bhumibol’s demise also saw the first performances of
a centrifugally evolving mourning ritual. Other than the above mass
gatherings, these rituals, broadcast every evening by local and national
news, remained visible to the Thai public only. The Thai expression for
these rituals best translates as ‘figure gatherings of all Thai citizens from
all over Thailand to form the figure 9 to express their feelings of loss’
(phasoknikon thuathai prae akson 9 sadaeng khwam alai). As such, the
rituals were to be understood as materializations of ‘the unique Thai qual-
ity of unity’, a notion also part of the royalist-nationalist ideology, and
the supposed precondition for the entire Thai population to engage in
these performances and hence a proper expression of Thainess (khwam
pen thai).
For the purpose of this chapter, I will use the shorthand ‘figure 9 ritual’
although in practice quite a few variations and elaborations existed in
addition to the shape of the figure 9, such as elephants, lotuses, hearts,
mourning ribbons and written messages. The gist of the ritual is that the
participants express their feelings of loss collectively by arranging their
joint black and/or white dressed bodies in the form of the Thai figure 9
(๙), while—depending on the design of the ritual—prostrating (krap)
themselves simultaneously. The latter gesture—a deep kneeling, with the
head over the hands pressed together (wai) just above the ground—was
abolished by Chulalongkorn, but made a comeback during Bhumibol’s
reign as the compulsory pose in presence of the king.
Carefully choreographed black-and-white patterned arrangements
established the intended aesthetics of the rituals performed during day-
time. After dark, figure 9 rituals were performed with burning candles.
Thus, to give an impression, the figure 9 ritual of the province of Rayong
consisted of a black heart within the centre the figure 9 in white, plus the
name of the province in capital letters in black, all of this ‘framed’ in
black. The people who made up the frame remained standing, while the
others prostrated. The figure 9 ritual of a school in Buriram province,

performed by teachers and students, also consisted of a heart, black out-
side, white inside, with a black 9 in the centre. In this case, the ritual was
performed with all participants standing.8
The figure 9 mourning rituals are an ‘invention’, yet, as is the case with
all ritual, they have predecessors (see Hobsbawm and Ranger 1983). They
are specific elaborations of the mass gatherings and stadium rituals the
world knows best from North Korean Mass Games or Olympic Games
opening ceremonies. They are also reminiscent of Soviet Union parades
and political rallies in Nazi Germany as recorded by Leni Riefenstahl.
Although no comparison in grandeur, in the Thai context the Thammasat–
Chulalongkorn universities football matches have a long-standing ‘new’
tradition of figure-expressing stadium performances.9 But specifically for
the figure 9 rituals, two events possibly offered a template. In 2015, then
Crown Prince Vajiralongkorn took the initiative for two cycling events: the
‘Bike for Mom’ (Sirikit, the queen-mother) and ‘Bike for Dad’ (Bhumibol).
These national bike rides also entailed some performances of figure rituals
(phrae akson) including the figure 9, albeit in different colours.10 The colour
code of the Bike for Mom ride was sky blue, the colour of the Queen and
related to Friday, the day of the week that she was born; the colour code for
the Bike for Dad ride was yellow, the colour of the king, and related to
Monday, the day of the week Bhumibol was born. In some places, these
rides included a halt to perform the figure 9, with the participants (mostly
men) bowing their bodies while remaining on their bikes.11
8
https://campus.campus-star.com/variety/22697.html (accessed 25 September 2019)
9
See https://www.matichonweekly.com/hot-news/article_79945 (accessed 25 September 2019).
10
Yet, who or what organization took the first initiative is unclear, as well as whether the figure 9
mourning rituals directly resulted from governmental instructions. After Bhumibol’s death, a cre-
mation committee (khanakam kanamnuaikanjatngan phrarachaphithi thawaiphraphleungphraboro-
masob) was established under the responsibility of the Ministry of Interior. This committee, chaired
by the Head of the Royal Household, was in charge of the organisation of the cremation celebra-
tions (25–29 October 2017) and of the mourning policy. Although in particular the Ministry of
Interior and the Ministry of Agriculture have been important with regard to disseminating instruc-
tions to the general public, the creative minds behind the mourning period policy so far have
remained untraceable.
11
See for example https://www.posttoday.com/social/local/404500 for a ‘9 in heart’ figure ritual
https://mgronline.com/local/detail/9580000135671, https://www.thairath.co.th/content/54735
‘for Dad’, and http://www.komchadluek.net/news/politic/211658 ‘for Mom’. Websites accessed 25
April 2019.
280 I. Stengs
Significantly, the aesthetic effect of such configurations can only be

fully appreciated from a bird-eye view. This implies that in order to make
these rituals realize their full potential—that is, to make them visible to
their performers and to the wider world a specific technology was
required: camera drones. More than providing bird’s-eye recordings of
rituals, I suggest that this drone technology is as much part of the making
of figure 9 rituals as are the bodies of the performers. The drone record-
ings are spectacular mediations of the idea of each individual organisa-
tional unit being united in love for the king and sorrow about his demise.
For one part, these visualisations are spectacles visible from heaven for a
so-called ‘presumed (divine) spectator’, comparable for instance to the
Nazca lines. For another part, the recordings enabled showing these ritu-
als on national and local television channels, and viewing them time and
again on YouTube and on other social media, as to give substance to and
proof of the unanimity of the Thai people and their willingness to go at
far length to give proof of their grief. In the first months of mourning, the
television evening news would have a special item on the figure 9 rituals
conducted that day or the previous evening, usually presented as a
sequence (literally a ‘collection’, pramuanphab) of stills and video record-
ings accompanied by music (Fig. 13.7).
Fig. 13.7 Screen shot of a figure 9 rituals compilation

Each ritual was performed by the members of an existing collective, in

particular government officials of provincial capitals or (sub)district
offices, military divisions, employees of hospitals, universities, banks,
broadcast organisations, larger companies, students and schoolchildren
of schools and colleges, and even the inmates of certain prisons. Sports
fields, city squares, military training grounds, meadows, highways,
beaches and schoolyards were the kind of open spaces where the rituals
were performed. Some performances required considerable amounts of
space, indeed. In particular, the rituals organized by larger cities or pro-
vincial administrations could involve tens of thousands of people.
The figure 9 rituals well illustrate the importance of the element of
competition in fleshing out the processes that accelerate and magnify the
Thai mourning rituals. The last months of 2016 saw ever-larger numbers
of participants in ever more complex aesthetics. The daily news coverages
would always, after mentioning the province, town or organisation that
had conducted the ritual, tell the numbers of people involved, for
instance, 30,000 people in the city of Nakhon Ratchasima, or 9999 (an
auspicious number) participants in the province of Phayao. Although a
heart with the figure 9 in the centre was one of the more common figure
9 rituals, the executions could vary widely in size and complexity. The
extraordinary bird’s eye view recording of the figure 9 ritual of ‘the people
of subdistrict Nakhon Thai’ showed a sophisticated choreography of the
creation of a heart with the figure 9, by streams of bodies in black and
streams of bodies in white at perfect pace and ending up in perfect ranks.
The whole configuration was underlined with bodies forming the text
‘King of Kings’ (in English) and the name of the subdistrict in Thai.12
The province of Surin performed a complex design of two mirroring ele-
phants, with their trunks ‘raising’ a heart with the figure 9 in it, every-
thing in black with white outlines and details, the audience at the left in
white and at the right in black. In addition to a rather straightforward
white-lined black circle with a white figure 9 in it, the figure 9 ritual of
the province of Nakhon Sawan comprised a very sophisticated Chinese-
style, rampant, dragon.13 After 2016, performing figure 9 rituals came to
12
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QGig5-YT9TA (accessed 26 September 2019).
13
http://mediastudio.co.th/2016/10/27/64621 (accessed 26 September 2019).
282 I. Stengs
an end. Instead, other ritualized activities, similarly organized along the

lines of the administrative state structure, had been initiated to engage
the citizenry more structurally in the year of mourning and to ensure
their interest and involvement in the eventual cremation.14
Conclusion
This chapter has demonstrated that the massive compliance with the
mourning colour and dress code was much more than a self-evident, ritu-
alized way of expressing sorrow, gratitude and respect towards the Thai
king. Instead, the colour code was part of a carefully designed mourning
policy (‘cultural management’), entailing a broad range of aesthetic prac-
tices, materialising in public space through bodies, art, (social) media,
decorations and ritualized settings. The figure 9 rituals illustrate well the
remarkable forms such a policy is able to evoke and the powerful emo-
tional effect of the ‘mourning-coloured’ body: each black-and-white cho-
reography aimed at mediating a unanimous and forceful message of grief
and unity. With potentially the entire nation watching, such invites elab-
oration and perfection to the extent of competition. The exalted moral
and legal frameworks exercised a coercive force that further added to the
competitive dimension in the performance of mourning.
Finally, the year of mourning has highlighted the pivotal role of ritual
in generating emotions and feelings of belonging towards the king and
the nation. Whether of ‘religious’ or ‘secular’ origin, together these rituals
make up the ‘system of royal rituals’, disseminated and produced by the
‘secular’ administrative state structure. The Thai state therefore is key to
understanding the king’s apparently endless increase in sacredness. In the
Thai polity, the secular and the sacred never have been separated domains,
irrespective of the establishment of institutions generally regarded as sec-
ular, the constitutional monarchy and the administrative state system in
particular. Twenty-first century Thailand therefore is ever more moving
14
These initiatives entailed: sandalwood funeral flower making, registering as a volunteer, and the
growing of marigolds (yellow being the color of Bhumibol). Again, we may speak of ‘a mourning
by numbers’: the element of competition encouraged organizations and people to set substantial
targets in making sandalwood flowers and growing marigolds (see Stengs 2020 f.c.).
towards an inextricably intertwined secular-sacred of king, nation and

state. The sacredness of the king creates a culture of compliance, in which
criticizing the state, the nation, the military regime or any government
always implies criticizing the king. In light of the worrying recent politi-
cal developments, a better understanding of these entanglements is of
particular urgency.
References
Bowie, K. (1997). Rituals of National Loyalty. An Anthropology of the State and the
Village Scout Movement in Thailand. New York: Colombia University Press.
Dhani, N. (1946). The Old Siamese Conception of the Monarchy. Journal of the
Siam Society, 36(2), 91–106.
Geertz, C. (1980). Negara. The Theatre State in Nineteenth-century Bali.
Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
Gray, C. (1986). Thailand: The Soteriological State in the 1970s. PhD disserta-
tion, University of Chicago.
Haberkorn, T. (2016). A Hyper-Royalist Parapolitics in Thailand. Bijdragen tot
de Taal-, Land- en Volkenkunde, 172(2/3), 225–248.
Hobsbawm, E., & Ranger, T. (Eds.). (1983). The Invention of Tradition.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Isaacs, B. (2019) Husbands, Lovers, Gods; Unrequited Images in Thai Media.
Multimodal section on the American Anthropologist website, April 2019.
Lane, C. (1981). The Rites of Rulers. Ritual in Industrial Society – the Soviet Case.
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Riggs, F. W. (1966). Thailand. The Modernization of a Bureaucratic Polity.
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284 I. Stengs
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and Polity in Thailand against a Historical Background. London: Cambridge
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Thongchai, W. (1994). Siam Mapped. A History of the Geo-body of a Nation.
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(Ed.), ‘Good Coup’ Gone Bad. Thailand’s Political Development Since Thaksin’s
Downfall (pp. 79–108). Singapore: ISEAS Publishing.
Afterword
Birgit Meyer
The state of our world in 2020 is a far cry from the high expectations of
modernity that arose in the aftermath of fascism, decolonization and the
Fall of the Berlin Wall. As the social sciences and humanities emerged
along with—and were shaped by—the unfolding of the modernist proj-
ect, their theories, concepts and methods are inflected with it. How to
come to terms—epistemologically, politically and ethically—with the
ugly, irrational and uncivilized faces of current politics of inclusion and
exclusion, in which nativist culture and identity are mobilized for the
sake of political agendas that violate the rights of citizens and refugees
guaranteed by democratic constitutions? And in so doing, how to recon-
figure the social sciences and humanities from a critical, non-eurocentric
and postcolonial angle that, moreover, does not downplay bodies, things
and emotions in favor of abstraction and rationality? Such questions trig-
ger critical reflections about how to analyze culture and society in our
time, in ways that acknowledge continuities from antiquity and the
B. Meyer
Utrecht University, Utrecht, The Netherlands
e-mail: b.meyer@uu.nl

and Citizenship Series, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-38050-2
286 Afterword
middle ages to modernity (rather that postulating sharp breaks) and simi-
larities between Western and non-Western cultures and societies (rather
than postulating sharp differences between a developed ‘West’ and a
backward ‘Rest’).
Calling attention to the arousal of emotions in political settings in
which ‘sacrality and secularity mutually inform, enforce and spill over into
each other’ (Balkenhol, Hemel, Stengs, this volume p. 1), this volume is
part of this critical endeavor. All contributors form part of a longstanding,
international network for scholarly exchange and public activities in which
the Meertens Institute, the home base of the three editors, forms an
important node and hospitable forum. Concomitantly, for Markus
Balkenhol, Ernst van den Hemel and Irene Stengs this network is impor-
tant in redirecting the focus of the institute from ‘Dutch (folk) culture’ to
‘culture in the Netherlands,’ against a broader global horizon that allows
for comparison and the tracing of transregional connections. The volume’s
grounded case studies place societies in Europe, Africa, Asia and Latin
America in one conceptual frame, thereby showing how ‘the perils of
nation and religion’ play out across the world. The rise of populist identi-
tarian movements with their highly exclusivist, discriminating and racist
agendas across Europe reminds us that modern democracy both facilitates
and is threatened by such perils. There is little reason to maintain an idea
of Europe as the global vanguard of modernization, democracy and well-
being. The point is to conduct research and theorize from ‘the middle of
things’ as proposed by this volume, which combines featuring a frighten-
ing parade of the ugly, unsettling side of the dynamics of belonging and
exclusion in modern nation-states with plastic critical analysis.
The anchor-point for this analysis is the notion of the ‘secular sacred.’
The coinage of this notion is grounded in the insight, as developed by
Talal Asad and Saba Mahmood, that secularity is not religion’s opposite.
Such a take on religion would merely reiterate the master narrative of
modernization, according to which religion was bound to vanish or at
least withdraw from the public into the private sphere. The starting point
for a critical approach to modernity is the recognition that secularity is
not only the frame for regulating the role and place of religions in society
but is also shaped by, and yet concealing, its Christian foundations. The
editors introduce the ‘secular sacred’ composite as a conceptual and
Afterword 287
methodological device to spot unexpected and partly hidden links

between secular and religious in contemporary nation-states.
In so doing, they make the secular-religious binary intersect with the
profane-sacred binary. The latter is grounded in the work of Durkheim,
who advocated a non-substantive, sociological understanding of the
sacred, according to which anything could be sacralized and thus made to
enshrine common representations and values that arouse sentiments of
effervescence, thereby affirming the bonds of those experiencing these
sentiments. The attraction of Durkheim’s binary is that it allows the
expansion of the notion of the sacred beyond the narrow confines of what
is conventionally recognized as religion (e.g. Chidester 2012). By the
same token, this notion of the sacred blinds attention to the specific ways
in which secularity produces and regulates religion. Combining the two
sets of binaries, however, felicitously opens up new possibilities for
thought. Next to the ‘secular sacred,’ the central focus of this volume,
other possible combinations are the ‘religious sacred,’ the ‘secular pro-
fane’ and the ‘religious profane.’ If we add the pure-polluted binary (as
mobilized in Verrips’s chapter), even more heuristic possibilities for anal-
ysis open up that allow the taking into account of the positive and nega-
tive dimensions of sacrality.
As this volume shows, the notion of the ‘secular sacred’ indicates some
kind of canalization and cannibalization of ‘belief energy’ (Certeau 1984:
187) into the sphere of politics. This idea is also deployed in the literature
on political theologies (e.g. Vries and Sullivan 2006) which, somewhat to
my surprise, is not discussed in the context of the volume. Clearly, many
of the contributions show in a detailed manner how in the face of a pre-
sumed ‘enemy’ political power taps into—or even ‘hijacks’ (Marzouki
et al. 2016)—religious cosmologies and affective repertoires, or engages
in new modes of sacralization steeped in religious emotions and wow-
effects. Thereby they are echoing Carl Schmitt’s (2005, orig. 1922) point
that modern political concepts are secularized theological concepts, and
that sovereignty means the right to declare a ‘state of exception’ and cur-
tail the rights of those considered to not belong. For future research, it
would be interesting to explore in detail how theories of political theol-
ogy align with, and possibly differ from, the notion of the ‘secular sacred’
proposed by this volume, and possibly the other related binaries
288 Afterword
mentioned above. A salient convergence, in my view, forms the impor-

tance of resilient religious forms, that are not easy to identify from a
modernist perspective and instead require detailed genealogical tracing
grounded in knowledge of theology and the history of religion (as pro-
posed by Yelle 2019). What I find particularly compelling and distinctive
about this volume is that many contributions situate the embracement of
political theologies under the aegis of the ‘secular sacred’ in plural con-
figurations, in which people with different cultural, religious and ethnic
identities co-exist. It seems that the marked mobilization of a ‘secular
sacred’—on the part of the state, nationalist movements, or contestations
thereof—gains momentum in moments of political precariousness, and a
shared sense of instability and insecurity.
Looking across the chapters, it can be noticed that the ‘secular sacred’
appears in different modalities. Let me distinguish four. One, it appears
that secularity can easily be fused with a privileged religious tradition into a
nationalistic project, as in the case of Dutch right wing populism and
nativism where Christianity is embraced as part of national culture
(Hemel, Kešić & Duyvendak), the appraisal of Hinduism as part of
Indian secularism at the expense of Islam and other religions (Binder),
the privileging of Sunni Islam in North-Nigerian secularism and the vio-
lent rejection of Shia public performances (Ibrahim), or the—ever more
contested—idea of Brazil as a secular country with a Catholic national
culture and Afro-Brazilian undercurrents (Oosterbaan and Godoy). In all
these settings, we encounter an appraisal of a particular religion as con-
ducive to nationhood and identity, while at the same time members of
other religious groups are discriminated against or even persecuted.
Clearly, nationhood does not simply come in as a secular substitute for
religion; it may be made to embrace and privilege a particular religion,
albeit in a more or less culturalized form, while rejecting others. Such
embracement, of course, triggers contestations. As Oosterbaan and
Godoy show in their study of the contestations around carnaval, evan-
gelicals re-religionize this festival in their own terms, thereby striving to
shift the Brazilian national-religious configuration in their favor.
Second, the volume shows how sacralization plays a key role in dynamics
of Othering, as in the populist idea of a German Leitkultur to which Islam
and Muslims are irredeemably foreign (Götz), or the dismissal of ‘gypsies’
Afterword 289
and ‘Arabs’ as ‘shit’ in public space in Berlin (Verrips). While Götz focuses
on the sacralization of a secular German nationhood that fiercely rejects
Islam as an instance of ‘bad’ religion, Verrips points at the peculiar sacral-
ity of the despised Other—an echo of longstanding sacrificial traits in
secular times.
Third, one can note a sacralization of secular values and history. This
may occur in the face of postcolonial criticisms, as in the sacralization of
the figure of Black Peet (Stipriaan) or contested statues of Jan Pieterszoon
Coen and colonial history (Balkenhol) in the Netherlands. In both cases,
sacralization is to protect items of national pride and heritage against
removal, going along with a repressive use of proverbial Dutch tolerance
to which protestors are expected to succumb. But such a sacralization
may also pertain to the valuation of human rights and heritage in hyper-
secular socialist settings, in which this valuation offers possibilities for
religious resilience, albeit in culturalized form, as shown in Salemink’s
analysis of the reframing of spirit possession rituals in Vietnam as cultural
heritage and a matter of human rights.
Fourth, and lastly, Irene Stengs’s analysis of Thai divine kingship in
modern times appears to make the secular-sacred implode, in that nation-
alist royal celebrations incorporate more and more Western cultural
forms, and aims to envelop people in a claustrophobic manner into the
production of sacredness of the monarchy, as epitomized in mourning
rituals.
Striking in these modalities of appearance of the ‘secular sacred’ is the
mobilization of emotions and affective energies. As Herman Roodenburg
shows in detail in his examination of Rothko’s secular sacred chapel of
art, the sphere of art has long featured a site in which belief energies, and
Christian modes and experiences of looking, are brought to bear on expe-
riences of an artistic sublime. Interestingly, such evocation of affects and
emotions also occurs in the context of the various modalities of the ‘secu-
lar sacred’ in political contexts. The question how to grasp the systematic
arousal of affects and emotions—and the profiling of grandiose feelings
of belonging to a certain body, such as the nation—has become a major
issue in social-cultural research. This becomes more pertinent in plural
configurations, which are prone to trigger tensions and clashes between
sensibilities and emotions that are grounded in different sensational
290 Afterword
regimes and aesthetic formations (e.g. Meyer 2018). In my view, the

analysis of big and hot feelings generated through an involvement with a
‘secular sacred’ requires a ‘cool’ analysis which details meticulously how
they emerge, and how they may be grounded in (past) religious sensa-
tional regimes or generated in new modes of sacralization that tap into
longstanding belief energies. While both the nation and religion do not
form perils per se, this volume shows that under the aegis of a ‘secular
sacred’ they may form rather toxic combinations, that, though difficult to
unhinge, must be traced and deconstructed via a genealogical and praxe-
ological approach.
References
Chidester, D. (2012). Wild Religion: Tracking the Sacred in South Africa. Berkeley,
CA: University of California Press.
Certeau, M. de (1984). The Practice of Everyday Life. Berkeley, CA: University of
California Press.
Vries, H. de, & Sullivan, L. E. (Eds.). (2006). Political Theologies. Public Religions
in a Post-Secular World. New York: Fordham University Press.
Marzouki, N., McDonnell, D., & Roy, O. (Eds.). (2016). Saving the People:
How Populists Hijack Religion. London: Hurst.
Meyer, B. (2018). The Dynamics of Taking Offense. Concluding Thoughts
and Outlook. In B. Meyer, C. Kruse, & A. Korte (Eds.), Taking Offense.
Religion, Art and Visual Culture in Plural Settings (pp. 340–372). München:
Fink Verlag. https://www.fink.de/fileadmin/downloads/fink/13_Birgit_
Meyer.pdf.
Schmitt, C. (2005). [orig. 1922]. Political Theology: Four Chapters on the Concept
of Sovereignty. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
Yelle, R. A. (2019). Sovereignty and the Sacred: Secularism and the Political
Economy of Religion. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
Index1
A B
Abolition (of slavery), 180 Backward, backwardness, 164
Aesthetic, 15, 58, 69–85, 95, 134, Bayle, Pierre, 177
278, 280–282, 290 Belonging, 4, 80
Affective, 70, 82 Belting, Hans, 13, 219, 220, 226
Afro-/Black, 119 Berlin, 4, 15, 54n11, 62, 238–249,
Afro-Brazilian, 108–112, 114, 115, 238n1, 251, 253, 254
117–123, 288 Bible Belt, 24, 24n6, 29, 34,
Andachtsbilder, 224, 225, 231 38, 251n12
Ashura, 4, 78, 79, 90, 91, Bildakt, 220, 224n3
93–101, 103 Blackface, 174, 179–188, 203
Assimilation/assimilate/ Blasphemy, 13
assimilationist, 50, 55, 56, 61, Body/bodies, 7, 8, 11, 13–15,
167–169, 174, 174n2, 181, 75–78, 80, 83, 91, 99, 101,
183, 188 134, 214, 220, 222, 228, 229,
Authentic/authentication, 50, 59, 275, 277–282
97, 114, 137, 144, 145, 209 Boundaries, 2, 7, 12, 13, 70, 72, 95,
Authority, 3, 4, 98, 131, 148, 104, 185, 212, 247, 249
211, 269 Bouts, Dieric, 224
Note: Page numbers followed by ‘n’ refer to notes.

1

and Citizenship Series, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-38050-2
292 Index
Brando, Marlon, 222 Confessional politics, 21–39

Bredekamp, Horst, 220, 227 Constable, John, 227
Busch, Werner, 227, 228 Cultural Christianity, 157–160, 162,
163, 166, 170
Culturalization, 1, 9, 54, 137
C Culture, 8–11, 22, 25–29, 31–35,
Caribbean/Antilles/Curaçao, 180, 37–39, 43n1, 44, 49, 54, 57,
180n11, 180n12, 181, 183, 60–62, 69–72, 75, 78–80,
184, 184n16, 203 108–111, 111n2, 113,
Catholic, 23, 79, 107–111, 118–122, 137, 138, 141, 155,
115–122, 134, 165, 177, 184, 158, 160, 164, 167, 168, 175,
205n13, 222, 288 178, 179, 184, 185, 187, 188,
Catholic Church, 107, 109, 253, 283
115–119, 116n5, 121–123,
131n2, 217
chapel, 217, 218, 220, 222, 230, D
231, 289 De Menil, Dominique, 217
Christians, 30 De Menil, John, 217, 218
Cicero, 220 De Niro, Robert, 222
Cinema, 75, 76, 82, 83, 271 Dehumanization, 245, 259
Citizenship, 80 Depoliticization, 71
dual, 10, 43, 44, 46–51, 54, 55, Discourse, 10, 12, 21, 22, 26–30,
59, 60, 62, 168 32, 33, 37, 38, 54, 56, 57, 59,
See also Movie/film 71, 78–82, 102, 129–131,
Collective identity, 70, 71 150, 155–158, 160, 162, 169,
Colonial/colonialism/colonization, 4, 170, 174, 174n2, 182,
8, 13, 70, 71, 117, 135, 154, 183, 185
166, 180, 183, 185, 188, 190, Disgust, 4, 13, 15, 210, 237–259
195–214, 270, 274, 289 Displacement, 169
Commemoration/commemorate, 2, Drone, 280
23n3, 75, 77, 79, 93, 98, 199, Dutch, 12
274, 275
Commodification, 70, 72
Communalism, 70–73, 79, 81 E
Community, 4, 9–11, 14, 24, 29, 47, Eckhart, Meister, 221
58, 69n1, 70, 72–74, 76, El Greco, 227
78–81, 90, 94n4, 95, 96n5, Elkins, James, 217, 219–222, 224,
108, 112, 115, 130, 138, 139, 230, 231
167, 168, 181, 198, 213, 275n6 Emotions, 1
Index 293
Enargeia, 217–231 national, 162, 164, 165

Enlightenment, 132n3, 159–161, Horace, 222
179, 179n10, 246n6 Huntington, Samuel, 9, 26, 161
Erasmus, 176
Essentialist/essentialised, 57,
182, 185 I
Evangelicals Neo-Pentecostal, 113 Identity, 4, 9, 11, 22, 27, 31,
Exclusion/exclude, 6, 7, 46, 47, 84, 34–38, 45, 46, 49–52,
101, 169, 170, 177, 177n8, 58–60, 63, 70–73, 77, 79,
181, 183, 188, 211, 254, 286 80, 82, 84, 85, 92, 95, 100,
102, 109, 117, 134, 137,
155–170, 174, 175, 182,
G 185, 198, 285, 288
Geertz, Clifford, 274, 275 collective, 70, 71
Gender, 79, 134, 157–160, 162, politics, 160–162, 165, 168,
165, 168, 170 169, 185
Golden Age, 13, 175, 178, 189 Image, 5, 7, 8, 10, 13–15, 21, 25,
Gregory the Great, 224 35, 61, 77, 81, 82, 94, 95,
Gypsies, 237, 239–241, 239n2, 108, 110, 111, 116, 118, 156,
243n3, 246, 246–247n6, 158, 174n2, 189n24, 195,
250n9, 251, 253–256, 198, 202, 206, 208, 210,
253n18, 255n20, 258, 212–214, 220, 222–224,
258n23, 288 224n3, 227, 254, 264, 267,
271, 275, 278
India, 11
H Integration/integrating, 26,
Heritage, 9, 26, 27, 61, 108, 109, 36, 45, 50–52, 55–57,
117, 119, 129–150, 161, 190, 78, 168, 169, 174,
208, 289 174n2, 175, 179,
Hindu nationalism/Hindutva, 70, 183, 245
72, 82, 84 Islam/Muslim, 4, 11, 21–23,
History, 12, 13, 24n6, 28, 34, 35, 25–39, 43, 43n1, 45–47,
70, 73, 78, 79, 108, 111, 56, 57, 60, 69–85,
118, 119, 123, 132, 146, 90–100, 92n3, 94n4,
149, 157, 161–165, 168, 102, 103, 130, 155–160,
170, 174, 176, 186n18, 162, 164, 165, 167–170,
188, 197, 205–209, 212, 183, 187, 189, 189n24,
222, 231, 237–249, 271, 254, 288, 289
288, 289 Islamophobia, 21, 25, 156
294 Index
J Modernity, 8, 11, 70, 80, 131, 132,

Jan Pieterszoon Coen, 13, 157, 161, 189, 197, 213,
195–214, 289 285, 286
Jew, 43n1, 176, 177, 244, 247n6, Mondrian, Pieter, 219
250n9, 255, 256 Moral, 79
Judeo-Christian, 4, 5, 9, 22, 26–28, Motherwell, Robert, 221
159, 161 Mourning, 2–5, 11, 15, 74,
77, 78, 81, 98,
103, 263–283
K See also Ritual
Knowledge, 80 Movie/film, 70, 74–78, 82–84,
Kooning, Willem de, 221 271, 271n4
Muharram, 77–79, 90, 93, 94, 94n4
Multiculturalism, 174, 178,
L 179, 189
Léger, Fernand, 218 Museum, 195, 202, 212
Leitkultur, 25, 37–38, 43n1, 288
Lese-majesty, 264
N
Nation/Nationalism, 4, 5, 7, 8, 11,
M 23, 25, 31, 44, 45n2, 46,
Majoritarian/majoritarianism, 49–52, 49n7, 57–63, 69, 70,
69–73, 73n2, 82–84 72, 73, 78, 80, 82, 84, 104,
Matisse, Henri, 218, 222 109, 111n2, 116, 117, 122,
Media, 3, 10, 11, 48, 52, 57, 59, 72, 123, 156–159, 161, 167, 169,
80–82, 100n6, 112, 113, 121, 175, 185, 186, 198, 198n3,
146, 148, 166 201, 213, 254, 258, 264, 267,
Memory, 45, 46, 61, 271, 273, 274, 277, 282, 283,
197–199, 207–209 286, 289, 290
Memory politics, 203 post-secular nationalism, 156n3
Meyer, Birgit, 5, 8, 10, 14, 15, 95, Nationality, 49, 180–182
208, 209, 219, 290 Nation-building, 44, 46, 55,
Migrants, 44, 45, 48, 49, 159, 198n3, 199
167, 168, 176, 184, Nationhood, 44, 45, 47, 49, 50,
184n16, 187 158, 288, 289
Minority, 31, 69–85, 103, 104, Nativism, 22n2, 155–170, 288
156, 158, 165, 167, 184, Natura naturans, 228, 229
185, 188 Newman, Barnett, 221
minoritization, 71, 79 Nostalgia, 81
Index 295
O Representation, 5, 24, 77–82, 95,

Offence/offensive/offended, 70, 109, 111, 117–120, 122, 123,
75–77, 84, 121, 264 197, 203, 208, 211, 213, 246,
Os, Henk van, 221 254, 256, 287
Rhetoric
affective, 223, 226, 228
P pictorial, 226, 230
Parades, 59, 90, 92, 94, 185, Rhetorica ad Herennium, 220, 226
279, 286 Rio de Janeiro, 111–113, 113n3,
Personhood, 71, 72, 77 120, 121
pictorial, 219, 226, 227, 230, 231 Ritual, 81
Piety, affective, 224, 226 ceremony/ceremonies, 274, 279
Pillarization/pillarized, 163, mourning, 2, 4, 5, 74, 103, 267,
178, 187–189 268, 278, 279, 279n10, 281
Pluriform, 3, 23 Rothko, Mark (chapel), 7, 14,
Pollock, Jackson, 221 217–231, 289
Populism, 63
Populist Radical Right, 21–39
Post-colonial, 179, 182, 183, S
186, 190 Sacredness, 3, 4, 6, 13, 213, 256,
Protestant, 6, 10, 11, 22, 23, 31–33, 271–278, 282, 283, 289
38, 164, 168, 184, São Paulo, 107, 112, 113, 115–117
222, 252n15 Secularism, 6, 8, 14, 61, 69–72,
Public procession, 93–95, 79, 97, 103, 104, 130–133,
98–102, 104 156, 160, 162, 167,
Public space, 7, 8, 10–11, 15, 51, 189, 288
89–104, 111, 214, 237, 251, Segregation, 177, 178, 181–183,
259, 265, 273, 282, 289 187n23, 188
Public visibility, 100, 104 Sensational, 80
Sentiment, 4, 9, 10, 15, 28, 43–63,
69–85, 95, 97, 254, 287
Q national, 43–63
Quintilian, 220 Sexuality, 157–160, 162, 165, 170
Shia, 4, 11, 69, 69n1, 70, 73–85,
89–104, 288
R Shit, 237, 240, 247, 250–253, 257,
Racism/racist/race, 9, 49n7, 51, 258, 289
107–123, 173, 174, 185–187, Short skirts, 33–37, 39, 173
190, 199, 286 Sinterklaas/Saint Nicholas,
Rembrandt, 219, 223, 227, 228, 230 185, 187
296 Index
Slave/slavery/enslaved, 13, 118, 119, T

179–181, 180n11, 185, 187, Tears, 2, 7, 14, 78, 217–231
203, 205, 213 Thailand, 2
abolition of, 180 Titian, 219, 223, 227–229
Spectacle, 280 Tolerance, 1, 5, 8, 11–13, 33, 39,
Staatkundig Gereformeerde Partij 79, 157, 161–164,
(SGP), 21, 23–25, 28–35, 173–190, 289
31n13, 37–39
State, 3
Statue, 4, 13, 109, 111, 115, 116, V
118, 195–214, 252, 271, Vietnam, 12
274, 289 Visibility, 11, 43n1, 69–85, 91,
Strasberg, Lee, 222 98–104, 132
Sunni, 73, 76, 78–80, 90,
91, 92n3, 95,
98–103, 288 W
Superstition, 146 Weyden, van der, 225
Superstitious, 80
Suriname, 180, 180n11, 180n12,
181, 183, 184, 203, Z
203n10, 205n13 Zwarte Piet/Black Pete, 174,
Symbolism, 83, 84, 98, 250n10 185–188, 187n23, 190, 203

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PALGRAVE POLITICS OF

IDENTITY AND CITIZENSHIP

The Secular Sacred

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The Secular Sacred

Palgrave Politics of Identity and Citizenship Series

Cover illustration: © Irene Stengs

1 Introduction: Emotional Entanglements of Sacrality and

2 The Boomerang-Effect of Culturalized Religion: The

3 ‘We’ and ‘The Others’ as Constituents of Symbolic

Part II Public Space 67

4 Religion, Aesthetics, and Hurt Sentiment: On the

5 Spatial Piety: Shia Religious Processions and the Politics

6 Samba Struggles: Carnaval Parades, Race and Religious

7 Homo Sanctus: Religious Contestations and the

8 Secularist Nativism: National Identity and the Religious

9 Dutch Tolerance in Black and White: From Religious

10 Colonial Heritage and the Sacred: Contesting the Statue

11 Rooted in the Sacred? On Mark Rothko, Tears Flowing,

12 Disgust and Difference: Conflicting Sensations of the

13 United in Competitive Mourning: Commemorative

Markus Balkenhol Meertens Institute, Amsterdam, The Netherlands

Irene Stengs Meertens Institute, Amsterdam, The Netherlands

Fig. 10.2 Empty pedestal of the Coen statue, 2011. © Vereniging

How, in various places across the world, do religious emotions and

M. Balkenhol • E. van den Hemel

© The Author(s) 2020 1

wary to use categories of religion and secular as neutral descriptive terms.

The Thai King as Secular and Sacred

August 2019, that the Thai king is above the constitution.

(Cavanaugh 2011), this book is inspired both by recent developments in

The Secular Sacred: A Praxeological Approach

losing or at least transforming their sacredness in the process. Inversely,

(…) is neither continuous with the religious that supposedly preceded it

Instead of the opposite of religion, Asad understands the secular to be

As much of recent scholarship suggests, contrary to the ideological self-­

In Mahmood’s understanding, to portray secularism as opposed to

artworks all directly draw from or resonate with explicit registers of

Sections of this Book

For Huntington, secularity is part and parcel of a Western, cultural

of rather vague or even deliberately empty signifiers that invite people to

tolerance knows no political party: it is what liberals and leftists reproach a

What originated as a theological and philosophical debate about free-

contested. At stake here is the modern subject whose supposed secularism

Asad, T. (2003). Formations of the Secular: Christianity, Islam, Modernity.

 etting the Scene: ‘Is Islam a Threat

E. van den Hemel (*)

© The Author(s) 2020 21

public associations the poster created. Faced with nation-wide backlash,

 onfessional Politics: The SGP on the Outside

Netherlands as one of the most secularized countries on earth. The image

 he Rise of the Populist Radical Right

The perhaps most well-known example of this mode of thinking can

This is no less than a clash of civilizations—the perhaps irrational but

Culture, in Huntington’s mindset, is defined as the deepest identifica-

Problems concentrate around all those fellow-citizens that originate from

In this citation, drawn from Fortuyn’s 2002 book De verweesde samen-

The ‘Islam Debate’

of talking points that were direct citations from well-known populist

De Volkskrant, 8 August 2007. Genoeg is Genoeg: Verbied de Koran.

therefore not be ashamed to publicly say that we should arm ourselves

The participant hints at his intimate knowledge of SGP political jar-

Since then, it has appeared frequently in SGP discourse. Most recently,

1 Introduction: Emotional Entanglements of Sacrality and

2 The Boomerang-Effect of Culturalized Religion: The

3 ‘We’ and ‘The Others’ as Constituents of Symbolic

Part II Public Space 67

4 Religion, Aesthetics, and Hurt Sentiment: On the

5 Spatial Piety: Shia Religious Processions and the Politics

6 Samba Struggles: Carnaval Parades, Race and Religious

7 Homo Sanctus: Religious Contestations and the

8 Secularist Nativism: National Identity and the Religious

9 Dutch Tolerance in Black and White: From Religious

10 Colonial Heritage and the Sacred: Contesting the Statue

11 Rooted in the Sacred? On Mark Rothko, Tears Flowing,

12 Disgust and Difference: Conflicting Sensations of the

13 United in Competitive Mourning: Commemorative

The Thai King as Secular and Sacred

The Secular Sacred: A Praxeological Approach

As much of recent scholarship suggests, contrary to the ideological self-

Sections of this Book

etting the Scene: ‘Is Islam a Threat

onfessional Politics: The SGP on the Outside

he Rise of the Populist Radical Right

The ‘Islam Debate’

Short Skirts Against Islam?

The Boomerang Effect of Invoking Leitkultur

ymbolic Politics as a Simplifier

r ediscovered, serving to legitimize the exclusion of groups of citizens. The

Illoyal and Privileged: Holders of Two

he Struggle for a New Citizenship

Diffusion of Old and New National Rhetoric

eligious Communalism and the Secular

he Precarity of Shia Visibility: Between

hedding Blood: Pious Embodiment

F rom Student Activist to Islamic

Shia Public Processions (muzahara)

The Secular-Sacred Encounter in Public Space

onspicuous Visibility of Shia Processions

Carnaval, Religion and the Nation-State