Garbage, Minimalism, and Religion

Discussions of minimalism immediately call to mind the religious renunciant—one who eschews worldly possessions, relations, and passions to abide by “high-living” principles. Renowned renunciants include St. Francis of Assisi, Buddha, Mother Theresa, and Mahatma Gandhi. However, the renunciant is only one of the most recognizable figures rejecting worldly things for religious or spiritual reasons. There are, in fact, a variety of ways to examine the complex relationship between religion and the stuff called “garbage” or “waste,” including household trash, human excrement, industrial waste, airborne pollutants, and other undesired, obsolescent, putrid, or worn things. Well-established connections exist between religious stewardship and “saving the Earth,” recycling, and consumer waste, as well as the spiritual qualities of conservation. But waste is much more than simply discarded stuff: it is a dynamic cultural category. Perhaps the more interesting discussion arises when one looks closely at the symbolic, moral, and religious values attached to waste forms, such as impurity; their relationship to advanced capitalism; and the everyday practices of handling, expelling, or avoiding waste forms across religious traditions.

What motivates practices of minimalism, restraint, or asceticism among religious practitioners? Much of the answer to this question requires an appreciation of the individual body as a site of rich symbolism and cultural instruction within religious traditions. As temple, gift, or vessel, scholars have shown that the body sometimes operates as a model and microcosm of the cosmic universe and a physical foundation for the individual's relationship to a divine force. It is widely recognized that behavioral restrictions in a variety of religions attempt to impose order on processes of decay and death. Bodily impulses, sensations, and experiences, ranging from eating to sexual activity, therefore become [Page 293]important places for demonstrating self-control and mastery over desire, hunger, disintegration, suffering, and, ultimately, human mortality. Concepts of waste derive meaning through associations with decay, death, and degeneration. It is important to note at the outset that approaching religion only as a static body of tenets, rules, or symbols yields limited insight. While practitioners strive to live according to such authoritative models, religious engagement is filled with multiple points of ambiguity and cultural variability. This should not dissuade anyone from proceeding; rather, it simply shifts the focus to human behavior and makes religion about much more than a series of rites, creeds, or traditions.

One way to explore the relationship of minimalism, garbage, and religion, therefore, is by investigating how laypeople navigate religious forms of taboo, prohibition, and moral censure concerning waste forms. Anthropologist Mary Douglas has shown that dirt and other waste matter derive their power through not simply being waste or having a kind of negative value. Rather, as “matter out of place,” things deemed dirty, spoiled, or noxious carry polluting effects for the person, transmitted through bodily substance or through touching. By avoiding impure or defiled forms, practitioners shore up purity and associate themselves with a path of holiness or sacredness. Hindu-inflected caste hierarchy in India historically associated the handling of garbage and waste forms with impurity and relegated this work to the “untouchables,” or dalit. Though formally banned by the Indian state in 1950, the caste structure reinforced status differences in those who had the greatest ability to spiritually elevate themselves and avoid forms of contagion.

...