Religion, Geography and

The geography of religion is a substantial subdiscipline of human geography that provides significant insight into the breadth and depth of religious traditions in their multifaceted contexts. The geography of religion involves the spatial study of religious systems and phenomena and includes a robust array of themes at numerous scales, including, but not limited to, religious diffusion, religious distributions, religious regions, religious diversity, religious fundamentalism, sacred space, religious landscapes, religion and the environment, and more recent developments in critical human geography.

Geographers of religion explore a multiplicity of faith traditions but tend to be more concerned with the social, cultural, and environmental associations of religion than with religion itself, though this is an internal point of debate among scholars. The geography of religion is therefore differentiated from religious geography, which, according to Petri Raivo, focuses instead on the role of religion in shaping human perceptions of the world and the place of humanity in the world.

The field is often described as the geography of religion and belief systems due to nuances and deficiencies in the term religion, which has no formally agreed on definition. The inclusion of belief [Page 2406]systems in the description of the discipline allows for a more inclusive study and permits investigation into phenomena such as civil religion.

The city of Cuzco, Peru, with the Cathedral of Santa Domingo in the foreground. It was built on the site of Kiswarkanchar, an Inca palace that was destroyed by the Spanish conquistadors. Completed in 1654, the cathedral is a UNESCO World Heritage site.

Source: (c) Can Stock Photo Inc.

The geography of religion has a strong institutional presence internationally, especially in the field of cultural geography, and is represented by formal groups of specialists in the United States, Germany, and Eastern Europe. Yet many scholars in fields such as religious studies or cultural geography, who are not overtly geographers of religion, also make important contributions to the field through research that is simultaneously religious and geographic.