This specialty group at the Association of American Geographers studies religion, secularization, and belief systems as analytics by which human geographies are constructed, fractured, and continuously shaped. It was founded in April 1978.
The Geography of Religions and Belief Systems (GORABS) Specialty Group at the Association of American Geographers (AAG) promotes the use of religion as a geographical analytic. Historically, the group has focused on how religion impresses a human impact on the environment and vice versa. Complementing these environmental approaches, more recent work in geographies of religion have revealed that religion is a productive lens through which to understand and debate secularization processes, the intersection of religion in social identity formation, the role of religion in cultural processes of placemaking, and issues of religion in political geography. Geographers of religion are contributing to current conversations and challenges in race, gender, sexuality, age, migration studies, critical geopolitics, global development studies, political ecology, hauntological approaches, post-secularization, piety movements, evangelicalisms, and public religions. Religion has thus progressed beyond being an object of study or subject of inquiry in geography, but a way by which to practice human geography critically.
The Geography of Religions and Belief Systems (GORABS) Specialty Group at the Association of American Geographers (AAG) promotes the use of religion as a geographical analytic. Historically, the group has focused on how religion impresses a human impact on the environment and vice versa. Complementing these environmental approaches, more recent work in geographies of religion have revealed that religion is a productive lens through which to understand and debate secularization processes, the intersection of religion in social identity formation, the role of religion in cultural processes of placemaking, and issues of religion in political geography. Geographers of religion are contributing to current conversations and challenges in race, gender, sexuality, age, migration studies, critical geopolitics, global development studies, political ecology, hauntological approaches, post-secularization, piety movements, evangelicalisms, and public religions. Religion has thus progressed beyond being an object of study or subject of inquiry in geography, but a way by which to practice human geography critically.