In Religion and Social Theory, sociologist Bryan S. Turner delivers a sweeping and intellectually rigorous exploration of how religion operates at the very heart of social life. Engaging deeply with major thinkers—Engels, Durkheim, Weber, Nietzsche, Freud, Parsons, Marcuse, Habermas, and Foucault—Turner traces the powerful, and often contested, role religion plays in shaping institutions, identities, and moral frameworks.
Moving beyond commentary, Turner advances his own provocative thesis: religion functions as a crucial institutional bridge between economic systems and human reproduction. Through a rich comparative and historical analysis of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, he reveals how belief systems both respond to and structure social change.
This expanded second edition, featuring a substantial new introduction, remains a foundational and thought-provoking work for readers interested in sociology of religion, critical theory, and the enduring entanglement of faith and modernity.
Editorial Reviews
"This perceptive and wide-ranging book embraces a number of distinctive themes... one of the most stimulating books in the field for a long time" —British Journal of Sociology
"Turner writes... with much more analytical penetration and sensitivity to historical variation and conjuncture than is to be found in the vast majority of sociological writings of our time on the theme of religion" —Theory, Culture & Society
About the Author
Bryan S. Turner is Professor of Sociology in the Asian Research Institute (ARI) at the National University of Singapore. Previously he was Professor of Sociology in the Faculty of Social and Political Sciences at the University of Cambridge from 1998-2005. His research interests include globalization and religion, concentrating on such issues as religious conflict and the modern state, religious authority and electronic information, religious, consumerism and youth cultures, human rights and religion, the human body, medical change, and religious cosmologies. He is Joint Chief Editor of the journal Citizenship Studies and serves on the editorial boards of several prestigious journals. His previous books include Weber and Islam (1974), The Body and Society (1984), Medical Power and Social Knowledge (1987), Nietzsche's Dance (with Georg Stauth, 1988), and Theories of modernity and Postmodernity (edited, 1990)
