About the Journal
Living Religion and Contested Identities (LiRCI)
Faith in Practice, Identities in Contestation
Living Religion and Contested Identities (LiRCI) is an international, peer-reviewed journal dedicated to advancing critical scholarship on religion as it is lived, practiced, and negotiated in everyday life. The journal examines how religious identities are formed, maintained, challenged, and transformed within contested social, political, and cultural spaces.
LiRCI recognizes that religion is not merely a set of doctrines or beliefs, but a dynamic field of practice shaped by power relations, social struggles, and individual agency. By focusing on the intersection of lived religious practices and contested identities, the journal provides a unique platform for interdisciplinary scholarship that bridges the gap between abstract theological discourse and the concrete realities of religious life.
The journal is committed to:
- Centering lived experience over doctrinal orthodoxy
- Foregrounding voices from the margins - religious minorities, women, LGBTQ+ communities, youth, migrants, and converts
- Critically examining power dynamics that shape religious practices and identities
- Promoting Global South perspectives and decolonial approaches to religious studies
- Embracing methodological diversity including ethnography, qualitative interviews, discourse analysis, visual methods, and digital ethnography
- Exploring religion in transformation - how faith adapts to technological, environmental, political, and social change
