Lois Lee

This research is an ethnographic study of non-religion – atheism, agnosticism, “secular neutrality”, etc. – in contemporary London. It aims to advance substantive understanding of non-religious forms and their potential variety – and to consider theoretical conceptions of religion, secularity and secularisation in this light. Early findings suggest that ‘rationalist’ non-religious discourses express a commitment to inter-subjectivity, or objectivity, as the sole legitimate form of knowing, but that this commitment arises from and is associated with social, emotional, aesthetic and mythic experiences and activity.