W.S.F. Pickering Durkheim's Sociology of Religion

Annotation

Religion is central to Durkheim's theory of society, and his work laid most of the foundations of the sociology of religion. Daring and brilliant though his analysis was, its bold claims and questionable premises has made it the subject of ongoing academic debate. Durkheimis work on the subject reached a peak with the publication in 1912 of what turned out to be a classic in its field, The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life. No other book has explained Durkheimis views on religion using the whole corpus of his writings. Dr Pickering shows how Durkheim's position developed and explains the themes and theories that run through Durkheimis work. This includes Durkheim's attitude towards secularisation and Christian churches, as well as his notion of the contemporary cult of the individual.