The Meaning of Weapons

This book studies the role, representation, and materiality of weapons, focusing on what they mean to communities and individuals in various cultural, social, political, and religious settings. Drawing on a range of case studies from across the globe, the chapters examine (1) how weapons are understood and used in different social, cultural, religious, theological, and ritual contexts; (2) their role within infrastructures of violence, that is, the socio-material, juridical, and spatial arrangements of weapons that enable or constrain violence; (3) processes of human socialization with weapons; (4) the infliction of violence through weapons; and (5) the representation of weapons in popular culture, games, myths, museums, and monuments. The volume brings together insights from various disciplines including anthropology, religious studies, philosophy, history, and conflict studies. In doing so, it lays the groundwork for highly needed new theoretical and methodological directions to understand the meaning of weapons in our times.

Lucien van Liere is Associate Professor in the Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies at Utrecht University, the Netherlands. Erik Meinema is Assistant Professor in Religion and Heritage at Utrecht University, the Netherlands.

1. Introduction: The Meaning of Weapons in Politics, Cultures, and Religions - Lucien van Liere & Erik Meinema; 2. White Evangelical Christianity and Concealed Handguns in the United States - Jenny Legath; 3. Militarized Masculinities: Weapons, Vodka, and Piety in the Iraq Warscape - Younes Saramifar; 4. Weapons, Bodies, and Acts of Killing - Lucien van Liere; 5. A Genealogy of Holy Weapons: Dungeons & Dragons and the weaponification of religion in (video)games - Lars de Wildt & Pieter van de Heede; 6. Beauty in Battle, an Aesthetic Attack: The Art of War and Visual Shield Forms in Papua New Guinea - Srdjan Sremac & Joris Visser; 7. Sacred Weapons: Analyzing Imagery Addressing the Russian Military Invasion of Ukraine - Elena Romashko; 8. Charmed Weapons and Anti-Weapons Charms Among the OPC Vigilante Groups in Lagos, Nigeria - Murtala Ibrahim; 9. The Weapons of Spiritual Warfare in Coastal Kenya - Erik Meinema; 10. The Regulation of International Arms Transfers - Policy and Practice - Frank Slijper; 11. Fragments and shards of a shared past: Colonial Weapons and Memory Practices of the Rif, Morocco - Nina ter Laan; 12. Afterword: Weapons at the Threshold - Tessa Diphoorn.