Diaspora of Brazilian Religions

The Diaspora of Brazilian Religions explores the global spread of religions originating in Brazil, a country that has emerged as a major pole of religious innovation and production. Through ethnographically-rich case studies throughout the world, ranging from the Americas (Canada, the U.S., Peru, and Argentina) and Europe (the U.K., Portugal, and the Netherlands) to Asia (Japan) and Oceania (Australia), the book examines the conditions, actors, and media that have made possible the worldwide construction, circulation, and consumption of Brazilian religious identities, practices, and lifestyles, including those connected with indigenized forms of Pentecostalism and Catholicism, African-based religions such as Candomblé and Umbanda, as well as diverse expressions of New Age Spiritism and Ayahuasca-centered neo-shamanism like Vale do Amanhecer and Santo Daime.

"This pioneering volume invites further research, for better understanding of the religions of the Global South via the new theories about globalisation: the glocalisation, trans-ethnicisation and transnationalisation of religion." J.E. Castillo Guerra, University of Nijmegen in Journal of Empirical Theology 28 (2015), 140-141.

Cristina Rocha, Ph.D. (2004, University of Western Sydney) is a Research Fellow at the Religion and Society Research Centre and a Senior Lecturer at the School of Humanities and Communications, Arts, University of Western Sydney, Australia. She is the editor of the Journal of Global Buddhism. Her publications include Buddhism in Australia (with M. Barker, Routledge, 2010) and Zen in Brazil: The Quest for Cosmopolitan Modernity (Hawaii UP, 2006).Manuel A. Vásquez, Ph.D. (1994, Temple University) is Professor at the Religion Department, University of Florida. He is the author of More than Belief: A Materialist Theory of Religion (Oxford UP, 2011) and The Brazilian Popular Church and the Crisis of Modernity (Cambridge UP, 1998). He also co-authored Living ‘Illegal’: The Human Face of Unauthorized Immigration (New Press, 2011) and Globalizing the Sacred: Religion across the Americas (Rutgers, 2003).Contributors include Ushi Arakaki, Dario Paulo Barrera Rivera, Brenda Carranza, Anthony D'Andrea, Sara Delamont, Alejandro Frigerio, Alberto Groisman, Annick Hernandez, Clara Mafra, Cecília Mariz, Deirdre Meintel, Carmen Rial, Cristina Rocha, Camila Sampaio, Clara Saraiva, Olivia Sheringham, Neil Stephens, José Claúdio Souza Alves, Claudia Swatowiski, and Manuel A. Vásquez.