CEU Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020
| Author | Stefanovic, Armin |
|---|---|
| Title | Theosophy and the New Age in Yugoslavia and Its Successor States |
| Summary | In this thesis, I analyze the development of the Yugoslav Theosophical Society (YTS) from the 1920s until the 1980s in the Kingdom of Slovenes, Croats, and Serbs, the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, and the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. I focus on the periods of ruptures and renewals of the Society in order to demonstrate the continuous effort of seekers to establish a religious institution with an intent to study and practice Theosophy. In doing so, I shed a light on the relationship between the YTS and Yugoslav authorities. Drawing on the Theosophical magazines and an interview, it was important for me to include accounts of Theosophists in order to give them voice in describing their own history. In the second part of the thesis, I analyze beliefs, practices, and teachings of the YTS in the 1970s and the 1980s. I compare them to of the elements of the New Age discourse in postsocialist Slovenia. I argue that in publishing and promoting books and magazines, organizing public lectures and summer camps, the YTS laid foundations for the subsequent development of the yoga and meditation groups. Drawing on the debates of history, sociology, philosophy, and anthropology of the religion that revolve around the relation of new religious movements to the secularization, I demonstrate that the increasing presence of the New Age discourse in the public space goes in line with the reenchantment thesis. |
| Supervisor | Szönyi, György Endre |
| Department | History MA |
| Full text | https://www.etd.ceu.edu/2020/stefanovic_armin.pdf |
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