---
name: jaar-theory-and-method
description: Use when articulating the theory and method of a Journal of the American Academy of Religion (JAAR) article. JAAR prizes method-conscious, reflexive, non-confessional scholarship and explicitly publishes studies of the methodologies by which religion is explored. Sharpens the theoretical/methodological frame; it does not gather sources.
---

# Theory & Method (jaar-theory-and-method)

What most distinguishes a JAAR article from a specialist-journal article is **methodological
self-awareness**. JAAR publishes not only studies of traditions but **studies of the methods** by which
religion is explored, and it expects scholarship to be **reflexive** and **non-confessional**. This
skill makes your theory/method explicit and load-bearing.

## When to trigger

- Stating the framework and method that drive the analysis
- A reviewer said the piece is "undertheorized," "naive about method," or "confessional"
- Using comparison and needing to justify the basis of comparison
- Reflecting on your own position and its effect on the analysis

## Make theory and method explicit

1. **Name the framework.** Whether phenomenological, historical-critical, social-theoretical,
   philosophical, feminist/postcolonial, cognitive, ritual-studies, etc. — say what lens you use and why
   it fits the problem.
2. **Method as argument.** Show how the method *produces* the reading; don't apply a theory decoratively.
   A JAAR article can make a **methodological contribution** (proposing or critiquing how we study X).
3. **Reflexivity.** Acknowledge your standpoint and its effects; distinguish description of believers'
   claims from your analytic claims. Study religion **about**, not **for**, the tradition
   (non-confessional) — represent insiders' views fairly without adopting them as your conclusions.
4. **Comparison done responsibly.** If comparing traditions/cases, justify the *tertium comparationis*
   (the basis of comparison); avoid decontextualized analogy and the "world religions" essentialism the
   field critiques.
5. **Categories under scrutiny.** Be alert to loaded categories (religion, myth, ritual, mysticism,
   the secular) and use them critically.

## Anti-patterns

- Theory name-dropped in the intro but absent from the analysis
- Confessional/apologetic argument presented as scholarship
- Comparison with no justified basis (apples-to-oranges essentialism)
- Using contested categories uncritically as if natural kinds
- No reflexivity — writing as if the scholar's position were nowhere

## Output format

```
【Framework】the theory/method and why it fits
【Method-as-argument】how it produces the reading / any methodological contribution
【Reflexivity】standpoint acknowledged; analytic vs. believers' claims distinguished
【Comparison (if any)】basis of comparison justified?
【Categories】loaded terms used critically?
【Next】jaar-structure-and-exposition
```

## Method-frame fit table

JAAR publishes across textual, historical, ethnographic, philosophical, and analytic-theological
approaches, and a referee for the AAR/Oxford University Press flagship expects the frame to fit the
problem and do real work. Match your lens to its move and risk.

| Frame | Characteristic move | Risk a JAAR reader watches for |
|-------|---------------------|--------------------------------|
| Phenomenological | Describe the structure of religious experience | Sliding into the believer's voice |
| Historical-critical | Situate texts/events in their formation | Antiquarianism with no field-level claim |
| Social-theoretical | Read religion as practice, power, institution | Reduction that explains the religion away |
| Feminist / postcolonial | Surface gender, empire, the category-maker | Critique asserted, not demonstrated |
| Comparative | Juxtapose to reveal a general insight | Decontextualized "world religions" essentialism |

## The insider/outsider and non-confessional line

The reflexivity norm at JAAR has a sharp edge that trips theologically trained authors: the journal
studies religion **about**, not **for**, a tradition. Hold this line:

- Represent insiders' claims **fairly** — then mark where your **analytic** claim begins.
- A believer's truth-claim is **data** for your analysis, not a **premise** of it.
- Reflexivity is not confession: stating your standpoint clarifies its effect; it does not license
  advocacy.

## Worked vignette: justifying a comparison's basis

The comparative-offerings essay compares a Marian shrine and a Sufi *dargah*. A theorist-referee asks:
on what basis?

- **Name the *tertium comparationis*.** Not "both are religious," which essentializes, but a specified
  shared structure — *a transactional contract with a saintly intercessor* — defined and defended as
  the unit of comparison.
- **Method as argument.** The comparison is not decorative; it *produces* the recategorization claim
  that neither case yields alone — a methodological contribution about how to study transactional
  devotion.
- **Reflexivity.** The author, raised in one tradition, states that standpoint and shows how
  cross-checking against the other case guards against reading it as the norm.
- **Categories under scrutiny.** "Popular piety," the residual bin both cases were filed under, is
  dismantled rather than used as a natural kind.

## Theory/method pushback → the fix

- "Undertheorized" → show how the method produces the reading.
- "Confessional" → re-draw the about/for line; bracket believers' truth-claims.
- "Apples-to-oranges comparison" → defend the *tertium comparationis*.

Hedged calibration: JAAR's openness to theological method is real but conditioned — it publishes
analytic, non-confessional theology of religion, not advocacy. The editorial boundary shifts and is
best confirmed against recent issues and the journal's current submission guidelines rather than
assumed from any single statement.

## Supplementary resources

- [`../../resources/external_tools.md`](../../resources/external_tools.md) — theory/method references in the study of religion
- [`../../resources/official-source-map.md`](../../resources/official-source-map.md) — JAAR publishes studies of methodology; reflexive, non-confessional scope