Mark Cauchi is Associate Professor in the Department of Humanities and in the Graduate Program of Social and Political Thought at York University, Canada. He is co-editor of Immanent Frames: Postsecular Cinema between Malick and von Trier (2018).

Few books have surprised me as much as Cinema and Secularism, which very generously and precisely asks the secularists among us, of which I am one, to examine our own assumptions about what secularism is, where most of us simply accept it as an essential value, and thus, potentially, as non-secular. The range of films, nations, periods, and concepts in evidence here—not to mention the sheer quality of the writing—is seriously impressive and proof of just how much this conversation needs to happen; proof that the questions matter to everyone.

• List of Images Acknowledgements Introduction: Screening the SecularMark Cauchi (York University, Canada)Part I: Is Cinema Secular? Genealogy, Theory, Philosophy1. Secularist Film Studies and the Occlusion of the SecularMark Cauchi (York University, Canada2. Deleuze’s “Conversion of Belief”: The Time-Image and the Disruption of Cinema’s Secularist OriginsJohn Caruana (Toronto Metropolitan University, Canada)3. The Secular as Sacred: Cinema and Buddhist RitualFrancisca Cho (Georgetown University, USA)Part II: Situating Secularism: Culture, Politics, and Cinema4. Ousmane Sembène’s Moolaadé: Sacred Space as Refuge and Political AgencyNikolas Kompridis (Humboldt University, Germany)5. Cinema as a Secularizing Medium in the Middle EastWalid El Khachab (York University, Canada)6. The Impossible Possible: Secularism and Hindi Popular CinemaSheila J. Nayar (University of Utah, USA)7. Observational Secular: Religion and Documentary Film in the United StatesKathryn Lofton (Yale University, USA)Part III: The Dis/enchantment of the World in Moving Images8. The Wonder of Film: Science, Magic, and the Endurance of EnchantmentCatherine Wheatley (King’s College London, UK)9. Vegetal Life, Plant-Soul: Early British Film FlowersSarah Cooper (King’s College London, UK)10. “There's a sort of evil out there”: Uncanny Secularity in Lynch’s Twin Peaks: The ReturnRobert Sinnerbrink (Freie Universität, Berlin, Germany)List of ContributorsIndex

Mark Cauchi is Associate Professor in the Department of Humanities and in the Graduate Program of Social and Political Thought at York University, Canada. He is co-editor of Immanent Frames: Postsecular Cinema between Malick and von Trier (2018).

Few books have surprised me as much as Cinema and Secularism, which very generously and precisely asks the secularists among us, of which I am one, to examine our own assumptions about what secularism is, where most of us simply accept it as an essential value, and thus, potentially, as non-secular. The range of films, nations, periods, and concepts in evidence here—not to mention the sheer quality of the writing—is seriously impressive and proof of just how much this conversation needs to happen; proof that the questions matter to everyone.

• List of Images Acknowledgements Introduction: Screening the SecularMark Cauchi (York University, Canada)Part I: Is Cinema Secular? Genealogy, Theory, Philosophy1. Secularist Film Studies and the Occlusion of the SecularMark Cauchi (York University, Canada2. Deleuze’s “Conversion of Belief”: The Time-Image and the Disruption of Cinema’s Secularist OriginsJohn Caruana (Toronto Metropolitan University, Canada)3. The Secular as Sacred: Cinema and Buddhist RitualFrancisca Cho (Georgetown University, USA)Part II: Situating Secularism: Culture, Politics, and Cinema4. Ousmane Sembène’s Moolaadé: Sacred Space as Refuge and Political AgencyNikolas Kompridis (Humboldt University, Germany)5. Cinema as a Secularizing Medium in the Middle EastWalid El Khachab (York University, Canada)6. The Impossible Possible: Secularism and Hindi Popular CinemaSheila J. Nayar (University of Utah, USA)7. Observational Secular: Religion and Documentary Film in the United StatesKathryn Lofton (Yale University, USA)Part III: The Dis/enchantment of the World in Moving Images8. The Wonder of Film: Science, Magic, and the Endurance of EnchantmentCatherine Wheatley (King’s College London, UK)9. Vegetal Life, Plant-Soul: Early British Film FlowersSarah Cooper (King’s College London, UK)10. “There's a sort of evil out there”: Uncanny Secularity in Lynch’s Twin Peaks: The ReturnRobert Sinnerbrink (Freie Universität, Berlin, Germany)List of ContributorsIndex

Mark Cauchi is Associate Professor in the Department of Humanities and in the Graduate Program of Social and Political Thought at York University, Canada. He is co-editor of Immanent Frames: Postsecular Cinema between Malick and von Trier (2018).

Few books have surprised me as much as Cinema and Secularism, which very generously and precisely asks the secularists among us, of which I am one, to examine our own assumptions about what secularism is, where most of us simply accept it as an essential value, and thus, potentially, as non-secular. The range of films, nations, periods, and concepts in evidence here—not to mention the sheer quality of the writing—is seriously impressive and proof of just how much this conversation needs to happen; proof that the questions matter to everyone.

• List of Images Acknowledgements Introduction: Screening the SecularMark Cauchi (York University, Canada)Part I: Is Cinema Secular? Genealogy, Theory, Philosophy1. Secularist Film Studies and the Occlusion of the SecularMark Cauchi (York University, Canada2. Deleuze’s “Conversion of Belief”: The Time-Image and the Disruption of Cinema’s Secularist OriginsJohn Caruana (Toronto Metropolitan University, Canada)3. The Secular as Sacred: Cinema and Buddhist RitualFrancisca Cho (Georgetown University, USA)Part II: Situating Secularism: Culture, Politics, and Cinema4. Ousmane Sembène’s Moolaadé: Sacred Space as Refuge and Political AgencyNikolas Kompridis (Humboldt University, Germany)5. Cinema as a Secularizing Medium in the Middle EastWalid El Khachab (York University, Canada)6. The Impossible Possible: Secularism and Hindi Popular CinemaSheila J. Nayar (University of Utah, USA)7. Observational Secular: Religion and Documentary Film in the United StatesKathryn Lofton (Yale University, USA)Part III: The Dis/enchantment of the World in Moving Images8. The Wonder of Film: Science, Magic, and the Endurance of EnchantmentCatherine Wheatley (King’s College London, UK)9. Vegetal Life, Plant-Soul: Early British Film FlowersSarah Cooper (King’s College London, UK)10. “There's a sort of evil out there”: Uncanny Secularity in Lynch’s Twin Peaks: The ReturnRobert Sinnerbrink (Freie Universität, Berlin, Germany)List of ContributorsIndex