Talk:James R. Lewis (scholar)

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ProfLewis (talk · contribs) This user has contributed to the article.

James R. Lewis, "Scientology", Oxford University Press

First, I know my anonymous address detracts from my credibility. I'm honestly not a sock-puppet or otherwise need to hide my identity, it's just that I used to waste too much time editing so I got rid of my account to curb the habit. I'm also not an anti-Scientology (let along an anti-New Religious Movement) activist, although I've read a lot of the journalistic commentary on the Church and my opinion of it is generally negative. I saw this new book in the "new acquisitions" shelf of my university library, checked it out, and read it. I was struck by the apologetic tone of the book. J. Gordon Melton's overview of the Church's history, in particular, reads almost like a PR account. Throughout the book, discussions of the Church's payment policy for auditing are brief and offhand and don't contextualize it comparatively, i.e. they do not note that few if any other churches charge so much money so their essential religious rituals. The Church of Latter-Day Saints, for instance, expects a significant financial commitment from members, but they can still participate in all aspects of the Church (including, if I'm not mistaken, Temple rituals) while declining to contribute money. Almost none of the book's essays, furthermore, refer to the Church of Scientology's aggressive and explicit policy of suing critics. The well-researched article by James Richardson on "Scientology in Court," for instance, ignores that subject to concentrate exclusively on the Church's struggles for religion status in various countries. And Anson Shupe's chapter on "The Church of Scientology versus the Cult Awareness Network" seems to take clear sides in favor of the Church. I do not for an instant question NRM scholars' good faith, but I suspect that the nature of the research, beginning from an explicit (and appropriate, for scholarly research) posture of non-judgment, can slide towards apologetics -- especially since the Church makes an effort to win scholars' good will, as it does with celebrities. I wish that researchers would be scrupulous about declaring any financial support for their research from the Church (including paying travel costs and subsidizing conferences). The situation, I suspect, is similar to that of medical researchers who overtime become more or more compromised by the support for their research provided by pharmaceutical companies. I intend this comment in the spirit of honest discussion, and would be interested in others' opinions on it. I'm cross-posting it to other relevant talk pages. 152.160.39.70 (talk) 14:09, 4 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Controversial topics

I am James R. Lewis. I am a faculty member at the University of Wisconsin and I am published by the best academic presses, such as Oxford University Press and Cambridge University Press. The fact that I provide neutral, scholarly information on controversial topics has caused people to attack me, most often in an 'anonymous' fashion. Wikipedia should require individuals who attack other people in their entries to identify themselve and to provide documented evidence of accusations.ProfLewis (talk) 20:37, 6 July 2009 (UTC)James R. Lewis[reply]

Thanks for your input. This article falls under a very strict policy, "biographies of living people". All assertions, especially those that are negative, need to be well-sourced and presented with the neutral point of view. Regarding the material that you removed, it used the Washington Post as its source. The Post charged that a team of American experts, including Lewis, were paid by Aum Shinrikyo to travel to Japan, and once there, made statements in defense of the group or in opposition to the official handling of the case. I think we can agree that the source is reliable. Rather than delete the material outright, it'd be better to improve it. For starters, I'd say that the heading was prejudicial. A title like "Aum Shinrikyo" would be more neutral. Another thing is that more viewpoints would be better. Did Lewis ever issue a response, or has there been a follow-up? Have other publications addressed this matter? Further, the article is very short, so devoting so much space to the matter gives it undue weight. That can be helped by cutting down the material and also by adding more material on Lewis' other accomplishments and activities. Are there any profiles or significant mentions in reliable sources that we could use to fill out this biography more fully? Will Beback talk 21:30, 6 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

What, ALL religious scholarship?

"The scholars' [well-intentioned, but unjustified](removed fluff) defence of Aum Shinrikyo led to a crisis of confidence in religious scholarship" Seriously? Every religious scholar everywhere suffered a "crisis of confidence" due to this? I suspect that the crisis was a little more focused that that. AndroidCat (talk) 07:51, 5 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Have you read the cited source?[[1] Will Beback talk 09:07, 5 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Yes. Reader is rather wordy, but I don't think he comes close to "crisis of confidence", except where he's citing/quoting Watanabe Manabu, who is referring to the situation in Japan immediately after that misstep. AndroidCat (talk) 15:03, 5 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think "crisis in confidence" is meant as a quotation. However it seems like a reasonable summary. Will Beback talk 22:34, 5 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Critiscism

I added a section to the article about the criticism on Dr. Lewis' work. This was removed by ResidentAnthropologist with the following message on my user page:

Please do not add unreferenced or poorly referenced information, especially if controversial, to articles or any other page on Wikipedia about living persons, as you did to James R. Lewis (scholar). Thank you.

Here's the removed section:

Lewis is a proponent of the view that critical former members ("apostates") of new religious movements are unreliable sources on the movements teachings and practice, based on work done on deprogramming.^[1]^[2] Having been a member of the yoga related 3HO and later formed his own breakaway group, he has been accused of downplaying abuse in various groups.^[1] Particularly his relationship with Scientology has lead to sharp criticism from the anti-Scientology movement.^[3]

^ ^a ^b Kent, S.A. (1911): The History of Credibility Attacks Against Former Cult Members. Article online
^ Lewis, J.R. (1989): Apostates and the Legitimation of Repression: Some Historical and Empirical Perspectives on the Cult Controversy. Sociological Analysis no 49 (4): pp 386-396 article online
^ Lewis, J.R. (2011): An Open Letter to: Scientologists, Ex-Scientologists, and Critics of the Church of Scientology. Posted to the Scientology critical website www.scientology-cult.com. Full letter

Considering Lewis work in one of (if not the) most controversial fields of religious studies, I thought it relevant to put in a section of both the scientific and public criticism of his work, similar to that on Melton. I hope ResidentAnthropologist or others would help me make this section acceptable. Petter Bøckman (talk) 16:34, 4 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

A letter on an anti-Scientology website is not really a good source to use in a BLP, even if it is genuine (I believe it is). In addition, the letter is not well summarised – Lewis also speaks of the CoS harshly criticising his work, especially because of the inclusion of the chapter on Xenu in his latest book on Scientology.

Kent would qualify as a reliable source, but where was this paper published? It seems to be an unpublished conference paper hosted on an anti-cult site. If we want to expand this biography, that is not the kind of source to begin with; we should begin with the best and most influential sources, work our way down, and make sure that at any time, criticism and praise are reflected in the same proportions as they can be found in published sources. Kent makes an important point, but we are in danger of featuring criticism only, and Lewis is quite a highly regarded scholar. The facts of his former 3HO membership and the AUM incident would be best integrated into the timeline of the biographical part of the article, in my view, rather than the reception (or criticism) section, and I'd feel easier if we had a better source for his 3HO history than an unpublished conference paper. Here is a paper from the man himself that we could use, published in the Marburg Journal of Religion: [2] Hope that helps. Regards. --J N 466 21:12, 4 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I've reorganised the article, added a couple of sentences about his 3HO membership, and created a reception section, where we should include both praise from other scholars, and criticism from scholars like Kent. But let's make an effort to look for better sources than Kent's conference paper (unless it has been published, that is, in which case it is fine to use). Another critic for example is Beit-Hallahmi [3]. AWARE, mentioned by Beit-Hallahmi, is also something that we should add to the biographical part; Beit-Hallahmi refers to Lewis 1994a on page 47, which should have further details. I don't have time to do more work on this right now, but will revisit the article in a few days. Cheers, --J N 466 21:43, 4 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, I think your solution looks better. I would hesitate to use Lewis' letter, were it not for it being written by him and addressing the popular (non academic) criticism of him directly. An alternative source is Readers article from the Aum episode, or perhaps Kent & Krebs When Scholars Know Sin. I am not worker in the field, but if I have understood things correctly, there are two separate (though linked) issues here. One is the academic critique of his methodology (his stance on apostates and reliance on NRMs spokesmen), the other is the non academic critique. Limiting the latter to his Scientology works would be a very US perspective, in Japan he is a very unpopular man due to his defence of Aum. Petter Bøckman (talk) 07:24, 5 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

bibliography

Where we link to his "publications list", the list here is a bit of a waste. Collect (talk) 23:07, 23 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]

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Category:American astrologers

Is he? The article does not say. --Hob Gadling (talk) 08:49, 29 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

[Kent-1] Kent, S.A. (1911): The History of Credibility Attacks Against Former Cult Members. Article online

[2] Lewis, J.R. (1989): Apostates and the Legitimation of Repression: Some Historical and Empirical Perspectives on the Cult Controversy. Sociological Analysis no 49 (4): pp 386-396 article online

[3] Lewis, J.R. (2011): An Open Letter to: Scientologists, Ex-Scientologists, and Critics of the Church of Scientology. Posted to the Scientology critical website www.scientology-cult.com. Full letter

[1]

[2]

[3]