New Religious Movements
New religious movements are one of my areas of research focus. This website's domain name (nrms.net) comes from the term "new religious movement" (NRM). During the 1970s, scholars coined the phrase “new religious movement” because the terms of “cult” and “sect” had lost their sociological distinction and become pejorative labels. The new term has enabled scholars of new religious movements to continue our work without casting value judgments on the groups that we study. I use the term with historical awareness, recognizing that “new” is a slippery concept, and that most new groups claim ancient lineages.
The debate over whether to call these groups NRMs or cults is highly charged. I have been called a "cult apologist" for wanting to call them NRMs rather than cults. The problem is that there is no clear way to distinguish a cult from any other religion without relying on subjective value judgements. Some people argue that any "high demand" group is a cult, but "high demand" is in the eye of the beholder. I have yet to see any definition of "cult" that does not rely on an implicit judgement about whose beliefs and practices are normal. There are plenty of groups I personally don't like: religious fundamentalists, religions with racist or antisemitic beliefs, religions that endanger public health by rejecting vaccines, religions that reject mainstream science, religions that are must mean. But just because I don't like them doesn't mean they are a cults. These are all value judgements.
You can read an article i wrote about how I teach about new religious movements, and why I recommend handling the topic of NRMs in the classroom in my article, "But Aren't Cults Bad?" Active Learning, Productive Chaos, and Teaching New Religious Movements.
Rather than get into a circular argument about what groups are cults, I prefer to call any group with religious ideology, practices, or beliefs a religion. Some are socially acceptable, some socially deviant. Some engage in violence, some not. Some have beliefs that I personally consider abhorrent, some do not.
One of the best resources for the study of NRMs is the journal Nova Religio: The Journal of Alternative and Emergent Religions, of which I serve as a co-general editor. Details are available on the Nova Religio website. Academic users can access back issues through that website, as well as Project MUSE, JSTOR and ATLA. Current issues require a subscription, generally through a university library.
You can find my publications on NRMs listed on my official institutional website, which I update yearly.
