Modernist Syncretisms

Does modernization entail secularization? Should modernist writers thus be seen as tending toward a secular rejection of the religious traditions that they often refer to in their works? Indeed, are such citations of foreign cultures and their beliefs signs of an Orientalist exoticism? While it has often been assumed that the answers to such questions are affirmative, I seek to chart a more nuanced picture of certain complex interactions between European modernists and their non-Western sources. In fact, key modernist writers drew on a wide span of global religious traditions to reshape the aesthetic expression of European modernity. This includes two figures from very different backgrounds and ideological positions, Gabriele d’Annunzio and TS Eliot, who both nevertheless reveal the complex way in which modernist writers were not just fascinated by but seriously engaged with studying a syncretic blend of spiritual and religious traditions centered on cultivating meditative consciousness. In their work, this form of consciousness becomes a model that reshapes modernist art while also informing a new praxis of aesthetic attention that these writers seek to imprint onto their audiences. Their syncretic modernism uses religious consciousness to rethink the affordances of aesthetic form.

This event took place on Thursday, December 4, 2025 from 5:00 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. ET.

Speaker:
Professor Michael Subialka, UC Davis

For more information visit the event website.