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The study of New Religious Movements (NRMs) is one of the fastest-growing areas of religious studies, and since the release of the first edition of The Oxford Handbook of New Religious Movements in 2003, the field has continued to grow and break new ground. In this all-new edition, contributors from the fields of sociology and religious studies address an expanded range of topics, covering traditional religious studies topics such as "scripture," "charisma," and "ritual," also applying new theoretical approaches to NRM topics. Other chapters cover understudied topics in the field, such as patterns of development of NRMs and subcultural considerations in the study of NRMs.
Divided into five sections, the first part of the book examines NRMs from a social-scientific perspective, particularly sociology. The primary factors that put the study of NRMs on the map, controversy and conflict, is also considered. A third section considers common themes within the field of NRMs, and a fourth section examines the approaches that religious studies researchers have taken to NRMs. Finally, as NRM Studies has grown, certain subfields, including Esotericism, New Age Studies, and neo-Pagan Studies have grown as distinct and individual fields of study, and the final section of the book investigates these emergent fields.
