Manifestations and experiences of enchantment and disenchantment can be fruitfully identified and interpreted through the study of the spaces and places that punctuate social life. Few things represent the rationalizing impulse of modernity as powerfully as a grey, bare room filled with filing cabinets and paperwork. Conversely, certain places are capable of generating intensity and, one might say, cultivating a sense of the sacred through their aesthetic dimension, symbolic “language,” and distinctive atmosphere. These diverse characteristics emerge from the interaction between physical and material elements, patterns of use, and the human activity of signification occurring within specific contexts and temporalities. Engaging with the interdisciplinary tradition that has applied the so-called spatial turn to the study of religion, this chapter reinterprets the theme of enchantment and disenchantment through the lens of placebased inquiry, focusing on both secular and religious sites that populate our cities. Drawing on recent developments in this field of study and on a series of case studies, the chapter proposes to reconsider the categories of enchantment and disenchantment not only by examining the dialectic between secular and religious or spiritual spaces, but also by exploring the dichotomy between peaceful coexistence and conflict.
Keywords: Enchantment and Disenchantment; Space; Religious and Secular Sphere; Shared Religious Places; Conflict