Religion News, November 2022
White folks with dreadlocks. Models sporting $800 turbans. Tacky plastic dreamcatchers. These examples might make appropriation seem obvious, but it isn’t always — just ask Liz Bucar.
A leading expert in religious ethics, Bucar readily admits she’s been borrowing other people’s religion since she was an 11-year-old wearing a cross necklace made popular by Madonna. While Bucar is clear that cultural appropriation is often harmful, she’s more interested in grappling with the elusive, murky forms of religious borrowing, like, say, walking the Camino de Santiago as a non-Catholic.
