Introduction

Abstract

This article starts from the remark that anthropology of religion and urban anthropology have been following different – and sometimes divergent – historical trajectories. Only in recent years the two perspectives started a dialogue and laid the foundations for a renewed study of religions in urban contexts. Against this background, the article claims the necessity for anthropological studies in which the approaches of anthropology of religion and of urban anthropology are put in contact. In order to answer to the problems that are at the basis of this special issue, we analyse the state of the art of the subject and describe the modalities and categories we propose for the study of religions in urban contexts and of the urban through the religious. Following this path, the article proposes that anthropology, due to its well established tradition of analysis both of religious and urban facts, is well positioned to propose new approaches and interpretative frames to keep together the religious dimension with other spheres in order to delineate an image of contemporary cities.