Accounting for the Other as Everyday: Anthropology and Theology in Dialogue on Morality

The call for a dialogue between the disciplines of anthropology and theology was initiated by anthropologist Joel Robbins in 2006. Within theology it was elaborated in 2014 by Michael Banner. This article compares both authors in order to understand what the highly generalising formulation of a dialogue between disciplines is about. They will turn out to aim at a conversation about what the disciplines are ultimately concerned with, formulated as otherness and everydayness, respectively. However, Robbins and Banner do not elaborate on their grand claims in a systematic and detailed way. This article offers a more systematic elaboration and aims to evaluate their views as a contribution to what is at stake in their calls for dialogue. For this purpose, it is necessary to better account for the complexity of the specific character of studying morality.