Diego A.

Soto Morera Statement of Purpose

Statement of Purpose

As a Latin American theologian I am looking for a doctoral program capable of providing me with the

theoretical and methodological tools necessary to understand, analyze and deconstruct the role of religion

in personal and sociopolitical dimensions of both political structures of coercion and social attempts at

liberation in Central American societies. I sustain that religious movements and religious symbolic

structures of meaning in Latin America, as political agents in the subcontinent, provides the basis of

meaning, metaphors and expectations through which many people perceive and produce their social

worlds, as well as the repressive set of relationships which constitute them.

More specifically, I have an interest in a constituent dimension of societies: to analyze the role played by

religious movements and religious symbolic structures over the determination of sexual ethics, institutions

and policies in Central America. I will research the participation of religious structures and movements in

the definition, legitimization and imposition of sexual models and institutions in the region. Therefore, I am

interested in responding this question: how religious structures of meaning have affected/supported the

ethical structures of the official sexual-set-of-relationships in Central American societies?

For instance, the recent discussion in Costa Rica over sexual rights shows the presence of a

clerical/religious narrative core within the construction of social imaginary, institutions and even in the

definition of laws. In Costa Rica the repression of sexual minorities is legitimated through religious

discourses that “defend” the monogamous, heterosexual and patriarchal family, as God’s accepted sexual

institution. In order to transform those imaginaries, we have to deconstruct the religious basis of meaning

(metaphors, narratives, ideas) which has both supported and legitimated oppressive-sexual political

structures all over Latin American societies. Therefore, we have the task of deconstructing the official

sexual ethics.

In order to accomplish my research expectation, I need a doctoral program that focus on the analysis of the

moral (im)position of some religious movements in Central America over the definition and legitimization

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Diego A. Soto Morera Statement of Purpose

of the sexual rights and policies. The Department of Religion at Northwestern University offers the Doctoral

area of study: Religion, Ethic and the Public (REP) life. It provides the ideal scholar scenario to study how

the argumentation of religious movements on sexuality, in both senses public and private, is a decisive fact.

REP provides the theoretical approach that my research needs: the analytical and descriptive where I will

be able to study how religious communities respond and assume religious moral (im)positions over the

determination of sexual rights of minorities.

Also, the REP offers an emphasis on sexuality. Sexuality and gender studies will complement the theoretical

bases to support the analysis of the social set of sexual oppression of minorities in Central America by

religious catholic and pentecostal movements. This proposed research must engage as its methodological

frame, the social analysis of religious moments on sexual policies. Therefore, we have to accomplish a

sociological understanding of the participation of these groups in the discussion and definition of the sexual

ethics and laws.

My career plan should narrow my teaching and writing over the study of the interactions between

religions, particularly Catholic as the major religion in Latin America, and sexuality. My doctoral studies at

Northwestern University will give the ideal formation to explore and deepen over an issue that have always

interested me as one of the central themes of my academic teaching, lectures, papers and my recent book:

Erotic demand. Religion terminable and interminable (forthcoming 2011), a theoretical approximation to

the work of Sigmund Freud on religion, as well as the discussion of this work by the Latin American

Theologians concerned with the sexual struggles of the region.

In Central America both religious institutions and sexual policies were [and still] articulated with the

dominating political structures. Once I finish my doctoral studies in Northwestern University, I will have the

academic formation that allows the promotion of research committed with the introduction of

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Diego A. Soto Morera Statement of Purpose

humanitarian differences in our societies, particularly in the sexual political scenario of Central American

societies.

As a professor and researcher in the Ecumenical School of Sciences of Religion at the National University of

Costa Rica, I am concerned with the religious dimension of Central America on oppression structures and

liberation struggles. In the project: A contribution to the study of Religion in Costa Rica 1989-2009, where I

serve as head researcher of an interdisciplinary group of study of the religious phenomena in Costa Rican

society, I have seen how the research of the religious dimensions of social, political, gender and artistic

movements in Central America represents an actual significant field of study for social, historical and

theological studies, where new research, with new insightful perspectives, has to be done.

Both my bachelor and Masters studies in the Ecumenical School of Sciences of Religion at the National

University of Costa Rica, provides me the background that will support my doctoral program of study at

Northwestern University. Besides, I have always characterized for being among the top students of my

class because of my commitment with doing work of high quality and the passion that I have for my scholar

field of study; as well as my interest and ability to produce interdisciplinary research, papers and work. I

complement these academic attitudes with my curiosity and tendency to be an autodidactic student and

researcher.

I deeply believe that the study of this social interaction ought to contribute in the transformation of

repressive policies within the region. It encourages me to commit myself with the study of the religious

dimensions of society as a contribution to the transformation of intolerant narratives and policies in

Central America, particularly Costa Rica, my home country, my passion.