Abstract
The author claims that describing New Age is easier if one treats it as a part of postmodern culture. The main features of New Age when viewed thus are: lack of a clear definition of the term itself or of its spatio-temporal contexts; a network structure; the erosion of extremes of cultural categories (high/low culture, East/West, ritual/game, global/local, body/soul, inside/outside); holism; transformation; autonomy of the different elements. New Age appears to have introduced new forms of spirituality. The author characterizes religious phenomena by situating them in categories such as levelling of the esoteric; individualism; rejection of tradition; relativization; differentiation; perennialization. The individual experience seems to be the central phenomenon, at the heart of the network of ideas and of the identification of spirituality. This experience, however, also relates to collectivities at the global level.