Most works on media developments and Christianity approach the subject from the perspective of the implications of new media technologies for traditional Christian practices or how churches can use new media to further their goals. The common framework of analysis is a 'given reality' of traditional institutional Christianity and how it interacts with, affects and is affected by media. Media are treated as a separate cultural reality. This book presents, in an accessible form, the new directions that approach the interaction of media and religion from a cultural perspective, and illustrates these new directions by a number of international and intercultural case studies and explorations. Looking at how global media are constructing cultural forms, structures and processes, the authors show how these have become the life out of which individual and social meaning is created and practiced. Examining how individuals create religious meaning by interacting with media of various kinds, crossing boundaries of traditional religious cultures and contemporary media cultures, this book reveals how Christian institutions are also defined in the process of living culturally within their broader media context.
Mary Hess is Associate Professor of Educational Leadership at Luther Seminary, where she has taught since 2000. She has a BA from Yale, an MTS from Harvard and a PHD from Boston College. She directed the Religious Education and Challenge of Media Culture Project prior to coming to Luther, and currently directs the Open Source Religious Resources project, which is developing the www.feautor.org site. Her most recent books include Teaching Reflectively in Theological Contexts: Promises and Contradictions, and Engaging Technology in Theological Education. She is a frequent contributor to the journal Religious Education. She is currently president-elect of the Religious Education Association/Association of Professors and Researchers in Religious Education, and a member of the Catholic Theological Society of America, the College Theology Society, and the American Academy of Religion. She consults widely with US theological school faculties on topics of distributed learning and pedagogy, and has worked with both the Wabash Center and the Lexington Seminar. She has written the blog Tensegrities since early 2003, and is active in a variety of digital contexts.
