God in the Details: American Religion in Popular Culture [Hardcover]

Eric Michael Mazur (Editor), Kate McCarthy (Editor)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 29, 2000

God in the Details offers a provocative look at the breadth, diversity, and persistence of religious themes in contemporary American consciousness. Throughout the book, the contributors critically assess the ways in which American popular culture reappropriates traditional religious symbols to serve the purposes of particular communities.

Editorial Reviews

Review

The insights explored in this volume provide rich resources for the student of missiology for the crucial task of engaging contemporary American culture, not only from an anthropological, but also from a missiological perspective. -- Eddie Gibbs, Missiology: An International Review
Mazur and McCarthy present a rich collection of ethnographic research detailing the religious myths and practices exhibited through a variety of expressions of popular culture. -- Religious Studies Review
...lively and fun-filled... Recommended for all readership levels. -- D. W. Ferm, Choice
With this book's smart and insightful authors acting as your guides, you can leave behind the seemingly secular surface of American popular culture, come to understand the religious impulses coursing through music and television, feel their pulse, tap their energy, and in the end reach another country where ordinary things reveal unexpected significance. Be a hero. Take the journey. -- Joel Martin, co-editor of Screening the Sacred: Religion, Mythology and Ideology in Popular American Film
Seeking not 'religious things' but religious meanings, the authors in this excellent collection address such diverse and pervasive interests in North American culture as football, dieting, southern barbeque, cop shows, rap, and religion on TV. Simultaneously sympathetic and critical, they propose new ways of thinking about popular culture and its effects. -- Margaret R. Miles, author of Seeing and Believing: Religion and Values in the Movies
Contributors delve into various popular subcultures such as rap music, multi-user domains (MUDs), the world of Disney, and Jimmy Buffett's faithful Parrotheads. These categories offer fascinating findings because they uncover novel communities of real-life people who exhibit religious devotion in alternative religious settings. -- Religious Studies Review
Mazur and McCarthy present a rich collection of ethnographic research detailing the religious myths and practices exhibited through a variety of expressions of popular culture. -- Tim Van Meter, Bethany Theological Seminary

About the Author

Eric Mazur is Assistant Professor of Religion at Bucknell University and author of The Americanization of Religious Minorities (1999). Kate McCarthy is Assistant Professor of Religious Studies at California State University in Chico.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 352 pages
• Publisher: Routledge; 1 edition (November 29, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0415925630
• ISBN-13: 978-0415925631
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.2 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #5,773,876 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Good Idea and OK Attempt, October 12, 2002

By 

John Vickery (Memphis, TN United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: God in the Details: American Religion in Popular Culture (Paperback)

This book is an attempt to highlight venues in American popular culture that contain elements of religion or replace it all together. The thesis sounds very intriguing and caught my attention right off. At times, however, the essays that compose the book seem to be too much of a stretch. They can seem to force the analogy of religion to some topics. Not all the meat of the essays is unfounded. Many points that are raised are worth reading. I perhaps had higher expectations of the book and was therefore a little disappointed in what insight it had being surrounded by superfluous discussion. The essays are intelligently written and carry a heavily academic tone. Overall, I gained a few insights, but not what I would consider 313 pages worth.