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Religious Freedom: The Contested History of an American Ideal Hardcover – October 2, 2017

by Tisa Wenger (Author)

2 customer reviews

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Religious freedom is so often presented as a timeless American ideal and an inalienable right, appearing fully formed at the founding of the United States. That is simply not so, Tisa Wenger contends in this sweeping and brilliantly argued book. Instead, American ideas about religious freedom were continually reinvented through a vibrant national discourse--Wenger calls it "religious freedom talk--that cannot possibly be separated from the evolving politics of race and empire.

More often than not, Wenger demonstrates, religious freedom talk worked to privilege the dominant white Christian population. At the same time, a diverse array of minority groups at home and colonized people abroad invoked and reinterpreted this ideal to defend themselves and their ways of life. In so doing they posed sharp challenges to the racial and religious exclusions of American life. People of almost every religious stripe have argued, debated, negotiated, and brought into being an ideal called American religious freedom, subtly transforming their own identities and traditions in the process. In a post-9/11 world, Wenger reflects, public attention to religious freedom and its implications is as consequential as it has ever been.

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Editorial Reviews

Review

A convincing and illuminating book about a little-studied facet of American religious history.--Publishers Weekly

Wenger asks: What are Americans really talking about when they talk about religious freedom? In part, they are invoking one of the United States's 'signal contributions to the larger causes of liberty and democracy around the world.' Equally relevant is the inverse of that question: What are Americans not talking about when we talk about religious freedom? That is, what concerns and issues are typically masked by religious freedom discourse? Race and empire—terms that do not harmonize quite as well with the American Dream—are often just below the surface of national conversations about religious freedom, Wenger finds." --Los Angeles Review of Books

A breakthrough study that . . . disturbs comfortable myths . . . [Wenger's] insights are highly relevant to an age in which religious freedom is once again claimed to support exemptions from anti-discrimination laws, as in the Masterpiece Cakeshop case currently pending in the Supreme Court.--Sarah Barrringer Gordon, Jotwell: The Journal of Things We Like (Lots)

Tisa Wenger's Religious Freedom is so compelling that I wish there was more of it.--Reading Religion

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Theoretically informed, brilliantly argued, clearly organized, carefully evidenced, beautifully written, and wonderfully textured, Religious Freedom is an important book. Exploring the triangulation of religion, race, and empire--and how they are mutually shaped--Tisa Wenger has advanced our understanding of the dilemma of religious freedom.--David Chidester, author of Empire of Religion

Tisa Wenger has crafted a riveting account of how the Western deployment of religious freedom emerged within the immanent frame of empire. As she examines transnational networks of race, colonialism, and religion, Wenger elucidates the historical and theoretical conundrums of civilizing missions, Indigeneity, democratization, subaltern agencies, and modern terrors that have rendered freedom of religion as a global formation. This is surely the high-water mark of interdisciplinary scholarship on religious freedom, and it sets a new standard.--Sylvester Johnson, author of African American Religions, 1500-2000

In this ambitious and impressive book, Tisa Wenger makes the compelling argument that American religious freedom is inseparable from the logics of race and empire. Broadly imagined and painstakingly researched, Religious Freedom will be of value to general readers and scholars alike.--Tracy Fessenden, author of Culture and Redemption

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Product details

Hardcover: 312 pages
Publisher: The University of North Carolina Press (October 2, 2017)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1469634627
ISBN-13: 978-1469634623
Product Dimensions: 6.8 x 1.2 x 9.8 inches
Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
Average Customer Review: 2 customer reviews
Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #296,609 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #694 in Books > Politics & Social Sciences > Politics & Government > Specific Topics > Civil Rights & Liberties
- #710 in Books > Religion & Spirituality > Religious Studies > Comparative Religion
- #1384 in Books > Politics & Social Sciences > Sociology > Race Relations > Discrimination & Racism

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Linda Mehta

It is timely because we in the United States seem to be poised at a watershed moment in our history as we begin to better recognize the different experiences of non-dominant groups in our ...

October 24, 2017

Format: HardcoverVerified Purchase

This is an important book for many reasons, but it's particularly timely in its examination of the cultural assumptions guiding the policies and ambitions of empire-building and colonial governance. It is timely because we in the United States seem to be poised at a watershed moment in our history as we begin to better recognize the different experiences of non-dominant groups in our culture and the limitations imposed upon them by the same cultural assumptions about the natural order of things that were held by the colonial powers over the colonized, those who had no fear of being enslaved over those who were enslaved, and, yes, men over women. The times they are a changin' as the song goes, and this book has the capacity to speak truth to (and about) power and support those changes that will make us a better people.

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Elizabeth Bucar

Turns out religious freedom is not such an easy or natural ideal as we thought

February 25, 2018

Format: HardcoverVerified Purchase

Turns out religious freedom is not such an easy or natural ideal as we thought....and as a concept it has shaped the way Americans think about race, identity, poltics and religion in important ways. An important book by a rock-star scholar.

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