How Hysterical reads scenes from the films Light It Up, Three Kings, Remember the Titans, Paris is Burning, Boys Don't Cry, and Magnolia alongside biblical texts from Numbers, Exodus, Isaiah, Micah, Ezekiel and Revelation . An innovation in studies on Bible and film, How Hysterical is less centred on direct citation of the Bible in film than on analyses of hypostasized biblical influence in culture. Here, through accessible engagement with feminist, queer, post-colonial and ideological critical theories, Runions discusses the processes by which biblical and filmic texts can both bolster and...

Religious traditions have provided a seemingly endless supply of subject matter for film, from the Ten Commandments to the Mahabharata . At the same time, film production has engendered new religious practices and has altered existing ones, from the cult following of The Rocky Horror Picture Show to the 2001 Australian census in which 70,000 people indicated their religion to be 'Jedi Knight'. Representing Religion in World Cinema begins with these mutual transformations as the contributors query the two-way interrelations between film and religion across cinemas of the world. Cross-cultural...

Religious traditions have provided a seemingly endless supply of subject matter for film, from the Ten Commandments to the Mahabharata . At the same time, film production has engendered new religious practices and has altered existing ones, from the cult following of The Rocky Horror Picture Show to the 2001 Australian census in which 70,000 people indicated their religion to be 'Jedi Knight'. Representing Religion in World Cinema begins with these mutual transformations as the contributors query the two-way interrelations between film and religion across cinemas of the world. Cross-cultural...

This book examines the words and actions of people who live in regions in the state of Maharashtra in Western India to illustrate the idea that regions are not only created by humans, but given meaning through religious practices. By exploring the people living in the area of Maharashtra, Feldhaus draws some very interesting conclusions about how people differentiate one region from others, and how we use stories, rituals, and ceremonies to recreate their importance. Feldhaus discovers that religious meanings attached to regions do not necessarily have a political teleology. According to...

Americans in the 1950s faced the challenge of negotiating the new medium's place in the home and in American culture in general. Using the American Protestant experience of the introduction of television, Rosenthal illustrates the importance of the interplay between a new medium and its users.

White Theology re-examines white race privilege throughout history and its relationship to black theology. James W. Perkinson articulates a white theology of responsibility responding to the claims of James Cone (and other black scholars) that serious engagement with history and culture must be at the heart of any American projection of integrity or "salvation" in the modern period. Perkinson interweaves autobiography and postcolonial analysis, history, and phenomenology to explore white supremacy and the future of religious studies. This is an essential and groundbreaking book for courses in...

This volume is an engaging and provocative introduction to Feminist Biblical Studies. The authors draw upon their own social, cultural and religious backgrounds and experiences in reading the New Testament as feminists in the context of globalization. They provide intentional interpretations of biblical texts that cast gender, race, class and power relationships as issues inherent in both the content and context of scripture and its interpretation. The essays call into question feminist social engagement that does not extend beyond academic halls, churches and Christians, suggesting...

This volume brings together compelling new research on South Asian women who have renounced worldly life for spiritual pursuits. Documenting contemporary women's experiences with intimate ethnographic narratives, this book offers feminist insights into Jain, Buddhist, Hindu and Baul ascetic traditions.

Retheorizing Religion in Nepal is an engaging and thought-provoking study of religion in South Asia, with important insights for the study of religion and culture more broadly conceived. Grieve uses ethnographic material as well as postsctructuralist and postcolonialist approaches to critique and expand religious studies as a discipline.

This groundbreaking work explores media scholar Sut Jhally's thesis that advertising functions as a religion in late capitalism and relates this to critical theological studies. Sheffield argues that advertising is not itself a religion, but that it contains religious dimensions - analogous to Durkheim's description of objects as totems.