Abstract:This article argues that new religious movements (NRMs) develop as cultural interlocutors. As emergent social bodies that respond to extant norms, structures, and values, NRMs can deploy cultural products as a shared vocabulary and grammar in their response to surrounding society. To demonstrate this approach's ability to parse NRMs' relations to popular culture while highlighting organizationally distinctive dimensions of such interactions, this article examines Jim Jones's references to visual media shown in Jonestown in 1978. Jones critiqued movies and television as tools of social control, repurposed documentaries and films as evidence to support his proffered doctrine, and creatively presented movies as analogues of the commune's perceived challenges. This threefold hermeneutic shaped the Peoples Temple's beliefs and behavior, as well as its own media productions.
{"title":"Watching Movies in Jonestown: A Cultural Interlocutor Approach to Visual Media and New Religions","authors":"Kristian Klippenstein","doi":"10.3138/jrpc.2020-0027","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3138/jrpc.2020-0027","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract:This article argues that new religious movements (NRMs) develop as cultural interlocutors. As emergent social bodies that respond to extant norms, structures, and values, NRMs can deploy cultural products as a shared vocabulary and grammar in their response to surrounding society. To demonstrate this approach's ability to parse NRMs' relations to popular culture while highlighting organizationally distinctive dimensions of such interactions, this article examines Jim Jones's references to visual media shown in Jonestown in 1978. Jones critiqued movies and television as tools of social control, repurposed documentaries and films as evidence to support his proffered doctrine, and creatively presented movies as analogues of the commune's perceived challenges. This threefold hermeneutic shaped the Peoples Temple's beliefs and behavior, as well as its own media productions.","PeriodicalId":38290,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Religion and Popular Culture","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-01-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49209103","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Prayers for Ancestors, Spirits, and Gods: Focusing on the ritual combination of divine beings","authors":"I. Sim","doi":"10.46263/rc.41.4.","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.46263/rc.41.4.","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":38290,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Religion and Popular Culture","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2021-12-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"83112694","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"A Study on Korean Divinatory Prose-poetry: Transition and Development from Ch?ng’s Predictions to Divinatory Prose-poetry","authors":"Byoung Hoon Park","doi":"10.46263/rc.41.1.","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.46263/rc.41.1.","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":38290,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Religion and Popular Culture","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2021-12-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"80072571","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The Religions of the Other Represented in the Novels of Annie L. A. Baird","authors":"Won-il Bhang","doi":"10.46263/rc.41.3.","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.46263/rc.41.3.","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":38290,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Religion and Popular Culture","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2021-12-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"88346072","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"A Study on the Theory of the Ascension to the Throne of Cha Kyung-seok in the 1920s","authors":"Ingyu Park","doi":"10.46263/rc.41.2.","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.46263/rc.41.2.","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":38290,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Religion and Popular Culture","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2021-12-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"83233461","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"What can Orthodox Christianity Learn from Postmodernism?: Merold Westphal’s Hermeneutics of Finitude and His Own Appropriation of Postmodernism to Religion","authors":"Dongkyu Kim","doi":"10.46263/rc.41.6.","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.46263/rc.41.6.","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":38290,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Religion and Popular Culture","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2021-12-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"75354079","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Juli L. Gittinger, William S. Chavez, Shyam K. Sriram, Ewan Bowlby, David Tuipulotu-Tuinukuafe, P. Anthony
Abstract:The term "prepper" or "survivalist" has long been associated with more conservative or politically right-leaning communities who have operated at the fringe of society for decades. Since the new millennium, this hobby of preparedness has increased and, most recently, shown a rise among liberal or left-leaning communities. This essay addresses the rise in liberal prepper culture not only as a political response to right-wing politics, but as a fear heightened by the realities of climate change and its impact on humanity, thus creating an eco-religion centred on ethical and moral responsibilities, with an overall apocalyptic hue.
{"title":"Liberal Prepping as Apocalyptic Eco-Religion","authors":"Juli L. Gittinger, William S. Chavez, Shyam K. Sriram, Ewan Bowlby, David Tuipulotu-Tuinukuafe, P. Anthony","doi":"10.3138/jrpc.2020-0026","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3138/jrpc.2020-0026","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract:The term \"prepper\" or \"survivalist\" has long been associated with more conservative or politically right-leaning communities who have operated at the fringe of society for decades. Since the new millennium, this hobby of preparedness has increased and, most recently, shown a rise among liberal or left-leaning communities. This essay addresses the rise in liberal prepper culture not only as a political response to right-wing politics, but as a fear heightened by the realities of climate change and its impact on humanity, thus creating an eco-religion centred on ethical and moral responsibilities, with an overall apocalyptic hue.","PeriodicalId":38290,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Religion and Popular Culture","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2021-12-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46607637","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
From the fight over the addition of God to the Pledge of Allegiance to religious satire on late night television, Anthony Hatcher argues in Religion and Media in America that American media, popular culture, and Christianity are inextricably linked by their history, development, and mutual impact on one another. While the book’s title and introduction promise a history and examination of the deep ties between American media and religion, the book discusses a range of cultural artifacts and focuses solely on Christianity.
{"title":"Religion and Media in America","authors":"Karlin Andersen","doi":"10.3138/jrpc.2020-0053","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3138/jrpc.2020-0053","url":null,"abstract":"From the fight over the addition of God to the Pledge of Allegiance to religious satire on late night television, Anthony Hatcher argues in Religion and Media in America that American media, popular culture, and Christianity are inextricably linked by their history, development, and mutual impact on one another. While the book’s title and introduction promise a history and examination of the deep ties between American media and religion, the book discusses a range of cultural artifacts and focuses solely on Christianity.","PeriodicalId":38290,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Religion and Popular Culture","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2021-12-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"69366114","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This excellent cultural history of the special evolving relationship between the arts in the US and Israel, including music, theatre, dance, film, literature, and television is a tour de force. It shows how the role of artists’ relationships to Israel has influenced how Americans often perceive Israel. These intertwined cultural histories of the US and Israel have shaped one another and destined Israel’s image. Books, films, TV, and music have played a significant role in forming American public views of Israel by depictions with subthemes of socialism, imperialism, racial justice, and Christian missionary efforts. A strength of the book is that Goldman, in the process of writing an outstanding cultural history, reveals much knowledge in areas of political science, historical background of the Middle East, foreign policy and diplomacy, Israeli public relations, Israel’s perceived international image, and world religious history. The book superbly shows how American cultural forces in the performing arts are part of the process of the American-Israeli story that is the most consequential international alliance. While much has been written about the diplomatic, military, and religious aspects of the relationship between the US and Israel, Goldman reveals that the mediating role of the power of the arts has shaped and destined the US-Israeli special relationship of the world stage. Goldman demonstrates how American artists who have journeyed to Israel to perform, lecture, and rivet fans have not only expressed but influenced the American special relationship with Israel. The wide scope, not only chronologically but for its far-ranging noetic ken, that incorporates a wide net to help understanding of the special relationship Israel has with the US, is refreshing to see in an age of narrow academic specialization. While containing many important details, it does not lose sight of the forest for the trees and traces broad general trends. A second strength is Goldman’s piercing analytic penetration that brings to light the leftright political divisions that form a subconscious background to historical unfoldings since the foundation of the United States. With this analytical penetration, Goldman is able to demonstrate that Christian support for Israel—primarily amongst Protestants, and to a lesser degree amongst Catholics—was and remains the central and determining part of Israel’s establishment, support, and growth, founded on the central place of reading the world’s destiny and fate into the Bible through Christian interpretation of Biblical prophecy. Recently this Christian Right has played a role in support of moving the American embassy to Jerusalem, scrapping the Obama-era US-Iran Deal, and recognizing that Judea and Samaria are not illegal but the rightful borders of Israel as described in the reigns of King David and Solomon. Thirdly, Goldman is able to focus and identify clear turning points in US-Israeli relations through the political sea cha
{"title":"Starstruck in the Promised Land: How the Arts Shaped American Passions About Israel by Shalom Goldman (review)","authors":"D. Levy","doi":"10.3138/jrpc.2021-0009","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3138/jrpc.2021-0009","url":null,"abstract":"This excellent cultural history of the special evolving relationship between the arts in the US and Israel, including music, theatre, dance, film, literature, and television is a tour de force. It shows how the role of artists’ relationships to Israel has influenced how Americans often perceive Israel. These intertwined cultural histories of the US and Israel have shaped one another and destined Israel’s image. Books, films, TV, and music have played a significant role in forming American public views of Israel by depictions with subthemes of socialism, imperialism, racial justice, and Christian missionary efforts. A strength of the book is that Goldman, in the process of writing an outstanding cultural history, reveals much knowledge in areas of political science, historical background of the Middle East, foreign policy and diplomacy, Israeli public relations, Israel’s perceived international image, and world religious history. The book superbly shows how American cultural forces in the performing arts are part of the process of the American-Israeli story that is the most consequential international alliance. While much has been written about the diplomatic, military, and religious aspects of the relationship between the US and Israel, Goldman reveals that the mediating role of the power of the arts has shaped and destined the US-Israeli special relationship of the world stage. Goldman demonstrates how American artists who have journeyed to Israel to perform, lecture, and rivet fans have not only expressed but influenced the American special relationship with Israel. The wide scope, not only chronologically but for its far-ranging noetic ken, that incorporates a wide net to help understanding of the special relationship Israel has with the US, is refreshing to see in an age of narrow academic specialization. While containing many important details, it does not lose sight of the forest for the trees and traces broad general trends. A second strength is Goldman’s piercing analytic penetration that brings to light the leftright political divisions that form a subconscious background to historical unfoldings since the foundation of the United States. With this analytical penetration, Goldman is able to demonstrate that Christian support for Israel—primarily amongst Protestants, and to a lesser degree amongst Catholics—was and remains the central and determining part of Israel’s establishment, support, and growth, founded on the central place of reading the world’s destiny and fate into the Bible through Christian interpretation of Biblical prophecy. Recently this Christian Right has played a role in support of moving the American embassy to Jerusalem, scrapping the Obama-era US-Iran Deal, and recognizing that Judea and Samaria are not illegal but the rightful borders of Israel as described in the reigns of King David and Solomon. Thirdly, Goldman is able to focus and identify clear turning points in US-Israeli relations through the political sea cha","PeriodicalId":38290,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Religion and Popular Culture","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2021-12-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42362910","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Devotions and Desires: Histories of Sexuality and Religion in the Twentieth-Century United States by Gillian Frank, Bethany Moreton, Heather R. White (review)","authors":"David Tuipulotu-Tuinukuafe","doi":"10.3138/jrpc.2021-0045","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3138/jrpc.2021-0045","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":38290,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Religion and Popular Culture","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2021-12-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42309646","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}