The Blackwell Companion to Religion in America / Edition 1

by Philip Goff

Overview

This authoritative and cutting edge companion brings together a team of leading scholars to document the rich diversity and unique viewpoints that have formed the religious history of the United States.

• A groundbreaking new volume which represents the first sustained effort to fully explain the development of American religious history and its creation within evolving political and social frameworks
• Spans a wide range of traditions and movements, from the Baptists and Methodists, to Buddhists and Mormons
• Explores topics ranging from religion and the media, immigration, and piety, though to politics and social reform
• Considers how American religion has influenced and been interpreted in literature and popular culture
• Provides insights into the historiography of religion, but presents the subject as a story in motion rather than a snapshot of where the field is at a given moment

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781405169363
Publisher:	Wiley
Publication date:	05/10/2010
Series:	Wiley Blackwell Companions to Religion , #32
Pages:	752
Product dimensions:	6.90(w) x 9.90(h) x 1.80(d)

About the Author

Philip Goff is Director of the Center for the Study of Religion and American Culture and Professor of Religious Studies and American Studies at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis. He is the author or editor of numerous books and articles, including co-editor, with Paul Harvey, of Themes in Religion and American Culture (2004) and The Columbia Documentary History of Religion in America Since 1945 (2005). For ten years he has been Senior Co-editor of Religion and American Culture: A Journal of Interpretation. Dedicated to public teaching, he has also been a scriptwriter and an interviewee on documentaries related to religion in American life for PBS, BBC, and HBO. Goff is a leading interpreter of religion’s role in contemporary American life, and has been named in Who’s Who Among Teachers, Who’s Who in America, and Who’s Who in the World.

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Table of Contents

Introduction by Philip Goff.

List of Contributors.

Interpreting American Religion.

Surveying Religion in America (Philip Goff, Indiana University – Purdue University, Indianapolis).

Religion in American Society and Culture.

American Revolution (Thomas Kidd, Baylor University).

Borderlands (Kristy Nabhan-Warren, Augustana College).

Church and State (Derek Davis, University of Mary Hardin-Baylor).

Civil Religion (Ira Chernus, University of Colorado).

Class and Labor ((Richard Callahan, University of Missouri).

Denominations (Russell Richey, Emory University).

Economics (James Hudnut-Beumler, Vanderbilt University).

Family (Rebecca Davis, University of Delaware).

Film (Judith Weisenfeld, Princeton University).

Gender (Sarah Johnson, Gustavus Adlophus College).

Health (Christopher White, Vassar College).

Sensory Cultures Material and Visual Religion ((Sally Promey, Yale University and Shira Brisman, Yale University).

Media (Robert Fortner, Calvin College).

Millennialism (Stephen Stein, Indiana University).

Missions (Wilbur Shenk, Fuller Graduate School of Intercultural Studies).

Piety, Practice, and Ritual (Kathryn Lofton, Yale University).

Popular Culture (John Schmalzbauer, Missouri State University).

Race and Ethnicity (Robero Trevino, University of Texas).

Regions (Philip Barlow, Utah State University).

Revivals (Michael McClymond, Saint Louis University).

Science (William Durbin, Washington Theological Union).

Social Reform (Zoe Trodd, UNC-Chapel Hill).

Theology and Beliefs (Robert Brown, James Madison University).

Women (Susanna Morrill, Lewis & Clark College).

Traditions and Movements

American Indians (Tracy Leavelle, Creighton University).

Anabaptists ((David Weaver-Zercher, Messiah College).

Baptists (Paul Harvey, University of Colorado).

Black Church (Sylvester Johnson, Indiana University).

Buddhism (Charles Prebish, Utah State University).

Catholicism to 1945 (Michael Pasquier, Louisiana State University).

Catholicism since 1945 (Philip Gleason, University of Notre Dame).

Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (David Whittaker, Brigham Young University).

Eastern Orthodox Christianity (Amy Slagle, University of Southern Mississippi).

Evangelicalism (Darren Dochuk, Purdue University).

Hinduism ((Khyati Joshi, Fairleigh Dickinson University).

Holiness and Pentecostalism ((Jonathan Baer, Wabash College).

Islam (Edward E. Curtis IV, Indiana University-Purdue University).

Judaism (Yaakov Ariel, University of North Carolina))

Lutherans (Susan McCarver, Lutheran Theological Southern Seminary).

New and Homegrown Religions (Sean McCloud, University of North Carolina).

Protestant Liberalism (Mark Hulsether, University of Tennessee).

Reformed Protestantism (Darryl Hart).

Wesleyan Tradition (Christopher Evans, Colgate Rochester Crozer Divinity School).

What People are Saying About This

Crispin N'Landa

"A remarkable achievement. This work draws on an impressive array of scholars of American religion to provide in brief and accessible form a series of introductions to key topics in the field, including excellent bibliographies. It should be on the desk of anyone who teaches about religion in America."
—Peter W Williams, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio

“These helpful and well-chosen essays supplement existing encyclopedias by focusing upon how the study of religion in America itself has changed. Students and scholars alike will appreciate the volume’s reflections on defining and studying the field, following it from its origins in ‘church history’ to the present-day mix of approaches, strategies, and new topics that characterize American religious history. In short, the Companion tells us how we got from there to here."
—Paula Kane, University of Pittsburgh

"An excellent addition to the field. It delineates the state of American religious historiography across a broad spectrum, with admirable sophistication and depth. Individual essays will be helpful to researchers of specific topics, and the volume as a whole will be an invaluable resource for scholars and students in American religious history for years to come."
—Marie Griffith, Harvard University

From the Publisher

"A remarkable achievement. This work draws on an impressive array of scholars of American religion to provide in brief and accessible form a series of introductions to key topics in the field, including excellent bibliographies. It should be on the desk of anyone who teaches about religion in America."
—Peter W Williams, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio

“These helpful and well-chosen essays supplement existing encyclopedias by focusing upon how the study of religion in America itself has changed. Students and scholars alike will appreciate the volume’s reflections on defining and studying the field, following it from its origins in ‘church history’ to the present-day mix of approaches, strategies, and new topics that characterize American religious history. In short, the Companion tells us how we got from there to here."
—Paula Kane, University of Pittsburgh

"An excellent addition to the field. It delineates the state of American religious historiography across a broad spectrum, with admirable sophistication and depth. Individual essays will be helpful to researchers of specific topics, and the volume as a whole will be an invaluable resource for scholars and students in American religious history for years to come."
—Marie Griffith, Harvard University

Editorial Reviews

Overall, the historical synopses, literature reviews, and bibliographic listings contained in the essays of this volume should all prove extremely helpful to serious students of American religious history. Graduate students and scholars alike will find this book to be an accessible and useful entry point into this field of study.”  (Journal of Religious History, 20 January 2014)

“For anyone interested in knowing more about the history and present state of scholarship on religion in America, this is an invaluable work, and the place to begin one’s search.”  (Lutheran Quarterly, 2012)

 

From the Publisher