Religion, Popular Culture, and the Nineties
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Description
This edited collection illuminates how religion shaped what it meant to live, believe, and belong at the turn of the millennium.
The nineteen-nineties occupy a paradoxical place in American cultural memory as both a space of nostalgia and profound socio-cultural transformation. In this edited collection, Ilaria W. Biano and her contributors consider a decade in which religion and spirituality were not confined to traditional institutions, but became deeply entangled with popular culture, shaping both public imagination and private practice. Both the Satanic Panic and the persistence of "culture wars" over school curricula, abortion, and civil rights pivotally informed the cultural production of that decade.
Across eighteen chapters, Biano and her contributors discuss how the nineteen-nineties amplified and diversified the entanglement of religion and popular culture, embedding spirituality into new genres, formats, and technologies. The essays herein span subjects including Five Percenter Rap, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and Magic: The Gathering, revealing an arena where religion was performed, contested, and transformed. This collection, therefore, approaches the nineteen-nineties not as a backdrop for religion, but as a decade in which popular culture was one of the principal sites where religious meaning was renegotiated.
Table of Contents
Part 1 – Screens of Belief: Irony, Satire, and Moral Ambiguity
Chapter 1: Yada, Yada, Yada, Amen: DIY Spirituality in Seinfeld, Keola R. Whittaker (Starr King School for the Ministry, USA)
Chapter 2: The Crypt Keeper as God's Avenger in Tales from the Crypt (HBO, 1989-1996), David K. Goodin (Université Laval, Canada)
Chapter 3: Virtue Isn't Virtue Unless It Slams Up Against Vice: Living Faith in the Works of Tom Fontana, Abel Fenwick (University of Arkansas, USA) and Ashley Chateau (Independent Scholar, USA)
Chapter 4: The Deep Space Nine-ties: Re-enchanting the Star Trek Franchise, Matthew Calloway (Independent Scholar, USA)
Chapter 5: Where the Madness Is: Disciplinary Subjection in Terry Gilliam's 12 Monkeys, John C. McDowell (Yarra Theological Union, Australia)
Chapter 6: Religion and the End of the Nineties in Kevin Smith's Dogma, Mark Henderson (Tuskegee University, USA)
Chapter 7: “Jesus Loves Winners”: Performative Christian Identity in Michael Patrick Jann's Drop Dead Gorgeous, Lo Riddell (Independent Scholar, USA)
Part 2 – Sonic and Digital Ecstasies: Games, Music, and Reenchantment
Chapter 8: Cardboard Church: Religion and Magic: The Gathering, Zechariah Houser (Independent Scholar, USA)
Chapter 9: Hell in the Hard Drive: Doom Franchise and the Techno-Religious Imaginary of the 1990s, Tijana Rupcic (Polish Academy of Sciences, Poland)
Chapter 10: “Running in the 90s”: Fleeing Religious Violence from EarthBound to Silent Hill, Trevor Babcock (Williams Baptist University, USA)
Chapter 11: Mystic Bits: New Age Music and Aesthetics in the Imaginaries of 16-Bit RPGs, Luka Douridas (UCLA, USA)
Chapter 12: The Mind of God: Digital Cosmology and Religious Redemption in 1990s Cyberpunk Culture, Ari Ben-Arie (Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel)
Chapter 13: From God Body to Odd Hajji: the Dynamic Tension between Five Percenter Rap and Sunni Islam in 1990s Hip Hop, Martin Abdel Matin Gansinger (American University in the Emirates, AUE)
Part 3 – Bodies and Publics: Religion, Power, and Cultural Politics
Chapter 14: A Three-cord Strand: Bill Gothard, Pro-Life, and Purity Culture as Foundational to Christian Nationalism, Neal Foster (Independent Scholar, USA)
Chapter 15: Consolidating the Cross: The Telecommunications Act of 1996 and an Electronic Church for the Digital Age, Mark Ward Sr. (Texas A&M University, USA)
Chapter 16: Cone's Spirituality, Priest's Panther: Black Panther and Black Liberation Theology, Douglas Clarke (Wilfrid Laurier University, Canada)
Chapter 17: Casual Buddhism: How Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Played with Buddhism and Won, Jennifer L. Lê (Bellevue College, USA) and Myron T. Strong (Community College of Baltimore County, USA)
Chapter 18: Postsecular anxieties: religion, technology, and conspiracy in Dean Koontz's Sole Survivor and the Moonlight Bay novels, Ilaria W. Biano (Independent Scholar, Italy)
Product details
| Published | Feb 04 2027 |
|---|---|
| Format | Hardback |
| Edition | 1st |
| Pages | 288 |
| ISBN | 9798765157985 |
| Imprint | Bloomsbury Academic |
| Illustrations | 4 bw illus |
| Dimensions | 9 x 6 inches |
| Series | Theology, Religion, and Pop Culture |
| Publisher | Bloomsbury Publishing |
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