| Description |
1 online resource (xii, 294 pages) |
| Series |
ACLS Humanities E-Book
|
| Contents |
Introduction -- Planet Hollywood -- Popular religion -- Plastic religion -- Embodied religion -- Sacrificial religion -- Monetary religion -- Global religion -- Transatlantic religion -- Shamanic religion -- Virtual religion -- Planet America |
| Summary |
Authentic Fakes explores the religious dimensions of American popular culture in unexpected places: baseball, the Human Genome Project, Coca-Cola, rock 'n' roll, the rhetoric of Ronald Reagan, the charisma of Jim Jones, Tupperware, and the free market, to name a few. Chidester travels through the cultural landscape and discovers the role that fakery - in the guise of frauds, charlatans, inventions, and simulations - plays in creating religious experience. His book is an analysis of the relationship between religion and popular culture and a celebration of the myriad ways in which invention can stimulate the religious imagination. Moving beyond American borders, Chidester considers the religion of McDonald's and Disney, the discourse of W.E.B. Du Bois and the American movement in Southern Africa, the messianic promise of Nelson Mandela's 1990 tour to America, and more. He also looks at the creative possibilities of the Internet in such phenomena as Discordianism, the Holy Order of the Cheeseburger, and a range of similar inventions. Arguing throughout that religious fakes can do authentic religious work, and that American popular culture is the space of that creative labour, Chidester looks toward a future "pregnant with the possibilities of new kinds of authenticity." |
| Bibliography |
Includes bibliographical references (pages 233-272) and index |
| Subject |
Popular culture -- Religious aspects.
|
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Popular culture -- United States.
|
|
Impostors and imposture.
|
|
11.09 systematic religious studies: other.
|
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Impostors and imposture
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Popular culture
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Popular culture -- Religious aspects
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Religion
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Pop-Kultur
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Religion
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Massenkultur
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Populaire cultuur.
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Religieuze aspecten.
|
|
Verbeelding.
|
| SUBJECT |
United States -- Religion.
http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh85140498
|
| Subject |
United States
|
|
USA
|
| Form |
Electronic book
|
| ISBN |
0520242793 |
|
9780520242791 |
|
0520242807 |
|
9780520242807 |
|
