This text includes statistical data and observations of cultures in Oceania. For each culture, it examines its history, settlements, economy, cultural relations, land tenure kinship, marriage and family, religion and sociopolitical organization.
This book introduces students to the best recent writings on the Scientific Revolution of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.
It covers a wide range of topics including astronomy, science and religion, natural philosophy, technology, medicine and alchemy.
Religion in World History: The Persistence of Imperial Communion
Added by: evren85 | Karma: 163.59 | Other | 17 May 2008
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In Religion and World History, distinguished authors John C. Super and Briane K. Turley examine the value of religion for interpreting the human experience in the past and present. They explore the elements of religion which best connect it to the cultural and political dynamics that have influenced history. Working within this framework, Super and Turley present three unifying themes: the relationship between formal and informal religious beliefs, how these change through time, and how they are reflected in different cultures; the relationship between church and state, from theocracies to the repression of religion; and the ongoing search for spiritual certainty, and the consequent splintering of core religious beliefs and the development of new ones. One of the few recent books to examine religion's role in geo-political affairs, its unique approach enables the reader to grasp the many and complex ways in which religion acts upon and reacts to broader global processes.
In a society overrun by commercial clutter, religion has become yet another product sold in the consumer marketplace, and faiths of all kinds must compete with a myriad of more entertaining and more convenient leisure activities. Brands of Faith argues that in order to compete effectively, faiths have had to become brands - easily recognizable symbols and spokespeople with whom religious prospects can make immediate connections.
Mara Einstein shows how religious branding has expanded over the past twenty years to create a blended world of commerce and faith, where the sacred becomes secular and the secular sacred. In a series of fascinating case studies of faith brands, she explores the significance of branded church courses, such as Alpha and The Purpose Driven Life, mega-churches, and the popularity of the televangelist Joel Olsteen and television presenter Oprah Winfrey, as well as the rise of Kaballah. She asks what the consequences of this religious marketing will be, and outlines the possible results of religious commercialism - good and bad. Repackaging religion - updating music, creating teen-targeted bibles - is justifiable and necessary. However, when the content becomes obscured, religion may lose its unique selling proposition - the very ability to raise us above the market.
Nineteenth-Century Religion and Literature: An Introduction by Mark Knight and Emma Mason Recent scholarship in nineteenth-century
literary studies consistently recognizes the profound importance of
religion, even as it marginalizes the topic. There are few, if any,
challenging yet manageable introductions to religion and literature in
the long-nineteenth century, a factor that serves to fuel scholars'
neglect of theological issues. This book aims to show how religion,
specifically Christianity, is integral to the literature and culture of
this period. It provides close readings of popular texts and integrates
these with accessible explanations of complex religious ideas. Written
by two scholars who have published widely on religion and literature,
the book offers a detailed grounding in the main religious movements of
the period 1750-1914. The dominant traditions of High Anglicanism,
Tractarianism, Evangelicalism and Roman Catholicism are contextualized
by preceding chapters addressing dissenting culture (primarily
Presbyterianism, Methodism, Unitarianism and Quakerism), and the
question of secularization is considered in the light of the diversity
and capacity for renewal within the Christian faith. Throughout the
book the authors untangle theological and church debates in a manner
that highlights the privileged relationship between religion and
literature in the period. The book also gives readers a language to
approach and articulate their own 'religious' readings of texts, texts
that are often concerned with slippery subjects such as the divine, the
non-material and the nature of religious experience. Refusing to shut
down religious debate by offering only narrow or fixed definitions of
Christian traditions, the book also questions the demarcation of sacred
material from secular, as well as connecting the vitality of religion
in the period to a broader literary culture. (Amazon.com)
