Journal of the American Academy of Religion - current issue

2008 Presidential Address: Walking on the Rim Bones of Nothingness: Scholarship and Activism

Townes, E. M. — 2009-05-09

Jesus Freak and the Junkyard Prophet: The School Assembly as Evangelical Revival

Ebel, J. H. — 2009-05-09

The Christian Wrestling Federation (CWF) and You Can Run But You Cannot Hide (YCR) are two evangelical revivalistic ministries working through popular forms—professional-style wrestling and rock music—to convince young men and women to become Christians. Each group also stages character education assemblies in public schools across the United States. This article describes the activities of these two groups, places each in the broader context of the history of American revivalism, and discusses some of the issues raised by their inclusion in public school curricula. Conservative evangelical discontent with American public education is amply documented, as are attempts by local, state, and national organizations to make more room for Christianity in schools. Revivalist character educators have received almost no attention as part of this "Christianization" effort, yet their work helps frame and answer persistent questions about approaches to moral education, the place of religion in public education, and the much-studied relationship between evangelicalism and popular culture. The history of English and American revivalism, a history in which these ministries partake fully, offers potential answers to these questions—answers that encourage caution on the part of the educators and revivalists who embrace the school assembly as a moral educational venue.

Editor's Introduction: "Roundtable on the Encyclopedia of Religion and Nature"

2009-05-09

A Response to the Encyclopedia of Religion and Nature

Keller, C. — 2009-05-09

Comments on the Encyclopedia of Religion and Nature

Olupona, J. — 2009-05-09

"Why Prince Charles Instead of "Princess Mononoke?" The Absence of Children and Popular Culture in The Encyclopedia of Religion and Nature

Pike, S. M. — 2009-05-09

Back to Religion and Nature

Taylor, B. — 2009-05-09

All Work and No Play: Chaos, Incongruity and Differance in The Study of Religion

Roberts, T. — 2009-05-09

The last two decades have been fascinating and productive ones for theorists of religion. Recent work has offered a remarkably wide range of theoretical perspectives and possibilities that enrich our field even as they plunge us into vigorous theoretical debates. Amidst this contest—even confusion—some basic principles for guiding future work seem to be asserting themselves. Many think that, after a century of confusion and intermingling between theology and the study of religion, scholars of religion are finally in a position to establish the study of religion on properly academic, theoretical foundations. In this story Eliade's antireductionist discourse of the "sacred" becomes the epitome and, it is hoped, the last gasp of religious studies as a quasi-theological discourse. Yet despite their efforts to guide the study of religion away from Eliade, many remain Eliadan insofar as they accept Eliade's "locative" approach to religion. Yet is it really "theology" that is currently limiting the way we "imagine religion," or might it be instead the refusal to think beyond religion's locative function—a refusal very closely linked to the desire for academic respectability in a historicist age? Mark C. Taylor's After God provocatively disturbs the idea that religion is primarily locative and, in doing so, also disturbs the boundaries between the theological and the theoretical, religion and the study of religion. I consider the significance of this virtual map of religion, by reading After God with and against J. Z. Smith's early reflections or experiments with the ideas of chaos, incongruity, and location. I argue that Taylor's book leads us back to paths from which Smith turned in his early work.

Refiguring Religion

Taylor, M. C. — 2009-05-09

Defining Buddhism(s): A Reader (Critical Categories in the Study of Religion). Edited by Karen Derris and Natalie Gummer

Apple, J. B. — 2009-05-09

Book under Suspicion. Censorship and Tolerance of Revelatory Writing in Late Medieval England. By Kathryn Kerby-Fulton

Bose, M. — 2009-05-09

The Lord for the Body: Religion, Medicine, & Protestant Faith Healing in Canada, 1880-1930. By James Opp

Brown, C. G. — 2009-05-09

Prophet Motive: Deguchi Onisaburo, Oomoto, and the Rise of New Religions in Imperial Japan. By Nancy K. Stalker

Chilson, C. — 2009-05-09

Women in the Church of God in Christ: Making a Sanctified World. By Anthea D. Butler

Evans, C. J. — 2009-05-09

The Elusive God: Reorienting Religious Epistemology. By Paul K. Moser

Macdonald, P. — 2009-05-09

Portrait of a Priestess: Women and Ritual in Ancient Greece. By Joan Breton Connelly

Miles, M. M. — 2009-05-09

The Buddhist Dead: Practices, Discourses, Representations (Kuroda Studies in East Asian Buddhism 20). Edited by Bryan J. Cuevas and Jacqueline I. Stone

Penkower, L. — 2009-05-09

Greco-Roman Culture and the Galilee of Jesus. By Mark A. Chancey

Ruprecht, L. A. — 2009-05-09

The Fall of Man and the Foundations of Science. By Peter Harrison

Bland, K. P. — 2009-05-09

The Oxford Companion of English Literature and Theology. Edited by Andrew W. Hass, David Jasper, and Elisabeth Jay

Kort, W. A. — 2009-05-09

Ippolito Desideri S.J. Opere e Bibliografia [Subsidia ad Historiam Societatis Iesu 15]. By Enzo Gualtiero Bargiacchi

Pomplun, T. — 2009-05-09

Women Shaping Islam: Reading the Quran in Indonesia. By Pieternella van Doorn-Harder

Rinaldo, R. — 2009-05-09

Death and Social Order in Tokugawa Japan: Buddhism, Anti-Christianity, and the Danka System. By Nam-lin Hur

Rowe, M. — 2009-05-09

After God. By Mark C. Taylor

Caputo, J. D. — 2009-05-09

The Political Origins of Religious Liberty. By Anthony Gill

Hall, M. D. — 2009-05-09

Mircea Eliade: A Critical Reader (Critical Categories in the Study of Religion). Edited by Bryan S. Rennie * The International Eliade (Issues in the Study of Religion). Edited by Bryan S. Rennie

Jensen, T. — 2009-05-09

Christian Moderns: Freedom and Fetish in the Mission Encounter. By Webb Keane

Lofton, K. — 2009-05-09

Buddhism and Postmodernity: Zen, Huayan, and the Possibility of Postmodern Ethics. By Jin Y. Park

Magliola, R. — 2009-05-09

Religion and Ecology: A Review Essay on the Field

Jenkins, W. — 2009-05-09