Review of J. Hoberman and Jeffrey Shandler's Entertaining America: Jews,Movies, and Broadcasting

The impact of increasing religious diversity in U.S. society has taken on added significance in recent years. This study, the first broad-based examination of religion and public relations, explores the nature of religion in the United States, its role in local community relations, and its public relations dimensions. Phone and e-mail interviews, textual analysis of institutional media, and field observations were used to obtain data on religious diversity, place-of-worship activities, and public relations practices. The nature of the communication between select religious institutions and their publics, through different media channels, is also explored. Two case studies that are representative and illustrative are included. From a communication perspective, it is suggested that a key to fostering interreligious dialogue and civil discourse on religion may lie in expanding traditional definitions of diversity to include religion and moving beyond expertise and contractual models of public relations toward a model that is covenantal in nature.     

Religion and Incorporation: Islam in France and Germany

This article attempts to examine religion, particularly Islam, as an emergent type of corporate ethnicity in France and Germany and how Islam is represented and recognized in relation to the established principles governing the interaction of church and state both in the histories of each country and in comparison to the United States. Although religion constitutes one element of pluralism and diversity in which Islam would be the “religion of a minority” among other ethnic groups in the United States, in Europe Islam emerges as a “minority religion” in European nation‐states. Such a conceptual difference is reflected in the understandings and applications of multiculturalism and recognition in European countries and the United States. The question then is how to insure a historical continuity between principles and ideals of states on the one hand and how to integrate the religious diversity raised by Islam into the secularism of liberal European societies on the other.     

Introduction: The Puzzle of Incorporation and Solidarity

Multiculturalism is often vilified and misconstrued, and a multicultural backlash is evident. This special section attempts to move beyond the polemics by offering sociological insights into the current impact of multiculturalism and the challenges this mode of incorporation faces in addressing religious and racial diversity. This introduction sketches efforts aimed at offering distinctly sociological analyses of multiculturalism, in contrast to more normative philosophical accounts. It then offers brief overviews of the three substantive articles that follow: Irene Bloemraad on the significance of citizenship for multiculturalism; Rhys Williams on religious diversity; and Douglas Hartmann on the racial divide.     

Suicide,Religion, and Latinos: A Macrolevel Study of U.S. Latino Suicide Rates

Since the publication of Durkheim's Suicide more than a century ago, researchers have been examining the relationship between religion and suicide, and race/ethnicity and suicide. However, no study has examined how religion influences U.S. Latino suicide rates. This study fills a gap in the literature by applying three competing theses to the study of Latino suicide. Results show that (1) religious contextual variables significantly affect Latino suicide rates, (2) U.S.‐born Latinos benefit from religious communities, regardless of denomination or measurement used, and (3) foreign‐born Latinos only benefit from Catholic adherents and homogeneity.     

Reflections on Race,Diversity, and the Crossroads of Multiculturalism

This article draws upon recent research on race and diversity, much of it conducted by the author and his collaborators on the American Mosaic Project at the University of Minnesota, to provide a critical‐theoretical perspective on multiculturalism in contemporary American culture. It is based upon three main empirical findings. The first is that Americans are, on initial inspection, generally quite open to and optimistic about diversity. Further analysis and deeper probing, however, reveals a second, cross‐cutting discovery: that thought and talk about diversity is marked by a series of underlying tensions and misgivings. The third and perhaps most important finding is that the discourse about diversity is deeply informed and determined—over‐determined perhaps—by race in the United States. Taken together, it is argued that the contradictory, race‐based attitudes Americans exhibit toward diversity reflect and reproduce many of the key, animating ambivalences of multiculturalism in both theory and practice: for example, the tensions between individuals and groups and between abstract ideals and empirical realities. The article concludes by suggesting that multiculturalism is not only at a crossroads in the United States but is a crossroads where many conflicting impulses and ideals about solidarity, belonging, and equality come together in the same cultural space.     

Investigating Differences in How the News Media Views Homosexuality Across Nations: An Analysis of the United States,South Africa,and Uganda

While there is a wealth of information about the extent to which people across the world disapprove of homosexuality, we know a lot less about the lenses through which they view same‐sex relations. The aim of this study is to understand better how homosexuality is framed in the public press, and how religion and economic development may combine to shape this discourse. Through an analysis of almost 400 newspaper articles, this study compares how homosexuality is framed in Uganda, South Africa, and the United States. Because these nations have high levels of religious belief, but differ in their level of economic development and democracy, we can assess how these factors interact to shape portrayals. Drawing on work from cultural sociology and the sociology of religion, this study shows that the United States is much more likely than Uganda to frame homosexuality as a civil rights issue and use entertainers as claimsmakers. Conversely, articles from Uganda are more likely than those from the United States or South Africa to frame homosexuality as a religious issue and draw on religious claimsmakers. Likewise, Uganda is much more likely than South Africa to discuss homosexuality in the context of Western influences.     

Merchandizing the Sacred: Commodifying Hindu Religion,Gods/Goddesses,and Festivals in the United States

The Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 opened the gates for immigrants from India, who have come to the United States for various reasons other than religion. Their religious consciousness has grown along with the age of their children who are born in the United States. They have felt the need to retain and hand down their tradition and culture. In the process, sustaining their tradition and culture has become equivalent with religion, so they express it through rituals and festivals. With these festive observances has developed an intimate connection between commerce and religion, fashion and festival, celebration and consumption. In this scholarly essay, I analyze how Hindu religion has succumbed to the world of advertisements, mass production, and marketing in the United States. This aspect is significant because it gives an opportunity to conceptualize a larger transnational space that deals with Hindu religious practices and sees the participation of retailers and businesses located in various Hindu diasporic spaces using various marketing media strategically.     

HOW AMERICANS UNDERSTAND RACIAL AND RELIGIOUS DIFFERENCES: A Test of Parallel Items from a National Survey

How can we better conceptualize attitudes about difference in an increasingly diverse, multicultural United States? This article uses data from a recent, nationally representative telephone survey with oversamples of African Americans and Hispanics to analyze attitudes about two prominent sources of distinction in the United States. Race and religion were selected because they tend to be understood in very different ways—race as a social problem, religion as an individual choice and collective good. To assess the utility of these contrasting emphases built into common survey measures, we constructed a battery of questions that included parallel items for both. Our findings indicate that, with some notable exceptions, Americans' attitudes tend to be more similar than different, such that respondents see comparable (rather than contrasting) positive and negative aspects of race and religion in the United States. Based upon these results, we argue for a more multifaceted approach to the conceptualization, measurement, and analysis of race and religion, with implications for how we generally approach difference, diversity, and multiculturalism.     

Religion,Nationalism, and Transnational Civil Society in the Eritrean Diaspora

This article examines the emergence and significance of religion among Eritreans in the United States as a basis for building community in diaspora, reconfiguring nationalist identity, and constituting transnational civil society. It argues three related points: that religious identity and gatherings help mitigate against fractured political identities that have weakened secular diaspora associations; that practicing Eritrean identity through religion challenges the hegemonic power of the Eritrean state to transnationally control diaspora communities and dictate national identity; and that the very incipience of religious bodies as transnational avenues provides Eritreans in diaspora with an autonomous space to resist the state's totalizing demands. Through a critical ethnographic investigation of religious identity and church bodies in Eritrea and one United States diaspora community, the article shows that uneven transnational networks between the United States and Eritrea create new spaces for political action. Specifically, the relative autonomy of churches and the incipience of their transnationalism allow diaspora Eritreans to use religion in the constitution of an emergent transnational civil society.     

Du Bois and the Sociology of Religion: Rediscovering a Founding Figure*

In his popular introductory sociology text, Stark identifies W. E. B. Du Bois and Albion Small as important cornerstones of the U.S. sociological tradition. While the work of the “Chicago School” is well known in sociological circles, Du Bois’ sociological legacy is not. The Philadelphia Negro ([1899] 1996) is a classic empirical sociological study that is rarely included in discussions of the development of scientific sociology. Likewise, The Negro Church ([1903b] 2003) represents one of the first empirically based sociological studies of a religious institution. Sociologists of religion routinely discuss the contributions of Durkheim, Weber, and Simmel while virtually ignoring Du Bois. This is ironic because Du Bois’ work on religion was based on ethnographic data, field interviews, surveys, and census data. This article provides an overview of Du Bois’ sociological study of the Black Church in the United States by identifying some of the main themes developed in The Philadelphia Negro ([1899] 1996), The Souls of Black Folk ([1903a] 1994), and The Negro Church ([1903b] 2003). These studies reveal that Du Bois was a pioneer in the areas of evaluation research, public sociology, service learning, and congregational studies.     

Decoupling Religion and Ethnicity: Second-Generation Indian American Christians

Classic assimilation theory was based on the assumption of individualistic adaptation, with immigrants and their children expected to shed their ethnic identities to become Americans. In the sphere of religion, however, they could maintain their communitarian traditions through American denominations. In contemporary society, multiculturalism, spiritual seeking, and postdenominationalism have reversed this paradigm. First- and second-generation immigrants integrate by remaining ethnic and group-identified, but religion is viewed as a personal quest. This paper examines how this paradigm shift affects the ethnic and religious behavior of second-generation Americans. It is based on research among Malankara Syrian Christians belonging to an ancient South Indian community.     

Polarized Scientists? Exploring Political Differences about Religion and Science among U.S. Biologists and Physicists1

From the Texas textbook debate to the March for Science, visible displays of activism illuminate how deeply politicized the science‐religion interface has become. However, little is known about the extent to which scientists’ attitudes about science and religion are politicized. Using original survey data from 1,989 U.S. academic biologists and physicists, we examine the degree to which political views shape how scientists perceive the relationship between religion and science, religious authority, their personal religious identity, and views on dominant scientific theories. Findings suggest that, indeed, the science‐religion interface holds political meaning for scientists, but in different ways across the political spectrum. Specifically, for politically liberal scientists, atheism and the conflict narrative are particularly politicized belief structures, while politically conservative scientists emphasize religious identity to distinguish themselves from political liberals. Findings point to the critical role of politics in shaping scientists’ attitudes and identities, which may have implications for the scientific enterprise, both at the lab bench and in the political sphere.     

The Impact of Religious Homogeneity on the Rate of Divorce in the United States

This study extends the understanding of the relationship between religious homogeneity, that is, the extent to which formal religious groups are concentrated at the county level, and the rate of persons currently divorced in those counties. Linking the research question to Durkheimian precepts of religion as an integrative force in social life, the essential question is, “At the county level, does the rate of currently divorced vary inversely with more concentrated affiliation with formal religious organizations?” We investigate this relationship using data from the 1990 U.S. Census and from the Glenmary Research Center that encompasses 621 counties in the U.S., that is, a 20 percent random sample of counties from each state. As hypothesized, the divorced rate is inversely related to religious homogeneity, even after controlling for a series of factors that have been shown to be correlated with divorce in other studies.     

Threats and solutions: multiculturalism,religion and educational policy

The purpose of this article is to discuss how the interplay between multiculturalism, religion and education is described in Finnish national policy documents. The research question was as follows: How is the interplay between multiculturalism, religion and education portrayed in Finnish national policy? The data examined in this study included the national policy documents from 1998 to 2009. The qualitative analysis proposed five policy concerns with regards to multiculturalism, which were political radicalisation, ethnic relations, active citizenship, identity formation and human dignity. Religion seemed to be portrayed in a different manner in the different areas of concern. In the policy documents, religion is generally viewed both as a threat and as a solution in an increasingly multicultural society. In future, studies should be carried out concerning the intertwining of religion, power and nationality in school everyday practices.     

Listening in Context: Religion and Spirituality

A review of the literature on listening as related to the contexts of religion and spirituality suggests that while religious/spiritual groups and individuals recognize listening as a communication and spiritual construct and claim to practice listening, the views of what constitutes listening vary greatly. In their discussions of listening, writers focus primarily on practicing listening and on aspects of the greater listening process rather than on a well-grounded understanding of how listening is related to religion and spirituality. Many of the reports of the role of listening are based on untested assumptions; thus, researchers are encouraged to investigate the role of listening in religion and spirituality with scientifically based methods.     

Religious Culture and Political Action

Recent work by political sociologists and social movement theorists extend our understanding of how religious institutions contribute to expanding democracy, but nearly all analyze religious institutions as institutions; few focus directly on what religion qua religion might contribute. This article strives to illuminate the impact of religious culture per se, extending recent work on religion and democratic life by a small group of social movement scholars trained also in the sociology of religion. In examining religion's democratic impact, an explicitly cultural analysis inspired by the new approach to political culture developed by historical sociologists and cultural analysts of democracy is used to show the power of this approach and to provide a fuller theoretical account of how cultural dynamics shape political outcomes. The article examines religious institutions as generators of religious culture, presents a theoretical model of how religious cultural elements are incorporated into social movements and so shape their internal political cultures, and discusses how this in turn shapes their impact in the public realm. This model is then applied to a key site of democratic struggle: four efforts to promote social justice among low-income urban residents of the United States, including the most widespread such effort—faith-based community organizing.     

Immigrant Religion in the U.S. and Western Europe: Bridge or Barrier to Inclusion?

This article analyzes why immigrant religion is viewed as a problematic area in Western Europe in contrast to the United States, where it is seen as facilitating the adaptation process. The difference, it is argued, is anchored in whether or not religion can play a major role for immigrants and the second generation as a bridge to inclusion in the new society. Three factors are critical: the religious backgrounds of immigrants in Western Europe and the United States; the religiosity of the native population; and historically rooted relations and arrangements between the state and religious groups.     

BEYOND THE BIBLE AND THE CROSS: A SOCIAL AND CULTURAL ANALYSIS OF CHINESE ELDERS' PARTICIPATION IN CHRISTIAN CONGREGATIONS IN THE UNITED STATES

Mainland Chinese elders constitute a unique group in popular Christian participation and conversion. This work aims to explore the social contexts and cultural facets of Mainland Chinese elders' Christian practice in the United States. Based on face-to-face, in-depth interviews with 20 Mainland Chinese elders as well as participant observation at selected congregational settings, this study suggests that the existing theories on aging and religion as well as religious practice among immigrants are inadequate to explain Chinese elderly immigrants' participation in Christian congregations in the U.S. Instead, social isolation and lack of social support system resulting from immigration and aging process serve as the major drive for the elders to pursue social and cultural recognition from Chinese Christian gatherings. Besides religious services, social service functions of churches and opportunities for fellowship are other factors that explain Chinese elders' church involvement. In conclusion, we argue that social and cultural services are needed to particularly assist Chinese seniors to adjust and adapt to their elderly lives in the host country.     

Warriors and Terrorists: Antagonism as Strategy in Christian Hardcore and Muslim “Taqwacore” Punk Rock

This article contributes to new scholarship in the sociological study of religion, which looks at how people define and communicate religion in secular spheres. I show how U.S. Christian Hardcore and Muslim “Taqwacore” (taqwa means “god consciousness” in Arabic) punks draw on the tools of a punk rock culture that is already encoded with its own set of symbols, rituals and styles to: 1) understand themselves as religious/punk and 2) express religion in punk rock environments. I find that both cases draw on a punk rock motif of antagonism—oppositional attitudes and violent rituals and symbols—to see themselves as religious/punk and express religion in punk in different ways. Christian punks use this motif to condemn other Christians for denouncing punk and create space for Protestant evangelical Christianity in punk. Taqwacores use this motif to criticize Islam for its conservatism as well as non-Muslims for stereotyping Muslims as religious fanatics. In the process, Taqwacores build a space for alienated brown youth who exist on the margins of mainstream American culture and traditional Islam.