The religious critic in American culture
Author(s)
Bibliographic Information
The religious critic in American culture
State University of New York Press, c1994
- : alk paper
- pbk. : alk. paper
Available at 10 libraries
  Aomori
  Iwate
  Miyagi
  Akita
  Yamagata
  Fukushima
  Ibaraki
  Tochigi
  Gunma
  Saitama
  Chiba
  Tokyo
  Kanagawa
  Niigata
  Toyama
  Ishikawa
  Fukui
  Yamanashi
  Nagano
  Gifu
  Shizuoka
  Aichi
  Mie
  Shiga
  Kyoto
  Osaka
  Hyogo
  Nara
  Wakayama
  Tottori
  Shimane
  Okayama
  Hiroshima
  Yamaguchi
  Tokushima
  Kagawa
  Ehime
  Kochi
  Fukuoka
  Saga
  Nagasaki
  Kumamoto
  Oita
  Miyazaki
  Kagoshima
  Okinawa
  Korea
  China
  Thailand
  United Kingdom
  Germany
  Switzerland
  France
  Belgium
  Netherlands
  Sweden
  Norway
  United States of America
Note
Bibliography: p. 227-247
Includes index
Description and Table of Contents
Description
This book provides a new rationale for "religious criticism" in American society. First, Dean shows why today's academic intellectuals are relatively indifferent to questions of meaning in America, pointing to the loss of American "exceptionalism," the professionalization of the academy, and the rise of post-structural criticism. He then shows how intellectuals may reclaim a prophetic role by offering a new theory of the nature of religious thought. Tracing this theory to a twentieth-century emphasis on conventions, Dean provides a way to understand how imaginative social constructions can become active historical conventions, with real historical force. He suggests that the sacred itself begins as an imaginative construct and becomes a convention, thus working as an active, "living" force in history. Finally, Dean argues that religious critics must now reclaim a responsibility for shaping their society's sacred conventions.
Table of Contents
Preface
Introduction
Part I: Abandoning American Culture
1. The Religious Critic and the End of an Era
2. The Rise of the Professional Intellectual
3. William James, Public Intellectual
Part II: Recovering Religious Theory
4. Religious Narrative and the Avoidance of Nature
5. Religious Naturalism and the Avoidance of Ambiguity
6. The Religious Thinker and the Acceptance of History
Part III: Grounding Religious Theory
7. The Reality of Conventions
8. The Reality of the Sacred Convention
Part IV: Reclaiming American Culture
9. The Religious Critic in the Third Sector
10. The Religious Critic and a Myth of America
Notes
Bibliography
Index
by "Nielsen BookData"