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Performing Religion in the Americas

Media, Politics, and Devotional Practices of the 2

Religious practice and belief remain astoundingly diverse across North and South America. At a time when globalization is taken to mean the ever greater homogenization of cultures, Performing Religion in the Americas reveals how individual cultures are more resilient than ever and that religion is a particularly rich area of diversity.

Religion is an especially rich arena for the analysis of political and cultural performance because the complexity of devotional practice and the intensity of faith can permeate all other parts of social life. The performance of religion highlights how communities and individuals in the Americas define themselves as both similar to and different from others.

Presenting detailed ethnographies from Mexico, Peru, Brazil, Canada, and the United States and drawing on a wide range of approaches - from Theater, Comparative Literature, Sociology, Anthropology, History, English, and Performance Studies - Performing Religion in the Americas reveals the breadth of faith-based cultural practice in the 21st Century.


256 pages | 24 halftones | 6 1/2 x 9 1/2

Enactments

Religion: American Religions


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Table of Contents

1. Introduction, Alyshia Gálvez, New York University, US
2. Re-defining Andean Sacred Landscapes and Identities: Authenticity, Migration, and Visual Reproduction in Andean Religious Rituals, Gisela Canepa-Koch, PUCP, Péru
3. The Celebration of Iemanja, New Year´s Eve in Rio de Janeiro: Tradition, Negotiation, and the Transformation Of An African Goddess, Zeca Ligiéro, UNI-RIO, Brazil
4. The Pilgrimage of Zapopan: Popular Fervor or Deception?, Celina Vázquez, Universidad de Guadalajara, México
5. The Drama of Death: Popular Religion and Performing the Good Death in Oaxaca, Kristin Norget, McGill University, Canada
6. Performing Imperialist Fundamentalism(s), Linda Kintz, University of Oregon, US
7. ‘She Made Us Human’: The Virgin of Guadalupe, Popular Religiosity and Activism in Mexican Devotional Organizations in New York City, Alyshia Gálvez, New York University, US
8. The Second Coming: Religion as Entertainment, Jean Franco, Columbia University, US
9. Performances of Spiral Time, Leda Martins, Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, Brazil
10. Afterword: Place-a-luiah!! Reverend Billy Claims a Democratic Public Space, Diana Taylor, New York University, New York, US

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