Sacred Terror: Religion and Horror on the Silver Screen Review

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Sacred Terror: Religion and Horror on the Silver Screen ReviewDemonic creatures, the undead, and evil are all vaguely religious concepts. "Sacred Terror: Religion and Horror on the Silver Screen" is a discussion of the strong presence of religion in horror films. Saying that horror films tend to prey on the religious sense that exists in most people, even those who are not exactly weekly church goers, author Douglas Cowan discusses many examples of popular movies and the most common fears used in these films. "Sacred Terror" is a key volume to better understanding horror and why it's frightening.
Sacred Terror: Religion and Horror on the Silver Screen OverviewSacred Terror examines the religious elements lurking in horror films. It answers a simple but profound question: When there are so many other scary things around, why is religion so often used to tell a scary story? In this lucid, provocative book, Douglas Cowan argues that horror films are opportune vehicles for externalizing the fears that lie inside our religious selves: of evil; of the flesh; of sacred places; of a change in the sacred order; of the supernatural gone out of control; of death, dying badly, or not remaining dead; of fanaticism; and of the power--and the powerlessness--of religion.

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Eyes Wide Open: Looking for God in Popular Culture Review

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Eyes Wide Open: Looking for God in Popular Culture ReviewWilliam Romanowski is Professor of Communication Arts & Sciences at Calvin College. He teaches courses on film, communication and cultural studies, and is a well respected authority on the interaction of Christianity and popular culture. He has written numerous articles and a handful of books on popular culture, with an emphasis on film. The thesis of Eyes Wide Open is that "Christians should help preserve the best features, improve the weakest parts, and eliminate the worst traits of popular art" (21).

Romanowski goes about defending his claim in a very engaging way. He speaks of modern day Christians who propose to shun all `evil' things such as movies, rock music and dancing, yet they are just as immersed in popular culture as the next person, only in the form of a ghettoized Christian subculture. The reality is that very few truly avoid popular culture, only prefer those elements of it which are, or appear to be sterile and safe. It is within this context that Romanowski argues for discernment. He believes strongly that this oversimplification has created Christians who have no idea how to discern good from bad, truth from error. The easiest way for evangelicals to make judgments is to simply count swear words, violent acts and sexual innuendos. Romanowski notes the Biblical mandate to cultivate: to create and tend to culture. Cultural forms, like anything else in creation, are corrupted by sin and in need of transformation, and we do a disservice to everyone when we make rigid divisions between sacred and secular. It is a sign of secularization that we would even think to label activities in God's world as secular.
The popular arts aid us in cultural communication (reflecting cultural ideals), social criticism (challenging or dealing with culturally contentious issues), social unity (when we've all seen the same movie) and collective memory (the way we view history is shaped by pop culture). This is what pop culture should be doing, but Romanowski notes that the primary venue for popular film in western culture is the melodrama, a dramatic genre with oversimplified depictions of good and evil, with prepackaged endings that end in "domestic bliss or harmonious community" (111). These melodramatic categories absolutely dominate the "Christian, family-friendly" genre and Romanowski wants to challenge this. The Biblical narrative conveys no such clear cut pattern, and he argues that this emphasis on sentimentalism indicates assimilation to, rather than a break from mainstream popular culture.
Christians who want to engage popular culture need to keep these things in mind. We are called to discern beyond whether something is "family-friendly" or not. The presence of violence and swearing and even sex is not always anti-Christian, but can very well be a catalyst for a story of redemption. And what we see as a story of redemption is often brazen individualism where someone pulls themselves up by the bootstraps and defeats the odds. This tells more about the autonomous human than redemption that can only come from God.
So beyond a "Jesus' per minute" scale and an "f-bomb count," Christians are called and even mandated to discern truth from error in popular culture. We are not to become mere consumers, but people who take seriously the message presented in a piece of popular art. He offers a helpful "matrix" for analyzing popular culture which lists questions to ask, but I feel that so many Christians are so far out of this discussion that more direction is needed. Romanowski presents a full analysis of Titanic through this matrix, also helpful, but I wish he gave further direction on how we can practice this act of discernment as Christians. We are conditioned to think that the acceptable Christian films are G, PG, and occasionally PG-13 (The Passion of the Christ excluded, of course), and we need time to learn to see God's beauty in culture again. In light of these facts, I would recommend this book to individuals and even church small groups. I hope it will help us all keep our eyes open a little wider.Eyes Wide Open: Looking for God in Popular Culture Overview

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Consumed: How Markets Corrupt Children, Infantilize Adults, and Swallow Citizens Whole Review

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Consumed: How Markets Corrupt Children, Infantilize Adults, and Swallow Citizens Whole ReviewI see a number of other reviewers belittling the book because of some trivial factual error regarding sports figures or celebrities, but in my eyes those points merely underscores the point that Barber is trying to make. In the end the constant media focus on these types of people is in my eyes a mass distraction. Does it change my life one iota when a drunken celebrity does something stupid? Not at all, but the media covers it for hour on end, and people lap it up.
People defend popular culture such as Harry Potter or Shrek, but these are all pure escapism and have very little relevance to our daily lives. Reviewers of those films make tortured comparisons to try and prove relevance to daily life, but the sad fact is that many people have become conditioned to not expect more, and perhaps not even have the patience to view a more substantive work.
Other reviewers insist that they aren't manipulated and that they have free choice. To an extent that is true, but one can easily argue that many people are making poor choices because they have been so deeply conditioned by advertisers. How can you justify spending 50K$ on a car, and replacing it when it is 3 years old when an inexpensive well-made car will fulfill the basic needs of transportation and may last 5-8 years instead? How can you justify spending money on bottled water when tap water in most areas is just fine? And how can you justify accumulating tens of thousands in consumer debt just to acquire all of this stuff? There are countless such examples all over the place.
And finally, there is the paradigm that runs deeply through our society that having more money and having more material goods will somehow make you happier. The problem is that these desires can never be satisfied - there is always something more, and there is always someone else who has more. In the end all of this materialism leaves people feeling empty, and the only tonic that they know to try and fill the void is to go out and shop some more.
On the other hand, if you can reach a point where you are content with what you have, you may find that many of the things that you do have are completely superfluous and can be donated to Goodwill or sold. Get rid of enough stuff, and that McMansion will seem empty, and a more modest and affordable house may meet your needs quite nicely.
Consumed: How Markets Corrupt Children, Infantilize Adults, and Swallow Citizens Whole Overview

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How to Watch TV News: Revised Edition Review

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How to Watch TV News: Revised Edition ReviewTruly eye-opening and fascinating. I read the first edition quite a few years back and eagerly read the newly revised edition that addresses the web and how it further affects the devolving quality of America's television news programming. It's astounding how little we truly know about something that is such an integral part of our everyday lives. The world of news can be overwhelming, and as a medium can't always be trusted. This book illuminates its inner workings in an easy and interesting way. You will never "watch" news the same way again after reading this book.
How to Watch TV News: Revised Edition OverviewA scathing and prescient look at television news—now updated for the new tech-savvy generation Television news : genuine information or entertainment fodder? Fifteen years ago, Neil Postman, a pioneer in media education and author of the bestselling Amusing Ourselves to Death, and Steve Powers, an award-winning broadcast journalist, concluded that anyone who relies exclusively on their television for accurate world news is making a big mistake. A cash cow laden with money from advertisers, so-called news shows glut viewers with celebrity coverage at the cost of things they really should know. Today, this message is still appallingly true but the problems have multiplied— along with the power of the Internet and the abundance of cable channels. A must-read for anyone concerned with the way media is manipulating our worldview, this newly revised edition addresses the evolving technology and devolving quality of America's television news programming.

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Global Cities Review

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Global Cities ReviewAbrahamson's Global Cities is a welcome new book: It provides a truly global perspective on urban life, examining both the economic and cultural dimensions of globalism. It provides especially thorough examinations of immigration and the effects of foreign investment upon global inequality. It is a very well-written book, with little un-necessary jargon.Global Cities OverviewGlobal Cities examines the distinctive commercial, residential, and spatial features of the major cities of the contemporary world--cities housing the financial and cultural activities that are most consequential for everyone, regardless of where they live. The development of these influential cities is intimately related to the emergence of modern telecommunications, the growth of multinational corporations, the internationalization of economic activity, and the increased movement of cultural symbols and artifacts across national lines. Accessible to readers with little background in sociology or social science, Global Cities analyzes numerous contemporary issues to illustrate concepts and processes pertaining to the most significant global cities. These concrete examples facilitate students' general understanding and show them the contemporary relevance of the material. The book offers a detailed and multifaceted picture of such leading urban centers as London, New York, Tokyo, and Paris, but also branches out to other important cities in the world. It analyzes both the internal features of the cities and the nature of their connections with each other. Global Cities is ideal for undergraduate courses in urban sociology and other social sciences.

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Frankenstein: A Cultural History Review

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Frankenstein: A Cultural History Review
For 191 years, Frankenstein's hulking monstrosity could be found, not only in our nightmares, but also on bookshelves, comic-book racks, theater stages, movie and television screens, as well as toy-store shelves. The monster indeed cast quite a long shadow across our popular culture and literary historian, Ms. Hitchcock (Mad Mary Lamb: Lunacy and Murder in Literary London), does a Herculean effort to enlighten the reader to the many facets and incarnations of the monster- from Shelley's original novel, to Karloff's tragic portrayal, to Dick Briefer's 1950's horror comic The Monster of Frankenstein and beyond.
Frankenstein: A Cultural History is a comprehensive and entertaining account of Shelley's infamous literary creation, and serves as a testament to the popularity of that, in Shelley's own words, "hideous phantasm of a man."Frankenstein: A Cultural History Overview
A lively history of the Frankensteinmyth, tracing its evolution from a Romanticnightmare to its prominence in today'simaginative landscape.
Frankenstein began as the nightmare ofan unwed teenage mother in Geneva, Switzerland,in 1816. At a time when the moral universe wasshifting and advances in scientific knowledgepromised humans dominion over that which hadbeen God's alone, Mary Shelley envisioned astory of human presumption and its misbegottenconsequences. Two centuries later, that story is still constantly retold and reinterpreted, fromHalloween cartoons to ominous allusions in thepublic debate, capturing and conveying meaningcentral to our consciousness today and ourconcerns for tomorrow. From Victorian musicaltheater to Boris Karloff with neck bolts, toinvocations at the President's Council onBioethics, the monster and his myth haveinspired everyone from cultural critics to comic book addicts. This is a lively and eclecticcultural history, illuminated with dozens ofpictures and illustrations, and told with skilland humor. Susan Tyler Hitchcock uses film,literature, history, science, and even punkmusic to help us understand the meaning of thismonster made by man. 68 illustrations

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