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Overview
- Applies cultural studies examples/discussion to religious studies directly
- Arguably the first serious study of Matthew Barney’s most recent work
- Applies broader public fascinations ie; The Joker in The DarkKnight
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About this book
Ashley Crawford investigates how such figures as Ben Marcus, Matthew Barney, and David Lynch—among other artists, novelists, and film directors—utilize religious themes and images via Christianity, Judaism, and Mormonism to form essentially mutated variations of mainstream belief systems. He seeks to determine what drives contemporary artists to deliver implicitly religious imagery within a ‘secular’ context. Particularly, how religious heritage and language, and the mutations within those, have impacted American culture to partake in an aesthetic of apocalyptism that underwrites it.
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Keywords
Table of contents (7 chapters)
Reviews
“With just the right balance of postmodern theory and pop intellectualism, Ashley Crawford explores the visions of apocalypse that were always there, in the night terrors of our New Jerusalem. Crossing the brio of his fellow Aussie Robert Hughes with an oracular style familiar from Baudrillard’s America, Crawford reveals American Christianity for the mutant thing it is: the dark side of the Enlightenment, haunted by gnostic strains and gothic tendencies. Dark Gnosis should take the place of every Gideons bible in every motel on Route 666.” (Mark Dery, author of I Must Not Think Bad Thoughts: Drive-By Essays on American Dread, American Dreams)
“Dark Gnosis takes us into the heart of America’s schizophrenic relationship with the apocalypse, the simultaneous fear and fascination with The End. Crawford’s thrilling analysis of end-time dreaming in the works of influential artists, writers and filmmakers shows how the religious imaginary remains integral to our cultural DNA.” (Margaret Wertheim, author of The Pearly Gates of Cyberspace and Physics on the Fringe.)
Authors and Affiliations
About the author
Ashley Crawford is a freelance cultural critic based in Melbourne, Australia, and is the author of a number of books on Australian culture.
Bibliographic Information
Book Title: Religious Imaging in Millennialist America
Book Subtitle: Dark Gnosis
Authors: Ashley Crawford
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-99172-6
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan Cham
eBook Packages: Religion and Philosophy, Philosophy and Religion (R0)
Copyright Information: The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2018
Hardcover ISBN: 978-3-319-99171-9Published: 02 October 2018
Softcover ISBN: 978-3-030-07572-9Published: 28 December 2018
eBook ISBN: 978-3-319-99172-6Published: 19 September 2018
Edition Number: 1
Number of Pages: VIII, 316
Topics: Religion and Society, Sociology of Religion, Popular Culture , Screen Studies