American gnosis: political religion and transcendence
"American Gnosis explores contemporary American spirituality as you've never seen it before. This startling book will change how you see contemporary society-reading it is like putting on a pair of the revelatory eyeglasses in the cult film They Live. In recent and contemporary American li...
Main Author: | |
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Format: | Electronic/Print Book |
Language: | English |
Subito Delivery Service: | Order now. |
Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
WorldCat: | WorldCat |
Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
Published: |
New York
Oxford University Press
[2024]
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In: | Year: 2024 |
Standardized Subjects / Keyword chains: | B
USA
/ Gnosis
/ Reception
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RelBib Classification: | AG Religious life; material religion BF Gnosticism KBQ North America TK Recent history |
Online Access: |
Table of Contents Blurb Volltext (doi) |
Parallel Edition: | Electronic
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Summary: | "American Gnosis explores contemporary American spirituality as you've never seen it before. This startling book will change how you see contemporary society-reading it is like putting on a pair of the revelatory eyeglasses in the cult film They Live. In recent and contemporary American literature and films, as well as in political life, we find many elements taken from the early Christian heretical category of "Gnosticism." In fact, new forms of Gnostic religion are found across the Americas, in all kinds of unexpected places. Thjs phenomenon calls for a new name, "Neo-gnosticism." In American Gnosis, Versluis surveys the prevalence of Neo-gnostic metaphors in films and novels, as well as in contemporary politics, primarily on the right. He provides case studies of some major contemporary Neo-gnostic figures and demonstrates how Neo-gnostic thought contributes to critiques of politico-technological dystopian contemporary American and global society. American Gnosis introduces and discusses, some for the first time in scholarship, major Neo-gnostic figures, also exploring how Neo-gnostic memes recur in social media and other sources, especially on the right. Versluis also explores the emergence of American gnosis in terms of perennialism, and as spiritually independent, reflecting the growing demographic category "spiritual but not religious.""-- |
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ISBN: | 0197653219 |
Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780197653210.001.0001 |