Southern Crossroads

The South has always been one of the most distinctive regions of the United States, with its own set of traditions and a turbulent history. Although often associated with cotton, hearty food, and rich dialects, the South is also noted for its strong sense of religion, which has significantly shaped its history. Dramatic political, social, and economic events have often shaped the development of southern religion, making the nuanced dissection of the religious history of the region a difficult undertaking. For instance, segregation and the subsequent civil rights movement profoundly affected churches in the South as they sought to mesh the tenets of their faith with the prevailing culture. Editors Walter H. Conser and Rodger M. Payne and the book’s contributors place their work firmly in the trend of modern studies of southern religion that analyze cultural changes to gain a better understanding of religion’s place in southern culture now and in the future. Southern Crossroads: Perspectives on Religion and Culture takes a broad, interdisciplinary approach that explores the intersection of religion and various aspects of southern life. The volume is organized into three sections, such as “Religious Aspects of Southern Culture,” that deal with a variety of topics, including food, art, literature, violence, ritual, shrines, music, and interactions among religious groups. The authors survey many combinations of religion and culture, with discussions ranging from the effect of Elvis Presley’s music on southern spirituality to yard shrines in Miami to the archaeological record of African American slave religion. The book explores the experiences of immigrant religious groups in the South, also dealing with the reactions of native southerners to the groups arriving in the region. The authors discuss the emergence of religious and cultural acceptance, as well as some of the apparent resistance to this development, as they explore the experiences of Buddhist Americans in the South and Jewish foodways. Southern Crossroads also looks at distinct markers of religious identity and the role they play in gender, politics, ritual, and violence. The authors address issues such as the role of women in Southern Baptist churches and the religious overtones of lynching, with its themes of blood sacrifice and atonement. Southern Crossroads offers valuable insights into how southern religion is studied and how people and congregations evolve and adapt in an age of constant cultural change.

An overview of public religion in Arkansas, Louisiana, Missouri, Oklahoma, and Texas.

Take a journey into the rich territory of Georgia's blues history starting with the legends of the past and including many favorites of the present and the young musicians who will help secure the state's musical future. The book is lavishly illustrated and includes profiles of a plethora of musicians every blues lover should know, from Blind Willie McTell, Cutley Weaver and Barbecue Bob to living legends and the newest generation of players. Discover exotic clubs of the past like The Royal Peacock, peak into the vibrant and rowdy Sweet Auburn district iin the 20;s and 30;s, and discover the clubs that keep the blues alive today. It's all about the blues and Georgia and it is a trip worth taking in the pages of this boo.

Becoming Jimi Hendrix traces “Jimmy’s” early musical roots, from a harrowing, hand-to-mouth upbringing in a poverty-stricken, broken Seattle home to his early discovery of the blues to his stint as a reluctant recruit of the 101st Airborne who was magnetically drawn to the rhythm and blues scene in Nashville. As a sideman, Hendrix played with the likes of Little Richard, Ike and Tina Turner, the Isley Brothers, and Sam & Dave—but none knew what to make of his spotlight-stealing rock guitar experimentation, the likes of which had never been heard before. From 1962 to 1966, on the rough and tumble club circuit, Hendrix learned to please a crowd, deal with racism, and navigate shady music industry characters, all while evolving his own astonishing style. Finally, in New York’s Greenwich Village, two key women helped him survive, and his discovery in a tiny basement club in 1966 led to Hendrix instantly being heralded as a major act in Europe before he returned to America, appeared at the Monterey Pop Festival, and entered the pantheon of rock’s greatest musicians. Becoming Jimi Hendrix is based on over one hundred interviews with those who knew Hendrix best during his lean years, more than half of whom have never spoken about him on the record. Utilizing court transcripts, FBI files, private letters, unpublished photos, and U.S. Army documents, this is the story of a young musician who overcame enormous odds, a past that drove him to outbursts of violence, and terrible professional and personal decisions that complicated his life before his untimely demise.

In July 2002 chief justice of the Alabama Supreme Court had a two-ton monument of the Ten Commandments placed into the rotunda of the Montgomery state judicial building. But this action is only a recent case in the long history of religiously inspired public movements in the American South. From the Civil War to the Scopes Trial to the Moral Majority, white Southern evangelicals have taken ideas they see as drawn from the Christian Scriptures and tried to make them into public law. But blacks, women, subregions, and other religious groups too vie for power within and outside this Southern Religious Establishment. Religion and Public Life in the South gives voice to both the establishment and its dissenters and shows why more than any other region of the country, religion drives public debate in the South.

This authoritative and cutting edge companion brings togethera team of leading scholars to document the rich diversity andunique viewpoints that have formed the religious history of theUnited States. A groundbreaking new volume which represents the firstsustained effort to fully explain the development of Americanreligious history and its creation within evolving political andsocial frameworks Spans a wide range of traditions and movements, from theBaptists and Methodists, to Buddhists and Mormons Explores topics ranging from religion and the media,immigration, and piety, though to politics and social reform Considers how American religion has influenced and beeninterpreted in literature and popular culture Provides insights into the historiography of religion, butpresents the subject as a story in motion rather than a snapshot ofwhere the field is at a given moment

Not just in the middle geographically, the Midwest represents the American average in terms of beliefs, attitudes, and values. The region's religious portrait matches the national religious portrait more closely than any other region. But far from making the Midwest dull, "average" means most every religious group and religious issue are represented in this region. Unlike other volumes in the series, Religion and Public Life in the Midwest includes a chapter devoted to a single city (Chicago), a chapter on a single Mainline Protestant denomination (Lutherans), and a chapter on religious variations in urban, surburan, and rural settings. This fourth book in the Religion by Region series does not neglect the pervasive image of the "typical" Midwesterner, but it does let the region's marbled religious diversity come through.

This book is the seventh and final volume in the Global Story of Christianity series. The volume’s chapters, written by major scholars in the field, spotlight vital episodes and themes for understanding the historical development of Christianity in the United States and Canada. Serving as an accessible text for students and an informative volume for scholars, the book provides new insights into Christianity’s development in North America, offering fresh perspectives on topics frequently overlooked by scholars. The book situates the history of North American Christianity within broader themes associated with Christianity’s role as a global religion.