René Girard, Theology, and Pop Culture
René Girard, Theology, and Pop Culture
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Description
René Girard, Theology, and Pop Culture provides a fresh and engaging introduction to and the application of René Girard’s mimetic theory. From movies to social media, television to graphic novels, the contributors explore popular culture’s theological depths and challenge readers to consider what culture reveals about them.
What a class act! These established and emerging Girard scholars demonstrate how mimetic theory, which cut its teeth on nineteenth-century novels, also illuminates contemporary film, television, and graphic novels—now that viewing has supplanted reading, as Girard acknowledges. And if these new genres don’t interest you, there are chapters on the weaponizing of Twitter, hoarding, anorexia, and the Church. Fr Duns’ introduction, explicating mimetic theory via The Devil Wears Prada, is a master class. A must for Girardians, an upskilling for theologians, a resource for preachers, and an education for pop culture junkies.
René Girard, Theology, and Pop Culture makes the case for what so many intrigued by mimetic theory intuit: it is everywhere. The editors have collected a range of impressive chapters covering blockbuster movies, graphic novels, the silver screen, and social media. Most delightful of all is an introduction that walks the reader through the stages of mimetic theory by recalling The Devil Wears Prada. This book is a great contribution to an important series and to scholars of religion interested in showing a theory at work.
This book is a marvelous illustration of what happens when encountering the seminal ideas of René Girard: one can no longer “unsee” what his work helps us to see. The volume as a whole provides an adventurous and often entertaining application of mimetic theory to a broad array of pop cultural phenomena, but without compromising anything of rigor of Girard’s insights. Ideal for the classroom, the volume will be equally engaging for those familiar with and brand new to Girard.
Ryan G. Duns is a Jesuit priest and assistant professor of theology at Marquette University.
T. Derrick Witherington is the director of liturgy for Gesu Parish and adjunct lecturer of theology at Marquette University.