Romancing God: Evangelical Women and Inspirational FictionUniv of North Carolina Press, 2006 M12 8 - 260 páginas In the world of the evangelical romance novel, sex and desire are mitigated by an omnipresent third party--the divine. Thus romance is not just an encounter between lovers, but a triangle of affection: man, woman, and God. Although this literature is often disparaged by scholars and pastors alike, inspirational fiction plays a unique and important role in the religious lives of many evangelical women. In an engaging study of why women read evangelical romance novels, Lynn S. Neal interviews writers and readers of the genre and finds a complex religious piety among ordinary people. In evangelical love stories, the success of the hero and heroine's romance rests upon their religious choices. These fictional religious choices, readers report, often inspire real spiritual change in their own lives. Amidst the demands of daily life or during a challenge to one's faith, these books offer a respite from problems and a time for fun, but they also provide a means to cultivate piety and to appreciate the unconditional power of God's love. The reading of inspirational fiction emerges from and reinforces an evangelical lifestyle, Neal argues, but women's interpretations of the stories demonstrate the constant negotiations that characterize evangelical living. Neal's study of religion in practice highlights evangelicalism's aesthetic sensibility and helps to alter conventional understandings--both secular and religious--of this prominent subculture. |
Contenido
| 1 | |
| 15 | |
2 The Discipline of Fun | 43 |
3 The Evaluation of Romance | 73 |
4 The Ministry of Romantic Fiction | 105 |
5 The Fashioning of Faith | 129 |
6 The Romance of God | 157 |
Epilogue | 185 |
Notes | 197 |
Bibliography | 219 |
Index | 233 |
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Página 181 - And the Lord God said, It is not good that man should be alone, I will make him an help meet for him.
Página 127 - I'autre), that is, the space instituted by others, characterize the subtle, stubborn, resistant activity of groups which, since they lack their own space, have to get along in a network of already established forces and representations. People have to make do with what they have. In these combatants...
Página 109 - The disciples came up and asked, "Why do you tell stories?" He replied, "You've been given insight into God's kingdom. You know how it works. Not everybody has this gift, this insight; it hasn't been given to them. Whenever someone has a ready heart for this, the insights and understandings flow freely. But if there is no readiness, any trace of receptivity soon disappears. That's why I tell stories: to create readiness, to nudge the people toward receptive insight.
Página 110 - ... only 2 showed any knowledge that my idea of the fall of the Bent One was anything but an invention of my own. But if...
Página 12 - In a pluralistic society, those religious groups will be relatively stronger which better possess and employ the cultural tools needed to create both clear distinction from and significant engagement and tension with other relevant outgroups, short of becoming genuinely countercultural.
Página 38 - ... an active agent in the maintenance of the ideological status quo because it ultimately reconciles women to patriarchal society and reintegrates them with its institutions.
Página 60 - However, even if it is true that alienation or deprivation tend to drive people to seek refuge in the mass media, it is not at all self-evident what they find when they get there. If mass media exposure is sought for relief from, or compensation for, inadequacies in certain of an individual's social roles, that does not mean, necessarily, that positive feedback is impossible for the roles in question. It certainly does not mean that such feedback is impossible for other of the...
Página 38 - adaptation" is an important one, for it implies some sort of activity on the part of women, not just passive acceptance. In exploring female romantic fantasies, I want to look at the varied and complex strategies women use to adapt to circumscribed lives and to convince themselves that limitations are really opportunities.
Página 38 - In sum, the vision reforms those very conditions characterizing the real world that leave so many women and, most probably, the reader herself, longing for affective care, ongoing tenderness, and a strong sense of selfworth. This interpretation of the romance's meaning suggests, then, that the women who seek out ideal novels in order to construct such a vision again and again are reading not out of contentment but out of dissatisfaction, longing, and protest.