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Quoting God
Edited by Claire H. Badaracco, Baylor University Press, USA .2005, pp. 317,
ISBN: 1932792066
Reviewed
by: Mirza Asmer Beg
This book
tries to explore how media deal
with religious news. It also
looks at how traditional and
emerging religions mix the
language of ‘spiritual
authenticity and authority’. The
book questions whether the place
of the religious writer has a
theological or philosophical
rationale and cultural
consequence that leads to the
formation of deep culture. It
focuses on the problems of cross
cultural formation of religious
information and its impact on
both the practices that make up
surface media culture and the
deeper culture.
The
emphasis of this volume is on
the media and the language of
cultural configurations where
the factors of interpretation of
public texts give shape to the
concept of national and
individual identity. Particular
emphasis is upon the production
of social texts in all facets of
media, with particular stress
upon news, but including
material culture.
The editor
is interested in the cultural
identity of God as ascribed to
the unknown by the secular
forces, chief among which is the
global news and mass media
industry.
While the
substance of this book builds on
prior academic discussion from
fields where religion is not the
focus of concern, it is engaged
with the intellectual problem of
how the public reader looks at
the mystical connection between
words and common language over a
period and how that influences
their interest in the
similarities between the ancient
and new, that reside in the
historical and collective memory.
The
essays in this book are based on
field experience and academic
research aimed at presenting the
interaction between the
spiritual and secular. The basic
concern is how images in the
cultural public sphere impinge
upon an individual’s perception,
group’s understanding and
national identity.
The
operational concern underlying
this book is how power
relationships affect the beliefs
of men. ‘Personal and subjective
beliefs about value and truth
shape objective storytelling-
construed as subjective when
aesthetic in visual
communication, but as objective
when occurring in news reporting
and ethnography.’ (p.12-13)
This book
in the first section delves into
the legal and constitutional
parameters of national identity
and the ideological preferences
of those in the news rooms where
the religious public square is
structured. The media in the
Middle East is studied and the
relationship between politics
and religion systematically
analysed. The second section
dissects the theme of reporting
across cultures as active
participants and observers. The
evolution of religion from the
private realm to the public, and
its representation in the media
is also discussed. Aslam
Abdullah makes a brief but
strong case for putting an end
to the stereotypical
presentation of Muslims in the
western media. C. Welton Gaddy
calls for the need today of
mutual respect among all
religious peoples in America. He
argues that religious rhetoric
should be prominent in a
nation’s life without it getting
vitiated by selfish interests.
The third
section analyses the dichotomy
between faith and reason. It
also looks at the inadequate
representation of religions
issues in the media due to the
complex nature of religious
issues. The book has elaborate
notes at the end which add up to
its academic worth.
In this age
when news media are generally
understood to be anti-spiritual
and organized religion, in turn,
perceives media to be
anti-moral, this book is a
useful reader for those
interested in understanding the
interaction between the media
and religion. The only
shortcoming in this book is that
some important issues like
working of the media in the
Middle East have not been dealt
with as incisively as the other
issues which the editor has
tried to touch upon. |
