Witnessing Suburbia: Conservatives and Christian Youth Culture / Edition 1

by Eileen Luhr

Overview

Witnessing Suburbia is a lively cultural analysis of the conservative shift in national politics that transformed the United States during the Reagan-Bush era. Eileen Luhr focuses on two fundamental aspects of this shift: the suburbanization of evangelicalism and the rise of Christian popular culture, especially popular music. Taking us from the Jesus Freaks of the late 1960s to Christian heavy metal music to Christian rock festivals and beyond, she shows how evangelicals succeeded in "witnessing" to America's suburbs in a consumer idiom. Luhr argues that the emergence of a politicized evangelical youth culture in fact ranks as one of the major achievements of "third wave" conservatism in the late twentieth century.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780520255968
Publisher:	University of California Press
Publication date:	02/10/2009
Edition description:	First Edition
Pages:	280
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.80(d)

About the Author

Eileen Luhr is Assistant Professor in the Department of History at California State University, Long Beach.

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations
Introduction

1. Home Improvement: Christian Cultural Criticism and the Defense of "Traditional" Authority
2. Rebel with a Cross: The Creation of a Christian Youth Culture
3. Metal Missionaries to the Nation: Christian Heavy Metal Music, 1984-1994
4. "An MTV Approach to Evangelism": The Cultural Politics of Suburban Revivalism

Epilogue
Acknowledgments
Notes
Bibliography
Index

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

"A diligent and informative . . . exploration of the ways mainstream evangelicals' attitudes toward popular culture have evolved in the past forty years."—Bookforum

"Luhr's work fills a significant gap within histories of conservative Christianity and popular culture."—Practical Matters

"Describes a moment and a movement that has had tremendous influence in American life."—Believer

"Thoroughly researched and well written, this book should interest scholars of 20th-century Christianity and popular culture. . . . Highly recommended."—Choice

Editorial Reviews

Describes a moment and a movement that has had tremendous influence in American life.

Believer

Thoroughly researched and well written, this book should interest scholars of 20th-century Christianity and popular culture. . . . Highly recommended.

Choice

A diligent and informative . . . exploration of the ways mainstream evangelicals’ attitudes toward popular culture have evolved in the past forty years.

Bookforum - Maud Newton

Luhr’s work fills a significant gap within histories of conservative Christianity and popular culture.

Practical Matters