Product Code: P304
ISBN: 9780865549562
Product Format: Paperback
Price: $25.00
An Unholy Alliance offers a dissenting view to the claim by a growing number of scholars that Sports are a new religion. The last few years have seen a spate of books that might be classified by a genre called "Sports Apologetics," that is, arguments defending or celebrating in one way or another the familiar and ongoing alliance in America between sports and religion. Recently, claims have been made by scholars that sports are an authentic religion in and of them-selves. They make this startling assertion not by showing connections with the teachings of Buddha, Jesus, Mohammed, or Moses, but by parallels between the rites of modern games and those of preliterate man that were "religious" in nature because they were designed to propitiate powers and to ward off evil for the tribes employing them.
In this evocative book, Higgs and Braswell suggest that while sports may often be good things, they are not inherently divine. They do not focus on wide-spread abuse in sports as evidence for their counterargument. Rather, they question the use of mythological parallels from prehistory as justification for viewing sports as a religion.
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Product Code: P683
ISBN: 9780881469127
Availability: Not currently available. ( Backorder policy)
Price: $35.00
BILL CLINTON AT THE CHURCH OF BASEBALL reveals how the President of the United States deployed the mythology of America's national pastime in the exercise of political power. It demonstrates how he exploited the intimate relationship between two sacred, but fallible American institutions, the presidency and Major League Baseball, to shape some of the most fiercely contested debates of the 1990s.
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Publisher: Mercer University Press
Product Code: H782
ISBN: 9780881461749
Product Format: Hardback
Price: $27.00
By using Buddhism as a lens to examine NASCAR racing—and NASCAR as a means to illustrate Buddhist teachings, Buddha on the Backstretch provides a unique new perspective to the field of sports and spirituality. Not aimed solely at either Buddhists or race fans, the work’s message of self-improvement via popular culture serves as a Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance for a new generation. Buddha on the Backstretch considers mindfulness, handling setbacks, patience, discipline, heightened awareness, impermanence, equanimity, and how we face death.
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Publisher: Mercer University Press
Product Code: P536
ISBN: 9780881465921
Price: $30.00
Amidst a proliferation of scholarly literature about Islam in the United States, very little attention has been given to sports among Muslim Americans. While books about professional Muslim athletes can be found, this is the first book to investigate Muslim American sports at the local level, looking at Muslim basketball leagues, sports programs at mosques and Islamic schools, and sports events hosted by Muslim organizations.
Drawing upon personal interviews and observations as well as scholarly sources, this book demonstrates that participation in sports activities plays a vital role in strengthening Islamic piety and fellowship, and in connecting Muslims with non-Muslims in post-9/11 America.
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Product Code: P308
ISBN: 9780865549616
Product Format: Paperback
Price: $25.00
In From Season to Season: Sports as American Religion, nine scholars explore the relationship between religion and sports in American culture. Topics explored include:
" The Rhythmic and Religious Significance of American Sports Seasons"
"The Pitcher’s Mound as Cosmic Mountain"
"The Fetish and McGwire’s Balls"
"The Super Bowl as Religious Festival"
"The Final Four as Final Judgment "
"A Puckish Reflection on Religion in Canada"
"Myth and Ritual in Professional Wrestling"
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Publisher: Mercer University Press
Product Code: P458
ISBN: 9780881464177
Product Format: Paperback
Price: $25.00
Game Day and God: Football, Faith, and Politics in the American South takes seriously the often-stated assertion that college football in the South is a religion. To this end, Eric Bain-Selbo draws upon a wide range of theoretical approaches in religious studies and cultural criticism. He also relies upon field research on several campuses in the Southeastern Conference where he interviewed fans and experienced “game day.” Game Day and God also recounts the role that college football has played in Southern history and culture. Going back as far as the Civil War, the work explains the cultural meaning of college football in the South, delivering a much-needed critical perspective to the subject.
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Publisher: Mercer University Press
Product Code: P552
ISBN: 9780881466331
Price: $40.00
GOD, NIMROD, AND THE WORLD presents the perspectives of more than two-dozen authors on the controversial sport of hunting, surveying the relationship between the blood sport and the salvation religion of Christianity. The first half of the book provides sketches of the diverse interpretations of hunting in Hebrew and Christian cultures of the last two millennia, finally giving voice to those in the field who are both practitioners and persons of faith. The second half offers prescriptions for the place of hunting in the life of contemporary Christians, with perspectives arguing for prohibition to those contending that hunting has a practical, even perfecting, place in the life of faith.
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Publisher: Mercer University Press
Product Code: P591
ISBN: 9780881467222
Price: $35.00
The focus of this volume is on the varieties of religious experiences in sports on the global stage. The first generation of sports and religion scholars debated the ways sports intersected with or even replaced traditional religions and investigated self-identified religious adherents and institutions that have used sports in traditional religious contexts. Our task here is to expand, revise, and complicate this conversation. The essays in this volume look both within and beyond conventional frames to shine a light on the many facets of this endlessly compelling topic.
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Product Code: P389
ISBN: 2151-0679-1
Product Format: Paperback
Availability: Not currently available. ( Backorder policy)
Price: $30.00
The International Journal of Religion and Sport is a refereed print publication analyzing the interchanges between world religions, religious practice, spirituality, and global sport. The editors of the journal invite contributions that take seriously the study of religion and sport as well as scholarship investigating notions of sport as religious or spiritual practice. The journal seeks contributions using diverse methodological approaches to religion and sport from a variety of disciplines such as myth and ritual studies, historical studies, popular culture studies, and liturgical studies. The editors welcome original scholarship in English from international contributors in the form of essays, book reviews, and film reviews. The journal is published yearly by Mercer University Press and is sponsored by the Centre for the Study of Sport and Spirituality at York/St. John College of the University of Leeds.
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Publisher: Mercer University Press
Product Code: P418
ISBN: 2151-0679-2
Product Format: Paperback
Price: $30.00
International Journal of Religion and Sport is a refereed print publication analyzing the interchanges among world religions, religious practice, spirituality, and global sport. The editors of the journal invite contributions that take seriously the study of religion and sport as well as scholarship investigating notions of sport as religious or spiritual practice.
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Product Code: H708
ISBN: 9780865549999
Product Format: Hardback
Availability: Not currently available. ( Backorder policy)
Price: $35.00
In various ways Rounding the Bases charts new territory in the literature about baseball and religion. Unlike previous works (such as The Faith of Fifty Million) that merely assert that baseball, as the national pastime, is an American civil religion, or others (such as And God Said, “Play Ball”) that draw parallels between the Bible and baseball, this book develops a sustained sociological argument for the conclusion that baseball is “a distinct denomination of American civil religion.”
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Publisher: Mercer University Press
Product Code: P366
ISBN: 9780881460407
Product Format: Paperback
Availability: Not currently available. ( Backorder policy)
Price: $25.00
After identifying early conflicts between churches and baseball in the late-nineteenth century, Price examines the appropriation of baseball by the House of David, an early twentieth-century millennial Protestant community in southern Michigan. Turning then from historical intersections between base-ball and religion, two chapters focus on the ways that baseball reflects religious myths. First, the omphalos myth about the origin and ordering of the world is reflected in the rituals and rules of the game. Then the myth of curses is explored in the culture of superstition that underlies the game. At the heart of the book is a sustained argument about how baseball func-tions as an American civil religion, affirming and sanctifying American identity, especially during periods of national crises such as wars and terrorist attacks. Building on this analysis of baseball as an American civil religion, two chapters draw upon novels by W. P. Kinsella and David James Duncan to explore the sacramental potential of baseball and to align baseball with apocalyptic possibilities. The final chapter serves as a full confession, interpreting baseball affiliation stories as conversion narratives. In various ways Rounding the Bases charts new territory in the literature about baseball and religion. Unlike previous works (such as The Faith of Fifty Million) that merely assert that baseball, as the national pastime, is an American civil religion, or others (such as And God Said, “Play Ball”) that draw parallels between the Bible and baseball, this book develops a sustained sociological argument for the conclusion that baseball is “a distinct denomination of American civil religion.”
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