Religion Dispatches
…ents in North Carolina, I offered a few thoughts on Twitter about just how American Islam is. Islam is as American as basketball. pic.twitter.com/O6IcSkxvy1 — peter manseau (@petermanseau) February 11, 2015 Islam is as American as dancing with dad at your wedding. pic.twitter.com/HZL7fRzWFC — peter manseau (@petermanseau) February 11, 2015 Islam is as American as pride and ambition. pic.twitter.com/ghycpAaTXo — peter manseau (@petermanseau) Februa…
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…ly subservient to simple “facts.” The creation of new museums dedicated to American Indians or African American history and culture is a sign that some part of our civic culture is slowly waking up to the ways that Americans live—indeed have always lived—in different universes, though these undoubtedly intersect and overlap. There is simply no comparing the universe in which I live to the universe of George Washington, or for that matter the unive…
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…ississippi, Alabama, Georgia—all these Southeastern states that had Native American populations. In the early 1800s they began to be pushed off the land and then were forcibly pushed off the land [even more rapidly] under Andrew Jackson’s presidency. It was the largest forced migration in the continent’s history. Some 80,000 people were forced from their land, and maybe 20% of them died en route to what is now Oklahoma. So that cleansing happens r…
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…calism developed as a giant protest movement against the liberalization of American Protestantism. Evangelical churches flourished as safe harbors for White Americans who wanted to be counted as Christian without engaging the challenges of an ethnoracially diverse society and a scientifically-informed culture that the mainline leadership embraced. Protestants had a choice. Those who chose evangelical churches rejected an easily available alternati…
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…s, while Juneteenth needs to be a “safe space”? White ethnic festivals and American civil holidays allow for an unconscious honorary ethnic status. It’s possible to see a young Asian American person in a “Kiss Me I’m Irish” t-shirt at a St. Patrick’s Day parade but not at a Juneteenth festival in one that says “Free-ish since 1865.” Again, the issues of race and slavery prevent this level of ethno-racial cosplay that we so frequently witness aroun…
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…eekend, some filled the time with recreational sports of many kinds. After American football developed in the late 1800s, high schools and colleges found Thanksgiving Day and weekend to be an ideal time for conference championship games. Later, professional football took over Thanksgiving Day with a televised Detroit Lions game, adding a Dallas Cowboy game in 1970 and now a third game in the evenings. Rowdy crowds of drunken Thanksgiving revelers…
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…also diffusing anti-U.S. sentiment. The manifestation of resentment toward Americans, this is merely on the surface, I believe, and will disappear if the American Government makes any attempt to win the good will of Dominicans . . . I deem it worthy of the Department’s notice that the American national game of baseball is being played and supported with great enthusiasm. The remarkable effect of this outlet for the animal spirits of the young men…
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…ourning his parents, which he’s never done. On a deeper level, the typical American “happy ending” of the film belies a more profound lesson. Herschel recognizes that life is not only about mourning; and Ben recognizes that life is also about mourning. If all one does is mourn, there’s no relief from one’s anger against God. And if one cannot mourn, there’s no relief from one’s anger against God. The avoidance of death is as frightening as its ine…
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…c story of America’s foundation. The conservative reads a tale about Anglo-American Protestant hegemony and the opening up of North American resources. But the radical, perhaps even the mystical interpreter, reads a more allegorically profound story about America as “Mother of Exiles,” a universal space that encompases all ethnicities, cultures, and religions precisely because of its universality. *** When Welcoming the Stranger Was Not Just a Rel…
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…k Obama, is unparalleled anywhere else in the world; it defines a uniquely American experience. The gun is one of the American gods, and its holy canon is the Second Amendment. We look through the warped window of the religion of America and find guns affixed to its throbbing heart. In 2013, Public Religion Research Institute reported that only 38 percent of white evangelical Protestants favored the passage of stricter gun control laws, while 59 p…
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