Late modernity has produced a marked turn away from institutionalized religions towards more autonomous, individual forms of the search for spiritual meaning. Film, television, the music industry, and the internet are central to this process, cutting through the monolithic assertions of world religions and giving access to more diverse and fragmented ideals. While the volume and variety of information travelling through global media changes modes of religious thought and commitment, the human desire for spirituality also invigorates popular culture itself, recreating commodities--film blockbusters, world sport, popular music--as contexts for religious meaning. Looking at the everyday interaction of religion and media in our cultural lives, and using extensive empirical research into household media consumption, "Religion in" "the Media Age "is an exciting new assessment of the state of modern religiosity.

Introduction; What This Book Could Be about; Part 1 From Medium to Meaning; Part 2 Media and Religion in Transition; Part 3 Articulating Life and Culture in the Media Age; Part 4 Reception of Religion and Media; Part 5 Cultural Objects and Religious Identity Among Born-Agains And Mainstream Believers; Part 6 Cultural Objects and Religious Identity Among Metaphysical Believers, Dogmatists, and Secularists; Part 7 Representing Outcomes; Part 8 Media and Public Religious Culture Post-09/11/01 And Post-11/2/04; Part 9 Conclusion;