Christianity in Popular Culture Blog

Victoria Sunnergren, Fall 2015

Works of artistic expression such as film, music, and art, can be analyzed to gain an understanding of the creator’s intentions. In art historical theory, this is structuralism – the analysis of a creator’s intention with his work of art, rather than focusing discussion on the work’s reception or perception by viewers. In religious studies, a structuralist approach to artistic religious expressions can be a tool for a scholar to discover what the creator of a work of art wanted to express about their religion to the viewer.

 In recent years, many works of American popular culture have been created by Christians as a means of expressing their religion to a general audience, many of whom are not practicing Christians. This blog discusses examples of popular culture items created by Christians. It analyzes a work from each of several genres – film, television, music, art, and literature – in order to understand what these creators are attempting to express about their religion to the general populace of America. The blog discusses the various ways in which artists, authors, directors, and musicians have used creative platforms to discuss their view of Christianity, in an attempt to bring those views to wider audiences through the use of popular culturej.

 The author of this blog is an American student, studying religion at the undergraduate level. This blog is part of a project to meet the requirements for university course. This project was created for REL1300, Introduction to World Religions, Fall 2015, at Florida State University.