CFP: Media, Religion, and Crisis

Volume Editors: Larisa Denise Anderson, Jason Bartashius, Melissa L. Gould

 

Abstract and CV Due: January 15, 2025

Initial Final Paper Due: September 2025  
 

Overview 

This special issue challenges essentialist (mis)conceptions that religion is crisis averse and always functions as a provider of safe spaces in times of crisis. On the contrary, 60% of people who identify as religiously unaffiliated or “nothing in particular” question religious teachings. More than half of religious unaffiliates cite religious organizations and religious people as part of the reason they are not religious. More broadly, scholarly debates about religious institutions point to the colonial, normative, and Western categorization of religion that informs social and spiritual violence toward religions of the Global South, indigenous religions, and Afro-diasporic religious traditions. In other words, religion is the crisis. Ongoing struggles for the fate of American Christianity, for example, hinge on how we identify and address anti-black racism, xenophobia, white supremacy, homophobia, transantagonism, sexism, misogynoir, classism, and climate change. Indeed, the sociopolitical characteristics of religion are dubiously tied to discourse and practice. At the same time, we recognize also that religion can be a force of resistance to right wing populism and, in certain contexts, subvert oppressive norms internal or external to religious communities. We contend that whether through social media platforms, broadcast news, film, television, advertising, or books, media play a pivotal role in setting the stage for public discourse about religion and/as crisis. 

 

This special issue considers: (1) how media depict the relationship between religion and/as crisis, (2) how religious communities respond to crises through media, and (3) how religion is appropriated by/in media to navigate moments of crisis. Crisis is an intentionally broad term we use to account for crisis operating at individual, local, national and global scales such as personal mental health struggles, social conflict, political unrest, organizational scandal, environmental catastrophe, or conspiracies. 

 

We are interested in the ways various media depict crises by fusing religious themes, language, iconography, or practice. For example, how do apocalyptic films reinforce Western eschatological authority? How might indigenous knowledge inform the ways we understand climate or eco-anxiety within religious communities on social media? With special attention to the ways religion is a crisis, we are also interested in the ways religious groups respond to crises through media. For example, how do conservative religious communities use media to combat religious discontent? How do books written by religious leaders address various crises? On the appropriation of religion, we look to explore how religion / religious referents are deployed as tools to make sense of moments of crisis. For example, how does a coming-of-age television show incorporate religious themes to build a character arc that struggles with and triumphs over personal moments of crisis? In the wake of ongoing imperial, climate, and medical violence(s), we hope that “crisis” is one way to cohere critical scholarship across studies of race, gender, media, popular culture, and theory. 

Potential Topics 

We invite papers that examine the intersections of media/popular culture and religion on topics related, but not limited to, the following social phenomena and crisis: 

• Social Movements 

• Periods of War—historic and contemporary 

• COVID-19 Pandemic 

• Representations of Religion

• Conspiracy Theories 

• Religion and Mental Health

• Christian Nationalism 

• Social Media Trends

• Popular Music, Gaming, Advertising

• White Supremacy  

• Climate Disasters 

• Democracy in Collapse  

 

We also invite papers focused on religious groups who use media during times of crisis. Examples include: 

• Email newsletters

• Live-stream

• Text message services 

• Web conferencing software 

• Social media 

• Mobile applications

 

Theoretical and conceptual papers that explore the concept of religion and/as crisis are also welcome. 

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Editor Bios

Larisa Denise Anderson

LaRisa Anderson is an assistant professor in communication at the University of Utah. She is completing her doctorate as Roy H. Park Fellow in the Hussman School of Journalism and Media. She researches religion and technoculture with a particular interest in digital religious culture. She is affiliated with the Center for Information, Technology, and Public Life where she organized the Religion, Media, and Public Life symposium. She has presented at national and international conferences, including the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication, where she won the Top Paper Award for work now published in the Journal of Religion, Media, and Digital Culture.  

 

Dr Jason Bartashius  

Jason Bartashius is an independent researcher. He holds a PhD in Global Studies (Sophia University) and an MA in Asian Religion (University of Hawaii at Manoa). While his dissertation research examined the interplay and intersections of religious and sexuality/gender ideologies in discourses on migration, his more recent work has interrogated cinema (Lady Bird; Fight Club;  Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter . . . and Spring) and television (Stranger Things). He has contributed journalistic pieces to outlets including The Japan Times, Shingetsu News, Kyoto Journal and Honolulu Civil Beat as well as public scholarship in Religion Dispatches.       

Dr Melissa L. Gould

Melissa is the head of Critical Media Studies and a senior lecturer in the School of Communications at Auckland University of Technology in Aotearoa New Zealand. Her postgraduate research explored the use of Christian cultural markers as promotional tools in television commercials, offering creative and cultural insights into the role of religion in Aotearoa. Currently, her research interests include media literacy, promotional culture, childhood studies, and the representations of gender and religion