Cinema, Black Suffering, and Theodicy

Cinema, Black Suffering, and Theodicy

Author: Shayne Lee

Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield

Published: 2022-01-26

Total Pages: 243

ISBN-13: 1666904228

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This book explicates how many films intersect black suffering and God-talk in ways that instantiate secular limitations to divine efficacy. The book’s concept of a modern God introduces a new method of analysis that reimagines theodical discourses as mechanisms of modern identities and filmmakers as skillful exegetes who recalibrate divine attributes to the sensemaking cadences of their contemporaries. Shayne Lee demonstrates how cinematic theodicy navigates a happy medium between affirming divine benevolence and sidelining supernatural activity and that filmic characters, like their real-world counterparts, are quite clever at triangulating rationality, faith, and tragedy. In addition to positing synergistic links between theodicy and secularity, Lee offers critical insights into cinema’s relevance to the sociology of evil by specifying how films code and narrate malevolent actions and outcomes, demarcate clear lines of distinction between victims and perpetrators, clarify societal dynamics driving inequality and oppression, and transform individual episodes of suffering into collective and memorialized identities of trauma. This book illuminates how filmic treatments of theodicy construct evil and suffering in calculated ways that connect specific acts, effects, and institutions to greater structures of meaning.


Book Synopsis Cinema, Black Suffering, and Theodicy by : Shayne Lee

Download or read book Cinema, Black Suffering, and Theodicy written by Shayne Lee and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2022-01-26 with total page 243 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book explicates how many films intersect black suffering and God-talk in ways that instantiate secular limitations to divine efficacy. The book’s concept of a modern God introduces a new method of analysis that reimagines theodical discourses as mechanisms of modern identities and filmmakers as skillful exegetes who recalibrate divine attributes to the sensemaking cadences of their contemporaries. Shayne Lee demonstrates how cinematic theodicy navigates a happy medium between affirming divine benevolence and sidelining supernatural activity and that filmic characters, like their real-world counterparts, are quite clever at triangulating rationality, faith, and tragedy. In addition to positing synergistic links between theodicy and secularity, Lee offers critical insights into cinema’s relevance to the sociology of evil by specifying how films code and narrate malevolent actions and outcomes, demarcate clear lines of distinction between victims and perpetrators, clarify societal dynamics driving inequality and oppression, and transform individual episodes of suffering into collective and memorialized identities of trauma. This book illuminates how filmic treatments of theodicy construct evil and suffering in calculated ways that connect specific acts, effects, and institutions to greater structures of meaning.


Moral Evil and Redemptive Suffering

Moral Evil and Redemptive Suffering

Author: Anthony B. Pinn

Publisher:

Published: 2002

Total Pages: 374

ISBN-13: 9780813024547

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"This excellent, balanced, comprehensive, representative, and scholarly useful text lives up to the expectations of those acquainted with Anthony Pinn's work and will impress others who might be coming to the subject matter of African-American religious thought and issues of theodicy in the black tradition for the first time."--Sandy Dwayne Martin, University of Georgia This book, a collection of nineteenth- and twentieth-century documents by African-Americans, traces the progression of black Christian theology's dominant response to the dilemma of evil in a God-protected world: the notion of suffering as redemptive. As the first extensive historical treatment of the problem of evil in African- American religious thinking, this anthology consists in great part of primary documents authored by a range of black theologians, speaking for themselves on theodicy. Supplemented by the editor's analyses of redemptive-suffering arguments and their consequences for black Christian thought and practice, the selections trace the historical development of a primary strand of African-American theology. The authors challenge traditional understandings of radical black religious thought and point out contradictions inherent in the words of black religious leaders. Documents show that black religions historically regarded as progressive have at their theological core an understanding of human suffering as redemptive. The most significant writings by African-American thinkers in this area have been compiled along cross-denominational and doctrinal lines. They include documents from Methodists and Baptists, Muslims and Catholics--not only from church leaders but also from lay people and political leaders. The volume brings clarity to the historical and epistemological underpinnings of one of the most pressing issues faced by African-American Christians. Anthony B. Pinn is associate professor of religion and coordinator of African-American studies at Macalester College, St. Paul, Minnesota.


Book Synopsis Moral Evil and Redemptive Suffering by : Anthony B. Pinn

Download or read book Moral Evil and Redemptive Suffering written by Anthony B. Pinn and published by . This book was released on 2002 with total page 374 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "This excellent, balanced, comprehensive, representative, and scholarly useful text lives up to the expectations of those acquainted with Anthony Pinn's work and will impress others who might be coming to the subject matter of African-American religious thought and issues of theodicy in the black tradition for the first time."--Sandy Dwayne Martin, University of Georgia This book, a collection of nineteenth- and twentieth-century documents by African-Americans, traces the progression of black Christian theology's dominant response to the dilemma of evil in a God-protected world: the notion of suffering as redemptive. As the first extensive historical treatment of the problem of evil in African- American religious thinking, this anthology consists in great part of primary documents authored by a range of black theologians, speaking for themselves on theodicy. Supplemented by the editor's analyses of redemptive-suffering arguments and their consequences for black Christian thought and practice, the selections trace the historical development of a primary strand of African-American theology. The authors challenge traditional understandings of radical black religious thought and point out contradictions inherent in the words of black religious leaders. Documents show that black religions historically regarded as progressive have at their theological core an understanding of human suffering as redemptive. The most significant writings by African-American thinkers in this area have been compiled along cross-denominational and doctrinal lines. They include documents from Methodists and Baptists, Muslims and Catholics--not only from church leaders but also from lay people and political leaders. The volume brings clarity to the historical and epistemological underpinnings of one of the most pressing issues faced by African-American Christians. Anthony B. Pinn is associate professor of religion and coordinator of African-American studies at Macalester College, St. Paul, Minnesota.


Barry Jenkins and the Legacies of Slavery

Barry Jenkins and the Legacies of Slavery

Author: Delphine Letort

Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield

Published: 2023

Total Pages: 163

ISBN-13: 1666918415

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"In this book, Delphine Letort illuminates the intertwining of fiction and history in the TV series adaptation of The Underground Railroad. Letort highlights the narrative and audio/visual strategies used by Barry Jenkins to make for an "affective moment" on television"--


Book Synopsis Barry Jenkins and the Legacies of Slavery by : Delphine Letort

Download or read book Barry Jenkins and the Legacies of Slavery written by Delphine Letort and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2023 with total page 163 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "In this book, Delphine Letort illuminates the intertwining of fiction and history in the TV series adaptation of The Underground Railroad. Letort highlights the narrative and audio/visual strategies used by Barry Jenkins to make for an "affective moment" on television"--


Race, Philosophy, and Film

Race, Philosophy, and Film

Author: Mary K. Bloodsworth-Lugo

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2013-04-12

Total Pages: 251

ISBN-13: 1136250441

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This collection fills a gap in the current literature in philosophy and film by focusing on the question: How would thinking in philosophy and film be transformed if race were formally incorporated moved from its margins to the center? The collection’s contributors anchor their discussions of race through considerations of specific films and television series, which serve as illustrative examples from which the essays’ theorizations are drawn. Inclusive and current in its selection of films and genres, the collection incorporates dramas, comedies, horror, and science fiction films (among other genres) into its discussions, as well as recent and popular titles of interest, such as Twilight, Avatar, Machete, True Blood, and The Matrix and The Help. The essays compel readers to think more deeply about the films they have seen and their experiences of these narratives.


Book Synopsis Race, Philosophy, and Film by : Mary K. Bloodsworth-Lugo

Download or read book Race, Philosophy, and Film written by Mary K. Bloodsworth-Lugo and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2013-04-12 with total page 251 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This collection fills a gap in the current literature in philosophy and film by focusing on the question: How would thinking in philosophy and film be transformed if race were formally incorporated moved from its margins to the center? The collection’s contributors anchor their discussions of race through considerations of specific films and television series, which serve as illustrative examples from which the essays’ theorizations are drawn. Inclusive and current in its selection of films and genres, the collection incorporates dramas, comedies, horror, and science fiction films (among other genres) into its discussions, as well as recent and popular titles of interest, such as Twilight, Avatar, Machete, True Blood, and The Matrix and The Help. The essays compel readers to think more deeply about the films they have seen and their experiences of these narratives.


The Power of Unearned Suffering

The Power of Unearned Suffering

Author: Mika Edmondson

Publisher: Lexington Books

Published: 2016-12-09

Total Pages: 251

ISBN-13: 1498537332

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This book explores the roots and relevance of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s approach to black suffering. King’s conviction that “unearned suffering is redemptive” reflects a nearly 250-year-old tradition in the black church going back to the earliest Negro spirituals. From the bellies of slave ships, the foot of the lynching tree, and the back of segregated buses, black Christians have always maintained the hope that God could “make a way out of no way” and somehow bring good from the evils inflicted on them. As a product of the black church tradition, King inherited this widespread belief, developed it using Protestant liberal concepts, and deployed it throughout the Civil Rights Movement of the 50’s and 60’s as a central pillar of the whole non-violent movement. Recently, critics have maintained that King’s doctrine of redemptive suffering creates a martyr mentality which makes victims passive in the face of their suffering; this book argues against that critique. King’s concept offers real answers to important challenges, and it offers practical hope and guidance for how beleaguered black citizens can faithfully engage their suffering today.


Book Synopsis The Power of Unearned Suffering by : Mika Edmondson

Download or read book The Power of Unearned Suffering written by Mika Edmondson and published by Lexington Books. This book was released on 2016-12-09 with total page 251 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book explores the roots and relevance of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s approach to black suffering. King’s conviction that “unearned suffering is redemptive” reflects a nearly 250-year-old tradition in the black church going back to the earliest Negro spirituals. From the bellies of slave ships, the foot of the lynching tree, and the back of segregated buses, black Christians have always maintained the hope that God could “make a way out of no way” and somehow bring good from the evils inflicted on them. As a product of the black church tradition, King inherited this widespread belief, developed it using Protestant liberal concepts, and deployed it throughout the Civil Rights Movement of the 50’s and 60’s as a central pillar of the whole non-violent movement. Recently, critics have maintained that King’s doctrine of redemptive suffering creates a martyr mentality which makes victims passive in the face of their suffering; this book argues against that critique. King’s concept offers real answers to important challenges, and it offers practical hope and guidance for how beleaguered black citizens can faithfully engage their suffering today.


Marketing Violence to Children

Marketing Violence to Children

Author: United States. Congress. Senate. Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation

Publisher:

Published: 2003

Total Pages: 184

ISBN-13:

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Book Synopsis Marketing Violence to Children by : United States. Congress. Senate. Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation

Download or read book Marketing Violence to Children written by United States. Congress. Senate. Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation and published by . This book was released on 2003 with total page 184 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:


God/Black Theodicy

God/Black Theodicy

Author: Maurice F. Scott

Publisher:

Published: 2013-03-05

Total Pages: 171

ISBN-13: 9780989126007

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Book Synopsis God/Black Theodicy by : Maurice F. Scott

Download or read book God/Black Theodicy written by Maurice F. Scott and published by . This book was released on 2013-03-05 with total page 171 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:


Encyclopedia of Religion and Film

Encyclopedia of Religion and Film

Author: Eric Michael Mazur

Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA

Published: 2011-03-08

Total Pages: 665

ISBN-13: 0313013985

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Comprising 91 A–Z entries, this encyclopedia provides a broad and comprehensive introduction to the topic of religion within film. Technology has enabled films to reach much wider audiences, enabling today's viewers to access a dizzying number of films that employ diverse symbolism and communicate a vast array of viewpoints. Encyclopedia of Religion and Film will provide such an audience with the tools to begin their own exploration of the deeper meanings of these films and grasp the religious significance within. Organized alphabetically, this encyclopedia provides more than 90 entries on the larger religious traditions, the major film-producing regions of the globe, the films that have stirred controversy, the most significant religious symbols, and the more important filmmakers. The included topics provide substantially more information on the intersection of religion and film than any of the similar volumes currently available. While the emphasis is on the English-speaking world and the films produced therein, there is also substantial representation of non-English, non-Western film and filmmakers, providing significant intercultural coverage to the topic.


Book Synopsis Encyclopedia of Religion and Film by : Eric Michael Mazur

Download or read book Encyclopedia of Religion and Film written by Eric Michael Mazur and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2011-03-08 with total page 665 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Comprising 91 A–Z entries, this encyclopedia provides a broad and comprehensive introduction to the topic of religion within film. Technology has enabled films to reach much wider audiences, enabling today's viewers to access a dizzying number of films that employ diverse symbolism and communicate a vast array of viewpoints. Encyclopedia of Religion and Film will provide such an audience with the tools to begin their own exploration of the deeper meanings of these films and grasp the religious significance within. Organized alphabetically, this encyclopedia provides more than 90 entries on the larger religious traditions, the major film-producing regions of the globe, the films that have stirred controversy, the most significant religious symbols, and the more important filmmakers. The included topics provide substantially more information on the intersection of religion and film than any of the similar volumes currently available. While the emphasis is on the English-speaking world and the films produced therein, there is also substantial representation of non-English, non-Western film and filmmakers, providing significant intercultural coverage to the topic.


Film Blackness

Film Blackness

Author: Michael Boyce Gillespie

Publisher: Duke University Press

Published: 2016-08-19

Total Pages: 248

ISBN-13: 0822373882

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In Film Blackness Michael Boyce Gillespie shifts the ways we think about black film, treating it not as a category, a genre, or strictly a representation of the black experience but as a visual negotiation between film as art and the discursivity of race. Gillespie challenges expectations that black film can or should represent the reality of black life or provide answers to social problems. Instead, he frames black film alongside literature, music, art, photography, and new media, treating it as an interdisciplinary form that enacts black visual and expressive culture. Gillespie discusses the racial grotesque in Ralph Bakshi's Coonskin (1975), black performativity in Wendell B. Harris Jr.'s Chameleon Street (1989), blackness and noir in Bill Duke's Deep Cover (1992), and how place and desire impact blackness in Barry Jenkins's Medicine for Melancholy (2008). Considering how each film represents a distinct conception of the relationship between race and cinema, Gillespie recasts the idea of black film and poses new paradigms for genre, narrative, aesthetics, historiography, and intertextuality.


Book Synopsis Film Blackness by : Michael Boyce Gillespie

Download or read book Film Blackness written by Michael Boyce Gillespie and published by Duke University Press. This book was released on 2016-08-19 with total page 248 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Film Blackness Michael Boyce Gillespie shifts the ways we think about black film, treating it not as a category, a genre, or strictly a representation of the black experience but as a visual negotiation between film as art and the discursivity of race. Gillespie challenges expectations that black film can or should represent the reality of black life or provide answers to social problems. Instead, he frames black film alongside literature, music, art, photography, and new media, treating it as an interdisciplinary form that enacts black visual and expressive culture. Gillespie discusses the racial grotesque in Ralph Bakshi's Coonskin (1975), black performativity in Wendell B. Harris Jr.'s Chameleon Street (1989), blackness and noir in Bill Duke's Deep Cover (1992), and how place and desire impact blackness in Barry Jenkins's Medicine for Melancholy (2008). Considering how each film represents a distinct conception of the relationship between race and cinema, Gillespie recasts the idea of black film and poses new paradigms for genre, narrative, aesthetics, historiography, and intertextuality.


Philosophy, Black Film, Film Noir

Philosophy, Black Film, Film Noir

Author:

Publisher: Penn State Press

Published: 2008

Total Pages: 368

ISBN-13: 0271046880

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"Examines how African-American as well as international films deploy film noir techniques in ways that encourage philosophical reflection. Combines philosophy, film studies, and cultural studies"--Provided by publisher.


Book Synopsis Philosophy, Black Film, Film Noir by :

Download or read book Philosophy, Black Film, Film Noir written by and published by Penn State Press. This book was released on 2008 with total page 368 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Examines how African-American as well as international films deploy film noir techniques in ways that encourage philosophical reflection. Combines philosophy, film studies, and cultural studies"--Provided by publisher.