Handbook of New Religions and Cultural Production

Music, literature, painting, sculpture, architecture, and more recently movies are among the cultural products within new religions that scholars of religion and of these disciplines analyze. The topics include the idea of the temple in Mormon history; Theosophical concepts in literature, visual media, and popular culture; the Anthroposophical movement and the Waldorf educational system; Gurdjieff's sacred dances and movements; bardic chairs and the emergent performance practices of paganism; reggae as cultural expressions of Rastafarian theology; the intricate relation between the metal band Therion and the magic order Dragon Rouge; localization and universal form in the Baha'i house of worship; and visualizing lost temple and mapping a straightening world in Solomon Islands as two cultural products of the Deep Sea Canoe movement. Annotation c2012 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Carole M. Cusack, Ph.D. (1996) in Studies in Religion, University of Sydney, is Associate Professor of this department. She has published extensively on contemporary religious trends, medieval religion, and method and theory in the study of religion, including Invented Religions (Ashgate, 2010).Alex Norman, Ph.D. (2010) in Studies in Religion, University of Sydney, is a lecturer at the University of New South Wales and the University of Western Sydney. His research interests include religion and travel, leading to the publication of Spiritual Tourism (Continuum, 2011).