Chris Klassen
Wilfrid Laurier University, Waterloo, ON
[1] Teaching courses on religion and popular
culture in a Canadian academic institution has provided
me with significant challenges. According to Raymond
Williams (1983), “popular” can have at least
four meanings in common parlance. (1) It can mean that
which is well-liked by a lot of people (e.g., the top
ten bestselling books); (2) it can mean that which is
inferior to elite or high culture (e.g., pop music versus
opera); (3) it can mean that which deliberately tries
to win the favour of “the people” (e.g.,
political campaigns); or (4) it can mean that which is
made by the people (e.g., youtube). Some of these definitions
lead to an assumption that popular culture is not particularly “deep” or
meaningful. For some people then, the question is, as
David Chidester asks in his book Authentic Fakes, “[h]ow
does the serious work of religion, which engages the
transcendent, the sacred, and the ultimate meaning of
human life in the face of death, relate to the comparatively
frivolous play of popular culture?” The Journal
of Religion and Popular Culture has consistently shown
the multiple ways this serious work of religion relates
to popular culture.
[2] It is not enough, however, to generically question
the relationship between religion and popular culture
without placing both religion and popular culture in
some kinds of context known to students. Though we live
in a globalized world and have access to multiple popular
cultures, particularly the omnipresent American culture,
there is also something to be said for including the
very local. As such, I continually question how to bring
the local context of popular culture into the discussion
for my Canadian students. In my past searches for books
and articles on religion and popular culture in Canadian
contexts, I have come up with very little. This edition
of the Journal of Religion and Popular Culture will help
fill some of that gap.
[3]Why is there such a dearth of resources on religion
and popular culture in Canada? Are Canadian religious
studies scholars simply not interested in popular culture?
No, of course, this is not the case. But the peculiarities
of the relationship between Canada and its more globally
vocal neighbour add some complication to the study of
religion and popular culture in Canada. Many Canadians
consume American popular culture more consistently than
they do Canadian popular culture. At least that is the
case when popular culture is defined as mass media and/or
entertainment media. But this definition is, perhaps,
too narrow. Nor does the consumption of American popular
culture preclude a Canadian cultural mode of that consumption
which has profound implications for understanding Canadian
religious, cultural and political identities. In The
Beaver Bites Back?, editor Frank E. Manning suggests
an ambiguity and resistance to American popular culture
by Canadian consumers. The resistance does not lead so
much to a rejection of these cultural products, as much
as a crafting of alternative meaning (Manning 1993).
Canadians are entertained by Americans, but they remain
Canadians in a way that is more than simply a national
distinction.
[4] When we broaden the definition of popular culture
beyond mass, entertainment media, we begin to see even
more space for a discussion of religion and popular culture
in Canada. This edition of JRPC brings to the discussion
multiple sites of popular culture in Canada. Michael
J. Gilmour’s essay on the music group Arcade Fire
and Tracy Trothen’s essay on hockey provide us
with analyses of the more familiar entertainment culture.
Though make no mistake, these essays challenge readers
to move beyond the familiar and ask serious theological
questions about violence, parody and the influence of
Christianity on and in popular culture. Laurence Nixon
and Olivier Bauer take us out of the realm of the entertaining
and into the realm of the everyday practice of culture
and religiosity. Nixon highlights the differences between
popular and official understandings of ritual, piety
and what might be called religious “kitsch” at
St. Joseph’s Oratory. Bauer points out the contradictory
and potentially empowering usages of the Catholic host
in Quebecois religious and popular cultures. Finally,
Rebecca Margolis takes us into the world of popular usage
of Yiddish, from Hasidic communities to theatre to literature.
In all of these essays we see the importance of Canadian
contexts in understanding the popular, and the importance
of the popular in understanding Canadian culture.
Bibliography
Chidester, David. 2005. Authentic Fakes:
Religion and American Popular Culture. Thomson Gale.
Flaherty, David H. and Frank E. Manning, eds. 1993.
The Beaver Bites Back? American Popular Culture in
Canada.
McGill-Queen’s University Press
Williams, Raymond. 1983. Keywords: A Vocabulary
of Culture and Society. Oxford University Press
