Alien worlds : social and religious dimensions of extraterrestrial contact / edited by Diana G. Tumminia.

Format:

Book

Contributor:

Tumminia, Diana G.

Series:

Religion and politics

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Human-alien encounters--Social aspects.

Human-alien encounters.

Human-alien encounters--Religious aspects.

Alien abduction.

Physical Description:

xlii, 364 pages : illustrations ; 26 cm.

Edition:

First edition.

Place of Publication:

Syracuse, N.Y. : Syracuse University Press, [2007]

Contents:

Part one: Contactee religions

Hagiography and text in the Aetherius Society : aspects of the social construction of a religious leader / Mikael Rothstein

The odyssey of Sister Thedra / Jerome Clark

Galactic messenger! overview of the Universal Industrial Church of the New World Comforter / Diana G. Tumminia

Presumed immanent : the Raëlians, UFO religions, and the postmodern condition / Bryan Sentes and Susan Palmer

In the dreamtime of the saucer people : sense-making and interpretive boundaries in a contactee group / Diana G. Tumminia

Part two: Abductees and contactees

Toward an explanation of the "abduction epidemic" : the ritualization of alien abduction mythology in therapeutic settings / Georg M. Rønnevig

Secondary beliefs and the alien abduction phenomenon / Benson Saler

Alien abduction narratives and religious contexts / Scott R. Scribner

Close encounters of the French kind : the saucerian construction of "contacts" and the controversy over its reality in France / Pierre Lagrange

Part three: Myth, folklore, and media

Consciousness, culture, and UFOs / Jacques Vallee

Aliens from the cosmos : a discourse of contemporary UFO myths / Anna E. Kubiak

All I ever want to be, I learned from playing Klingon : sex, honor, and cultural critique in Star Trek fandom / Jennifer E. Porter

Part four: Ufological "science" and therapy

Observations from archaeology and religious studies on first contact and ETI evidence / James F. Strange

A confederacy of fact and faith : science and the sacred in UFO research / Anne Cross

Ancient alien brothers, ancient terrestrial remains : archaeology or religion? / Pia Andersson

The Raëlian creation myth and the art of cloning : reality or rhetoric? / Christopher Helland

UFO abduction support groups : who are the members? / Christopher D. Bader.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 317-342) and index.

ISBN:

9780815608585

0815608586

OCLC:

77504359