Ecopiety : green media and the dilemma of environmental virtue / Sarah McFarland Taylor.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Taylor, Sarah McFarland, 1968- author.

Series:

Religion and social transformation

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Ecology--Religious aspects.

Ecology.

Mass media--Religious aspects.

Mass media.

Ecotheology.

Physical Description:

vii, 359 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm.

Place of Publication:

New York : New York University Press, [2019]

Summary:

Confident that your personal good deeds of environmental virtue will save the earth? The stories we encounter about the environment in popular culture too often promote an imagined moral economy, assuring us that tiny acts of voluntary personal piety, such as recycling a coffee cup, or purchasing green consumer items, can offset our destructive habits. No need to make any fundamental structural changes. The trick is simply for the consumer to buy the right things and shop our way to a greener future.It's time for a reality check. Ecopiety offers an absorbing examination of the intersections of environmental sensibilities, contemporary expressions of piety and devotion, and American popular culture. Ranging from portrayals of environmental sin and virtue such as the eco-pious depiction of Christian Grey in Fifty Shades of Grey, to the green capitalism found in the world of mobile-device "carbon sin-tracking" software applications, to the socially conscious vegetarian vampires in True Blood, the volume illuminates the work pop culture performs as both a mirror and an engine for the greening of American spiritual and ethical commitments.Taylor makes the case that it is not through a framework of grim duty or obligation, but through one of play and delight, that we may move environmental ideals into substantive action.

Contents:

Restorying the earth: media interventions as moral interventions

Fifty shades of green: moral licensing, offsets, and transformative works

I can't! It's a Prius: purity, piety, pollution porn, and coal rolling

Green is the new black: carbon-sin trackers, reality tv, and green modeling

Vegetarian vampires: blood, oil, eros, and monstrous consumption

Composting a life: green burial marketing and storied corpses as media

Expanding the scope of justice: tattooing and hip hop as ecomedia witnessing tools

Conclusion. Storying the future: becoming green scheherazades in the anthropocene.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 271-341) and index.

ISBN:

9781479810765

1479810762

9781479891313

1479891312

OCLC:

1091844817