Humanism: Essays on race, religion, and cultural production

✍ Scribed by Anthony B. Pinn

• Publisher: Bloomsbury Academic
• Year: 2015
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 185
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

Who are the “Nones”? What does humanism say about race, religion and popular culture? How do race, religion and popular culture inform and affect humanism?
The demographics of the United States are changing, marked most profoundly by the religiously unaffiliated, or what we have to come to call the “Nones”. Spread across generations in the United States, this group encompasses a wide range of philosophical and ideological perspectives, from some in line with various forms of theism to those who are atheistic, and all sorts of combinations in between. Similar changes to demographics are taking place in Europe and elsewhere.
Humanism: Essays on Race, Religion and Popular Culture provides a much-needed humanities-based analysis and description of humanism in relation to these cultural markers. Whereas most existing analysis attempts to explain humanism through the natural and social sciences (the “what” of life), Anthony B. Pinn explores humanism in relation to “how” life is arranged, socialized, ritualized, and framed. This ground-breaking publication brings together old and new essays on a wide range of topics and themes, from the African-American experience, to the development of humanist churches, and the lyrics of Jay Z.

✦ Table of Contents

Title Page
Copyright Page
Contents
Introduction: Sisyphus, humanism, and the challenge of three
Humanism on the ground
Why another book on humanism?
Framing the chapters
Acknowledgments
Section One: Race
Chapter 1 Racing humanism: Two examples for context
Shadow humanism
Naturalistic humanism
Chapter 2 African Americans living li(f)e
African American humanism
What humanism means for African Americans
Chapter 3 The ongoing challenge of race
A bit of context
Challenging the status quo: Target one—religion
Challenging the status quo: Target two—nontheist introspection
The implications
Chapter 4 Does race have a religion? On the “Faith” of Du Bois
Religion and Du Bois: Friends or enemies?
A prophet’s new Christianity
Black life through religious naturalism
The moral thinker’s religion
And so . . .
Section Two: Religion
Chapter 5 Nimrod is a hero . . . and God is a problem
Thinking about Nimrod
God as restraint exposed
Human creativity in community
God’s great fear
Learning from Nimrod
Good-bye God
Chapter 6 Humanism and the rethinking of a King’s King
“Somebodyness” and the theological significance of the body
King and the Personal God
Reenvisioning the Divine
Divine mishaps and detours
Chapter 7 Putting Jesus in his place
What would Jesus do?
Using Jesus
Black folks and a Jesus who understands “Us”
When Jesus becomes black
Hip-hop Jesus
The dilemma of Christology
Chapter 8 Gathering the godless: Intentional “Communities” and ritualizing ordinary life
Contextual considerations
The difference between theism and religion
Community for humanists and atheists?
New gatherings of the godless—Sunday assemblies
Humanists gatherings—The case of Houston Oasis
On “New” ritualized gatherings for the godless
And now . . .
Section Three: Cultural production
Chapter 9 Learning to be cool, or making due with what we do
The persistence of faith
To recap . . . and move on
What to do, and how hip-hop might help
PR and branding
Help from an unlikely source: Hip-hop
A hip-hop posture for humanists
Example one: “Thick” diversity
Example two: Significance of the ordinary4
Example three: Measured realism
Finally . . .
Chapter 10 End of the “End”: Humanism, hip-hop, and death
A few words on context
Death over against life
Rap music on death: Tupac is Jesus
Rap music and death: New authority
Looking at death
Chapter 11 Speaking in public: The problem of theistic language for collective life
The President
Speaking the USA
The limits of language
Revising language
Linguistic building blocks
Finally . . .
Notes
Introduction
Chapter one
Chapter two
Chapter three
Chapter four
Chapter five
Chapter six
Chapter seven
Chapter eight
Chapter nine
Chapter ten
Chapter eleven
Epilogue
Epilogue: Sisyphus’s happiness
Humanism . . .
Bibliography
Discography (Sound recordings)
Index