Imagining Judeo-Christian America: Religion, Secularism, and the Redefinition of Democracy (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9780226663852)

"Judeo-Christian" is a remarkably easy term to look right through. Judaism and Christianity obviously share tenets, texts, and beliefs that have strongly influenced American democracy. In this ambitious book, however, K. Healan Gaston challenges the myth of a monolithic Judeo-Christian America. She demonstrates that the idea is not only a recent and deliberate construct, but also a potentially dangerous one. From the time of its widespread adoption in the 1930s, the ostensible inclusiveness of Judeo-Christian terminology concealed efforts to promote particular conceptions of religion, secularism, and politics. Gaston also shows that this new language, originally rooted in arguments over the nature of democracy that intensified in the early Cold War years, later became a marker in the culture wars that continue today. She argues that the debate on what constituted Judeo-Christian--and American--identity has shaped the country's religious and political culture much more extensively than previously recognized.

Author: K. Healan Gaston
ISBN-10: 022666385X
ISBN-13: 9780226663852
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Language: English
Published: 11/13/2019
Pages: 368
Format: Paperback
Weight: 1.05lbs
Size: 8.90h x 5.90w x 0.80d

Review Citation(s):
Choice 07/01/2020