A Communion of Shadows

Religion and Photography in Nineteenth-Century America

Nonfiction, Religion & Spirituality, Inspiration & Meditation, Devotionally, History, Americas, United States, 19th Century, Art & Architecture, Photography
Cover of the book A Communion of Shadows by Rachel McBride Lindsey, The University of North Carolina Press
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Author: Rachel McBride Lindsey ISBN: 9781469633732
Publisher: The University of North Carolina Press Publication: October 17, 2017
Imprint: The University of North Carolina Press Language: English
Author: Rachel McBride Lindsey
ISBN: 9781469633732
Publisher: The University of North Carolina Press
Publication: October 17, 2017
Imprint: The University of North Carolina Press
Language: English

When the revolutionary technology of photography erupted in American culture in 1839, it swiftly became, in the day's parlance, a "mania." This richly illustrated book positions vernacular photography at the center of the study of nineteenth-century American religious life. As an empirical tool, photography captured many of the signal scenes of American life, from the gold rush to the bloody battlefields of the Civil War. But photographs did not simply display neutral records of people, places, and things; rather, commonplace photographs became inscribed with spiritual meaning, disclosing, not merely signifying, a power that lay beyond.

Rachel McBride Lindsey demonstrates that what people beheld when they looked at a photograph had as much to do with what lay outside the frame--theological expectations, for example--as with what the camera had recorded. Whether studio portraits tucked into Bibles, postmortem portraits with locks of hair attached, "spirit" photography, stereographs of the Holy Land, or magic lanterns used in biblical instruction, photographs were curated, beheld, displayed, and valued as physical artifacts that functioned both as relics and as icons of religious practice. Lindsey's interpretation of "vernacular" as an analytic introduces a way to consider anew the cultural, social, and material reach of religion.

A multimedia collaboration with MAVCOR—Center for the Study of Material & Visual Cultures of Religion—at Yale University.

View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart

When the revolutionary technology of photography erupted in American culture in 1839, it swiftly became, in the day's parlance, a "mania." This richly illustrated book positions vernacular photography at the center of the study of nineteenth-century American religious life. As an empirical tool, photography captured many of the signal scenes of American life, from the gold rush to the bloody battlefields of the Civil War. But photographs did not simply display neutral records of people, places, and things; rather, commonplace photographs became inscribed with spiritual meaning, disclosing, not merely signifying, a power that lay beyond.

Rachel McBride Lindsey demonstrates that what people beheld when they looked at a photograph had as much to do with what lay outside the frame--theological expectations, for example--as with what the camera had recorded. Whether studio portraits tucked into Bibles, postmortem portraits with locks of hair attached, "spirit" photography, stereographs of the Holy Land, or magic lanterns used in biblical instruction, photographs were curated, beheld, displayed, and valued as physical artifacts that functioned both as relics and as icons of religious practice. Lindsey's interpretation of "vernacular" as an analytic introduces a way to consider anew the cultural, social, and material reach of religion.

A multimedia collaboration with MAVCOR—Center for the Study of Material & Visual Cultures of Religion—at Yale University.

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