Georgia Anne Persons - Contemporary Patterns of Politics, Praxis, and Culture

The National Political Science Review
Volume 10

EDITOR

Georgia Institute of Technology

San Francisco State University

University of Maryland-Baltimore County

Georgia State University

National Governors Association

University of Michigan

Columbia University

University of Baltimore

Clark Atlanta University

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

University of Chicago

Rutgers University

University of South Florida

Sacramento State

Ohio State University

Howard University

Northwestern University

Georgia State University

University of Southern California

Wellesley College

University of New Mexico

University of Missouri Columbia

University of North Carolin Charlotte

First published 2005 by Transaction Publishers

Published 2017 by Routledge

2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN

711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017, USA

Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.

Notice:

Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe.

Library of Congress Catalog Number: 2004058890

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Contemporary patterns of politics, praxis, and culture / Georgia A. Persons, editor.

p. cm.

Published also as v. 10 of the National political science review.

Includes bibliographical references.

ISBN 1-4128-0468-X (pbk. : alk. paper)

1. Political sociology. 2. United StatesRace relations. 3. United StatesPolitics and government. I. Persons, Georgia Anne. II. National political science review.

JA76.C575 2005

306.2dc22

2004058890

ISBN 13: 978-1-4128-0468-4 (pbk)

Georgia A. Persons

The Editor offers special thanks to all of the contributors whose work is included in this volume of the National Political Science Review. Special thanks to Associate Editors Robert C. Smith and Cheryl M. Miller, and colleagues in the discipline who served as reviewers and made completion of this volume possible.

Thanks to Carmen Williams and Elena Santana of the School of Public Policy, Georgia Institute of Technology, who provided administrative assistance, and who always provided kindness, mirth, and good humor as well.

The Editor extends deep gratitude to all of the members of the Editorial Board and extends a special welcome to new members who have agreed to lend their assistance to furthering the goals of this journal.

This volume of the National Political Science Review contains a collection of manuscripts that is reflective of major research foci salient across the social science disciplines: religion, race, gender, culture, and, of course, politics. These same themes that engage us as a community of scholars also engage us in praxis as individual citizens and practitioners in a democratic society, and collectively as member-participants in a changing culture. At least two of these themes, religion and culture, are relatively new areas of intellectual curiosity for political scientists who have historically left the scholarly study of religion to sociologists and the study of culture to anthropologists. Quite arguably, religion is emerging as the most gripping (new) social phenomenon in modern times, or, as some would say, of the post-modern era.

Hence, the penetration of scholarly inquiry on religion and culture across the whole of the social sciences is reflective of the heightened concern about and engagement around these matters at both the mass and elite levels of American society and in countries around the world. African American political scientists have quickly established beachheads in this area of study in works that have plumbed the significance and influence of religion in both individual and group behavior, and in its inevitable move onto the center stage of U.S. public affairs. Thus it is quite fitting that this volume opens with three articles that address different dimensions of religion and public life. The article by Combs and Welch explores ways in which the complex idea of racial solidarity is affected by religion and interracial contact. McDaniel and McClerking focus on the importance of political churches in mobilizing the black community and provide new insights into how membership in those churches varies along socioeconomic lines. The article by Chin, Warber, and Hardy examines whether the organizational characteristics of churches influence the level of political and civic participation that they undertake within their communities.

The study of culture has essentially languished for almost a generation within the discipline of Political Science, most especially with regard to the study of American politics and society. During this lacuna the emphasis of scholarly inquiry has also shifted significantly from an almost exclusive focus on civic culture to embrace an expanding focus on the broad expanse of popular culture in the contemporary period. This is an appropriate and timely shift in emphasis as it reflects the essentiality of broad-based cultural dynamics to all things social and political. Culture is the crucible within which politics, race, religion, and gender both foment and ferment, and artistic products of the culture are manifestations and mirrors of how we envision and construct a changing reality. The NPSR welcomes the contribution by Lester K. Spence and its explicit focus on the intersection of culture, race, and politics and invites more work of this genre.