Exploring Religion and the Sacred in a Media Age

Chris Deacy is Head of Religious Studies at the University of Kent, where he specialises in Applied Theology. His first book, Screen Christologies: Redemption and the Medium of Film, was based on his doctoral thesis and published by the University of Wales Press in 2001. His 2005 publication, Faith in Film: Religious Themes in Contemporary Cinema, published by Ashgate, was the product of a two-year Special Research Fellowship from the Leverhulme Trust. In 2008, Blackwell published Chris's latest book, co-authored with Gaye Ortiz, Theology and Film: Challenging the Sacred/Secular Divide, which focuses upon a number of theoretical and methodological questions that arise in the area of theology and film before applying many of these insights to a range of theological perspectives and filmic themes, including violence, justice and eschatology. Chris is a member of INTERFILM, the American Academy of Religion (AAR) and the UK Theology, Religion & Popular Culture Network Group. Elisabeth Arweck is Senior Research Fellow at the University of Warwick (Institute of Education). She is a member of a range of national and international learned societies in religious studies and the sociology of religion and is a Council member of the International Society for the Sociology of Religion. Elisabeth is an editor of the Journal of Contemporary Religion. She has co-edited a number of volumes, including Reading Religion in Text and Context: Reflections of Faith and Practice in Religious Materials (with Peter Collins) (Ashgate, 2006), Materialising Religion: Expression, Performance and Ritual (with William Keenan) (Ashgate, 2006), and Theorising Faith: The Insider/Outsider Problem in the Study of Ritual (with Martin Stringer) (Birmingham University Press, 2002). She is author of Researching New Religious Movements in the West: Responses & Redefinitions (Routledge, 2007) and co-author (with Peter Clarke) of New Religious Movements in Western Europe: An Annotated Bibliography (Greenwood Press, 1997). She has published a number of articles in journals (with Eleanor Nesbitt), book chapters, and entries in handbooks and encyclopaedias.