This post is part of my Independent Study in Religious Communication and Digital Life at the University of North Dakota. See a description of the course here, and review of Understanding Digital Culture here.

When I talk about new media in church contexts, the lens or framework people use as they speak of technology says a lot about the direction of the conversation. Some people, such as those who think the church should change to attract new younger members, praise technology for its amazing capabilities. Others, such as those suspicious that there is too much change in the church will speak of the deleterious effects of technology. Such conversations can become difficult to moderate, but the task will be easier for me now that I’ve read Heidi Campbell’s When Religion Meets New Media.

Campbell draws from an impressive array of experiences, studies, and faith traditions for her book, including in-person study of Jewish, Muslim, and Christian communities. After helpfully summarizing the history of religion’s interactions with the internet, Campell launches into the books major contribution, a term she calls “the religious-social shaping of technology.”

The religious-social shaping of technology accounts for how religious communities approach technologies and how technologies are then encountered in light of the community’s beliefs and practices. Campbell argues that religious communities negotiate a way of interacting with technology and that this negotiation process can be studied with an analytical framework considering 1) the history and tradition of a given community, 2) the core beliefs, patterns, and values of a community, 3) the negotiation process through which religious communities go as they encounter technologies, and 4) the communal framing and discourse about a technology. As Campbell shows, sometimes through this process religious communities actually bring about technological changes (such as the “kosher” cell phone) even as they elect to appropriate technology in their communities.

The book contains a thorough and fairly in-depth description of what led Campbell to come to her framework, and a chapter is devoted to each of the four areas above. Campbell’s fieldwork in ultra-orthodox areas in Israel was most interesting to me, as it clearly backed her points and also helped me gain a fuller perspective of that community.

In the chapter on negotiation with new media Campbell includes longer case studies on evangelical approaches to the internet, and the Anglican presence in Second Life. A little later on she discusses the Christian emerging church movement (which I have followed fairly closely through my work with Presbymergent) claiming that the use of the internet by the movement “affirms the community itself” (150). She (rightfully, I think) makes the case that how the emerging church movement embraces and negotiated the internet actually reflected their values, theology, and history.

Campbell’s book was a really helpful overview and framework for me to have at the ready as my study of religion and new media continues. Her careful work with particular communities of faith is helpful, but I wonder how far we can take it. For instance, Campbell notes that individuals can buck the trend of a community, which would obviously present research challenges. Furthermore, I wonder about how “community of faith” is best defined and measured for, say, people like myself. Would claim my community as US mainline denominations, the ELCA since I work for them, progressive PC(USA) congregations, one congregation itself, or even a young adult group of a particular congregation? It’s much easier, I suppose, to study a religious community ensconced in a geographical area that claims a very conservative way of life, but things get murkier when communities overlap and defy clear boundaries and definitions.

Nevertheless, When Religion Meets New Media presents a valuable framework for further consideration, and a really helpful elucidation and description from Campbell’s research. I commend it to religious communication scholars and those interested in the interplay of internet communication technologies and religion.