This volume examines Latin American literature in the context of a complimentary audiovisual culture dominated by mass media such as photography, film, and the Internet. The articles gathered here, all of them published for the first time, critically assess Latin American media theories (Garcia Canclini et al.), pointing out their strengths and shortcomings; show how literary works have been able to sustain their visibility in a highly competitive media ecology, accommodating to pop and mass culture while at the same time reaffirming the authority of the literary intellectual. Overall, the book's foregrounding of the impact of mass media on Latin American literature opens the critical debate on an increasingly essential subject.

An introduction to text analysis using computer-assisted interpretive practices, accompanied by example essays that illustrate the use of these computational tools. The image of the scholar as a solitary thinker dates back at least to Descartes' Discourse on Method. But scholarly practices in the humanities are changing as older forms of communal inquiry are combined with modern research methods enabled by the Internet, accessible computing, data availability, and new media. Hermeneutica introduces text analysis using computer-assisted interpretive practices. It offers theoretical chapters about text analysis, presents a set of analytical tools (called Voyant) that instantiate the theory, and provides example essays that illustrate the use of these tools. Voyant allows users to integrate interpretation into texts by creating hermeneutica—small embeddable “toys” that can be woven into essays published online or into such online writing environments as blogs or wikis. The book's companion website, Hermeneuti.ca, offers the example essays with both text and embedded interactive panels. The panels show results and allow readers to experiment with the toys themselves. The use of these analytical tools results in a hybrid essay: an interpretive work embedded with hermeneutical toys that can be explored for technique. The hermeneutica draw on and develop such common interactive analytics as word clouds and complex data journalism interactives. Embedded in scholarly texts, they create a more engaging argument. Moving between tool and text becomes another thread in a dynamic dialogue.

"This landmark work constitutes a complete historical, sociological, and political view of religion as a cultural expression in Latin America. Parker shows how, beginning with the arrival of the conquistadors, religion has played a transcendent role in shaping the national cultures of the region, particularly its popular cultures, and continues to do so." "Parker argues that while capitalistic modernization and urbanization do lead to secularization, this process is not linear or progressive. Secularization in Latin America does not destroy its religious fabric but rather transforms it, accentuating its pluralistic character." "Christianity, and particularly Roman Catholicism, has influenced Latin American identity and culture most profoundly, but it has by no means been the sole influence, nor has Christianity itself remained unchanged in the process. As a product of history and capitalistic modernization, the trait of religion that emerges most clearly is that of cultural and religious pluralism."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved

In Reading the Bible Across Contexts Esa Autero offers a fresh perspective on Luke’s poverty texts. In addition to an historical reading, he conducted an empirical investigation of two Latin American Bible reading groups – one poor and the other affluent – to shed light on Luke’s poverty texts. The interaction between historical reading and present-day readings demonstrates the impact of socio-economic status on biblical hermeneutics and sheds new light on Luke’s views on wealth and poverty. At the same time Esa Autero critically examines liberation theologian’s claim that poor are privileged biblical interpreters.