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People of the Facebook?: Biblical Conversation, Community, and Social MediaTraditionally, engagement with scripture has been characterized by sustained reflection with a body of text. While various communities have long gathered to study the Bible—from clandestine Medieval readers of vernacular Bible translations to local Bible study groups to online discussion chains to national and international scholarly and religious conferences—the modern norm has been for biblical reflection even in community to proceed from private, individual reading and reflection into community. This talk explores how the social structuring of new media like Facebook and Twitter changes the ways in which we approach and interpret sacred texts on the basis of new ways of developing and sustaining distributed, collaborative spiritual communities that are promising for both religious organizations and developers of the technologies that support them.
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Biblical Conversation, Community, and Social Media
Elizabeth Drescher, PhD Church Divinity School of the Pacific
March 26, 2010
People of the Facebook?
+Presentation Overview
A Brief Apology
The Social Logic of Communication
Issues in Digital Hermeneutics
What Designers, Religious Leaders, and Users Can Do
Your Comments and Questions
+The Medium is Not the Message
“In the name of ‘progress,’ our official culture is striving to force the new media to do the work of the old.”
~Marshall McLuhan, 1967
+ From Wyclif to Zuckerberg*: Tracing the Social Logic of Communication
* Gratefully adapted from Keith Anderson’s wonderful presentation, “From Gutenberg to Zuckerberg, available online at http://tinyurl.com/yjjcxqe
Historical Context
Dominant Communication Mode
Cultural Communication Logic
Primary Communication Practice
Source of Authority
Available Communication Tools
Pre-modern Oral/Aural Grammatical Dialectical Rhetorical
Interpersonal What is said Stories Verse Forms Structural Images
Early Modern Print Dialectical Rhetorical Grammatical
Private What is written Broadsides Books Pamphlets Magazines
High Modern Broadcast Rhetorical Dialectical Grammatical
Public What is presented
Radio Television Movie Photograph Telegraph Telephone Microphone
Postmodern Digital Grammatical Rhetorical Dialectical
Interactive What is re-presented
Email Internet Video Social Networking Cell Phone Texting PDA
+Social Logic of Communication
Classical Trivium of the liberal arts: Grammar—Structure/Rules
Dialectic—Reasoning/Argument
Rhetoric—Presentation/Persuasion
In the classical pedagogical tradition, the levels of the trivium were equated to social categories: Grammar—Childhood/Female/Slave
Dialectic—Adolescence/Boy/Peasant or Laity
Rhetoric—Adulthood/Man/Lord or Clergy
+ From Wyclif to Zuckerberg*: Tracing the Social Logic of Communication
* Gratefully adapted from Keith Anderson’s wonderful presentation, “From Gutenberg to Zuckerberg, available online at http://tinyurl.com/yjjcxqe
Historical Context
Dominant Communication Mode
Cultural Communication Logic
Primary Communication Practice
Source of Authority
Available Communication Tools
Pre-modern Oral/Aural Grammatical Dialectical Rhetorical
Interpersonal What is said Stories Verse Forms Structural Images
Early Modern Print Dialectical Rhetorical Grammatical
Private What is written Broadsides Books Pamphlets Magazines
High Modern Broadcast Rhetorical Dialectical Grammatical
Public What is presented
Radio Television Movie Photograph Telegraph Telephone Microphone
Postmodern Digital Grammatical Rhetorical Dialectical
Interactive What is re-presented
Email Internet Video Social Networking Cell Phone Texting PDA
+Pre-Modern Worries for Post-Modern Bible Study For it is a dangerous thing, as blessed St. Jerome witnessed, to translate the
text of the holy Scripture out of one tongue into another; for in translation
the same sense is not easily kept, as the same St. Jerome confessed, that
although he was inspired, yet oftentimes in this he erred: we therefore
decree and ordain, that no man, hereafter, by his own authority translate any
text of Scripture into English or any other tongue by way of book, libel, or
treatise; and that no man read any such book, libel, or treatise, not lately set forth
in the time of John Wickliffe, or since, or hereafter to be set forth, in part of in
whole, privately or in the open, upon pain of greater excommunication, until
the translation is allowed by the ordinary of the place, or, if the case so
require, by the council provincial. He that shall do contrary to this, shall likewise
be punished as a favorer of error and heresy.
~The Constitutions of Archbishop Thomas Arundel, 1409 (modernized from John Foxe’s 1563 English translation in Acts and Monuments, AMS Press, 1965)
+From Lexical Translation to Digital Transformation Translation, from the Latin translatio, to carry across or to bring across:
The act of rendering into another language; interpretation; as, “The translation of idioms is difficult.”
The act of translating, removing, or transferring; removal; also, the state of being translated or removed; as, “the translation of Enoch”; “the translation of a bishop.”
Transformation, from the Latin transformare, to change the shape of: A thorough or dramatic change in appearance; as, “The artist transformed a
rough stone into a beautiful statue.”
A metamorphosis in the lifecycle of an animal or plant; as when a caterpillar becomes a butterfly.
A process by which an element in the underlying deep structure of a system is converted to an element in the surface structure; as when grammatical forms (Noun-Verb-Noun) are transformed into sentences in conversation (“Sally ran home.”).
+Issues in Digital Hermeneutics
Cross-media translation and transformation
Interpretive authority
Distributed interactivity
Error management
+ iTalk to God: Cross-Media and Platform Translation and Transformation
Comic Jesus
Daily Devotions for Women
A Buddhist Bible
Bible Quiz 201 Bible Promises
Children's Bible
TouchWord Bible Tree Bible iArt Pocket Bible (Free)
More than 400 bible-related iPhone Apps (not counting searches for
“Jesus”, “Christian”, and similar terms.
+Legos and Interpretive Authority
“…for in translation the same sense is not easily kept…”
Illustrations from thebricktestament.com. Used by permission.
+Distributed Interactivity: Tweeting to the Disciples
+ The Bible on Facebook: Ever Expanding Interpretive Communities and Strategies
The Bible 1,958,537 fans Created by the Rev. Mark Brown Australian Anglican Priest, blogger, founder of the Anglican Second Life Cathedral, “ministry entrepreneur”
A search of “bible” on Facebook currently yields more than 42,000 results (not including “Jesus,” “Christian,” and related search terms)
“Greatest Hits” include:
(No, Really) The Bible 10,933 fans Created by Valerie Smith Atlanta, GA Site purpose is to gather “1,000,000 men and women of God who believes in THE BIBLE- is right!”
(Also) The Bible 28,471 fans Creator unidentified Accra, Ghana Site purpose: “The Bible contains the mind of God, the state of man, the way of salvation, the doom of sinners, and the happiness of believers.”
+And Open-Ended Interpretive Process
+ Affirmative, Non-Critical Exchange
+A More Limited Exchange of Texts
+Error Management: The Wikipedia Effect
The greater the general interest in the content…
The more textually and visually developed the content…
The more editorial access people have to the content…
The greater the factual accuracy and critical quality of the content.
+The Digital Translation Challenge
De-textualization of Scripture
De-contextualization of Scripture
De-institutionalizing of Scripture
Disembodiment of Scripture
+What Designers, Religious Leaders, and Users Can Do
Extend contextual linkages
Expand interactivity
Encourage platform transfer across digital and physical platforms
+About Me…
I am a Christian spirituality scholar who explores the practice of faith by ordinary believers today and in the past. I am particularly interested in how ordinary believers have reshaped the Church by using resources that are traditionally thought of as being under the control of "elite" religious and academic authorities in the contexts of their daily lives. In pre-modern Christian communities, this often involved access by laypeople and lower clergy to spiritual and theological writings and the involvement of laypeople in the day-to-day management of cathedrals, churches, and guilds. Today, new social media such as Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube are much at the center of new practices of religious leadership, communication, and community, and this is the focus of much of my current research, writing, and speaking.
As a writer, public speaker, educator, spiritual director, and preacher, I am committed to supporting the spiritual nurture and growth of ordinary believers by exploring with them the complicated relationship between religion, culture, and personal and community well-being.
As a person of faith in a pluralistic, post-Christian, and post-traditional world, I attempt to practice a spirituality of inclusiveness, critical reflection, and practical engagement with those in need.
Elizabeth Drescher, PhD www.elizabethdrescher.net [email protected]
