Description
"God for Girls" describes the search for a version of God in the contemporary American South who is unquestionably beneficial for girls and women. Part probing cultural analysis, part personal narrative, this creative nonfiction work features close scrutiny of Christian practice and doctrine, even the most progressive versions. It also details and assesses a wide range of contemporary alternative religions such as Wicca, Integral Yoga, and Laconneau, noticing their shortcomings--and possibilities--for female participants. "God for Girls" uses a personal voice to make incisive critiques of cultural and religious assumptions, particularly those related to who--or what--God is, who is emboldened to speak for God, who goes on a spiritual quest, and what that quest looks like. While engaging a wide range of theoretical questions about religion, region, gender, and the nature of God, it is also anchored in a compelling personal story: the coming-to-consciousness of a young daughter and the growing concern that she would be harmed by what mainstream American culture, secular and sacred, appears to offer little girls: a sea of passive Barbies and Disney princesses on the one hand, and a male God and His only son, on the other. This concern leads to envisioning a spiritual quest positing a mother-child duo as seeker, and to construct a theology based on a life lived with children. Throughout the work, personal narrative, feminist critique, and insights gained via wide-ranging field research are combined with interviews with unusual female spiritual leaders across the South.
