Oprah
The Gospel of an Icon
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- $20.99
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- $20.99
Publisher Description
"Today on Oprah," intoned the TV announcer, and all over America viewers tuned in to learn, empathize, and celebrate. In this book, Kathryn Lofton investigates the Oprah phenomenon and finds in Winfrey’s empire—Harpo Productions, O Magazine, and her new television network—an uncanny reflection of religion in modern society. Lofton shows that when Oprah liked, needed, or believed something, she offered her audience nothing less than spiritual revolution, reinforced by practices that fuse consumer behavior, celebrity ambition, and religious idiom. In short, Oprah Winfrey is a media messiah for a secular age. Lofton’s unique approach also situates the Oprah enterprise culturally, illuminating how Winfrey reflects and continues historical patterns of American religions.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Lofton, an assistant professor of religious studies and American studies, looks long and very closely at the Oprah Winfrey media empire, analyzing Oprah's pulpit: message, style, and ubiquitous recommendations. She has sifted through mountains of material about Winfrey, both scholarly and popular, as well as what Winfrey has said in the course of talk shows that have been broadcast five days a week since 1986. Lofton's prodigious research has produced a killer 50-page footnotes section and a book accessible to an academic audience only. That's both unfortunate and ironic, given the mass appeal of its complex subject and the value of an analysis of Oprah's overwhelming power. Lofton is at her best as a historian of American religion, insightfully locating Winfrey's signature confessionalism in the context of the "anxious bench" of 19th-century evangelical revival. She also does good work in taking seriously and helping define the term "spirituality" that is evident in popular beliefs about matters divine and transcendent. The book is a tenure maker; general readers will find the writing academic hardtack ("Yet this generic is inadequate to the narratives of its particular").
