%0 Journal Article %J Journal of Media and Religion %D 2013 %T Mapping the Landscape of Digital Petitionary Prayer as Spiritual/Social Support in Mobile, Facebook, and E-mail %A E. James Baeslera %A Yi-Fan Chena %K Digital %K digital prayers %K God %K mobile %K New Media %K petitionary prayers %K Self %K Traditional prayers %X Traditional prayers can function to provide spiritual and social support for oneself and others. With social media, this support finds a new expression in digital prayers. We map the landscape of digital petitionary prayers for self and others across three different media. In survey one (n = 218), frequency of digital petitionary prayers, described by topic, relationship, place, and outcome, was highest for the mobile medium (phone and text messaging), midrange for Facebook (posting and e-mail), and lowest for traditional e-mail. A second survey (n = 116) revealed that different types and contexts for petitionary prayers are positively associated with love of self, others, and God. Suggestions for future research include investigating the quality and outcomes of petitionary prayers across private, face-to-face, and digital contexts. %B Journal of Media and Religion %V 12 %G eng %U http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/15348423.2013.760385#.Ulmi51Csim5 %N 1 %& 1 %R 10.1080/15348423.2013.760385 %0 Book %D 2010 %T Personal Connections in the Digital Age %A Baym, N. %K Connection %K Digital %K relationships %X The internet and the mobile phone have disrupted many of our conventional understandings of our selves and our relationships, raising anxieties and hopes about their effects on our lives. This timely and vibrant book provides frameworks for thinking critically about the roles of digital media in personal relationships. Rather than providing exuberant accounts or cautionary tales, it offers a data-grounded primer on how to make sense of these important changes in relational life. The book identifies the core relational issues these media disturb and shows how the ways we talk about them echo historical discussions about earlier communication technologies. Chapters explore how we use mediated language and nonverbal behavior to develop and maintain communities, social networks, new relationships, and to maintain relationships in our everyday lives. It combines research findings with lively examples to address questions such as whether mediated interaction can be warm and personal, whether people are honest about themselves online, whether relationships that start online can work, and whether using these media damages the other relationships in our lives. Throughout, the book argues for approaching these questions with firm understandings of the qualities ofmedia as well as the social and personal contexts in which they are developed and used. Personal Connections in the Digital Age will be required reading for all students and scholars of media, communication studies, and sociology, as well as all those who want a firmer understanding of digital media and everyday life--Publisher. %I John Wiley & Sons, Inc. %C Cambridge %G English %U http://books.google.com/books/about/Personal_Connections_in_the_Digital_Age.html?id=JRyOQAAACAAJ %0 Book %D 2003 %T Islam in the Digital Age: E-jihad, Online Fatwas and Cyber Islamic Environments %A Gary Bunt %K cyber %K Digital %K fatwas %K Islam %K jihad %X The Internet is very big in the Arab world. After Al-Jazeera, it is the second most important source of dissenting opinion. Literally, millions of people in the Muslim world rely on web-sites to get their information and fatwas. A whole new life of cyber Imams and a new culture is emerging through Internet programmes and will have a profound effect on Arab consciousness. This book documents all this and examines various sites and offers the first comprehensive analysis of the impact of the Internet on Islamic culture. Zia Sardar, author of Postmodernism and the Other and Why Do People Hate America. The Internet is an increasingly important source of information for many people in the Muslim world. Many Muslims in majority and minority contexts rely on the Internet -- including websites and e-mail -- as a primary source of news, information and communication about Islam. As a result, a new media culture is emerging which is having a significant impact on areas of global Muslim consciousness. Post-September 11th, this phenomenon has grown more rapidly than ever.Gary R. Bunt provides a fascinating account of the issues at stake, identifying two radical new concepts: Firstly, the emergence of e-jihad ('Electronic Jihad') originating from diverse Muslim perspectives -- this is described in its many forms relating to the different definitions of 'jihad', including on-line activism (ranging from promoting militaristic activities to hacking, to co-ordinating peaceful protests) and Muslim expression post 9/11. Secondly, he discusses religious authority on the Internet -- including the concept of on-line fatwas and their influence in diverse settings, and the complexities of conflicting notions of religious authority. %I Pluto Press %C London %G English %0 Book Section %B Digital Religion: Understanding Religious Practice in New Media Worlds %D 2012 %T Authority %A Cheong, P %E Heidi Campbell %K Apps %K Authority %K Digital %K media %K religion %K technology %X Digital Religion offers a critical and systematic survey of the study of religion and new media. It covers religious engagement with a wide range of new media forms and highlights examples of new media engagement in all five of the major world religions. From cell phones and video games to blogs and Second Life, the book: provides a detailed review of major topics includes a series of case studies to illustrate and elucidate the thematic explorations considers the theoretical, ethical and theological issues raised. Drawing together the work of experts from key disciplinary perspectives, Digital Religion is invaluable for students wanting to develop a deeper understanding of the field. %B Digital Religion: Understanding Religious Practice in New Media Worlds %I Routledge %C London %G eng %0 Book %D 2015 %T Digital methodologies in the sociology of religion %A Cheruvallil-Contractor, S %A Shakkour, S %K Digital %K Sociology of religion %X This volume considers the implementation difficulties of researching religion online and reflects on the ethical dilemmas faced by sociologists of religion when using digital research methods. Bringing together established and emerging scholars, global case studies draw on the use of social media as a method for researching religious oppression, religion and identity in virtual worlds, digital communication within religious organizations, and young people's diverse expressions of faith online. Additionally, boxed tips are provided throughout the text to serve as reminders of tools that readers may use in their own research projects. %I Bloomsbury Academic %C London, England %G eng %U https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/digital-methodologies-in-the-sociology-of-religion-9781472571182/ %0 Book %D 1998 %T Cybergrace: The Search for God in the Digital World %A Cobb, Jennifer %K cyber %K Digital %K God %K grace %X Theologian and high-tech consultant Jennifer Cobb combines her expertise to create a new theory of the Divine in the Information Age. As computers and artificial intelligence systems become more sophisticated, the question of whether we can find spiritual life in cyberspace is beginning to be asked. CyberGrace: The Search for God in the Digital World is a bold, thought-provoking, affirmative answer to one of the most intriguing inquiries of our time. Until now, an unbridgeable schism has separated the world of the spirit and that of the machine. According to an increasingly compelling concept known as emergence, the gulf may be an imaginary one. Fifty years ago, Jesuit paleontologist Teilhard de Chardin combined his lifelong passions of God and science to predict the emergence of cyberspace, based on his studies of evolution. Using Teilhard's theories as a starting point, Jennifer Cobb asserts that as technical systems become more complex--with simple, predictable mechanisms coalescing into hierarchies of increasing organization--something elegant, inspired, and absolutely unpredictable simply and suddenly "emerges." Many observers today see this "hand of God" showing itself in disparate disciplines, from evolutionary theory to artificial intelligence--and especially in the furthest realms of cyberspace, where brute computation seems to give way to divine inspiration. CyberGrace offers paradoxical evidence that our machines may be conduits to a deeper spirituality. With daily headlines announcing dizzying advances in science and information technology, many people wonder about their--and their children's--ability to lead lives imbued by a sense of the sacred. In the new world, where the search for spirituality may seem scattered and unfocused, Cobb brilliantly uses the most popular and prevalent phenomenon of our times--the computer--to find a world filled with meaning and love. %I Crown Publishing %C New York %G English %0 Book %B Religion, Media and Culture %D 2013 %T Digital Zen: Buddhism, Virtual Worlds and Online Meditation %A Grieve, Gregory %K Buddhism %K Digital %K Ethnography %K Meditation %K Second Life %K Virtual World %K Zen %X Because it makes its practitioners mindful of desire, _Digital Zen_ argues that the primarily Western converts who practice Anglo-Buddhist digital religion offer a form of religion that allows them to flourish in a late capitalistic society. Much contemporary popular religion is a protest against, and also a product of, the suffering produced by the desires of living in late capitalism. Being mindful of desire is crucial for human flourishing in late capitalism, because while “solid” modernity was driven by need and production, the current “liquid” system is driven by desire and consumption. Digital Buddhism is an apt place to locate such desires because freed from the physical, digital media display the unhindered imagination of its users, and Buddhism, throughout its historical phases, has seen desire as the cause of suffering. %B Religion, Media and Culture %I Routledge %C new York %0 Manuscript %D 2012 %T The "Third Spaces" of Digital Religion %A S. Hoover %A N. Echchaibi %K Digital %K Digital Religion %K Negotiation %K New Media %K power %K Research %K Third Spaces %X The emergence of new modes of digital communicative practice has had both lay and scholarly discourses struggling to adapt. The descriptive challenge is, indeed, a formidable one as the range and depth of emergent implications in technology, society, culture, and practice continues to develop. The trajectories that flow out of "the digital" into individual, social, and cultural space seem nearly limitless in extent and scope, at the same time that many voices are urging caution in expecting or claiming too much for these practices %B Finding Religion in the Media: Work in Progress on the Third Spaces of Digital Religion %I Center for Media, Religion and Culture %C University of Colorado %G eng %U http://cmrc.colorado.edu/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/Hoover-Echchaibi-paper.pdf %0 Book %D 2015 %T From Jesus to the Internet: A History of Christianity and Media %A Peter Horsfield %K Christianity %K Digital %K internet %K intersection %K media %K religion %I Wiley Blackwell %C Hoboken, New Jersey %G eng %0 Book Section %B Digital Religion: Understanding Religious Practice in New Media Worlds %D 2012 %T Identity %A Lövheim, M. %E Campbell, H. %K Digital %K identity %K religion %X Digital Religion offers a critical and systematic survey of the study of religion and new media. It covers religious engagement with a wide range of new media forms and highlights examples of new media engagement in all five of the major world religions. From cell phones and video games to blogs and Second Life, the book: provides a detailed review of major topics includes a series of case studies to illustrate and elucidate the thematic explorations considers the theoretical, ethical and theological issues raised. Drawing together the work of experts from key disciplinary perspectives, Digital Religion is invaluable for students wanting to develop a deeper understanding of the field. %B Digital Religion: Understanding Religious Practice in New Media Worlds %I Routledge %C London %G eng %0 Book Section %B Digital Indonesia: Connectivity and Divergence %D 2017 %T Social media and Islamic practice: Indonesian ways of being digitally pious %A Slama, M %K Digital %K Indonesian %K Islamic %K social media %X This book places Indonesia at the forefront of the global debate about the impact of 'disruptive' digital technologies. Digital technology is fast becoming the core of life, work, culture and identity. Yet, while the number of Indonesians using the Internet has followed the upward global trend, some groups -- the poor, the elderly, women, the less well-educated, people living in remote communities -- are disadvantaged. This interdisciplinary collection of essays by leading researchers and scholars, as well as e-governance and e-commerce insiders, examines the impact of digitalisation on the media industry, governance, commerce, informal sector employment, education, cybercrime, terrorism, religion, artistic and cultural expression, and much more. It presents groundbreaking analysis of the impact of digitalisation in one of the world's most diverse, geographically vast nations. In weighing arguments about the opportunities and challenges presented by digitalisation, it puts the very idea of a technological 'revolution' into critical perspective. %B Digital Indonesia: Connectivity and Divergence %I ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute %P 146-162 %G eng %U https://books.google.com/books?id=rpsnDwAAQBAJ&dq=9+Social+media+and+Islamic+practice:+Indonesian+ways+of+being+digitally+pious&source=gbs_navlinks_s %1 Edwin Jurriens, Ross Tapsell %0 Journal Article %J Studies in Christian Ethics %D 2008 %T Who watches the watchers? Towards an ethic of surveillance in a digital age %A Stoddart, E. %K Digital %K Privacy %K Surveillance %X The essay considers contemporary surveillance strategies from a Christian ethical perspective. It discusses first surveillance as a form of speech in the light of biblical themes of truthfulness, then draws on principles of subsidiarity and solidarity. Surveillance is dignified as human work whilst its dehumanizing outcomes are challenged. It is concluded that surveillance must contribute to human dignity and that accountability for data must follow a revised model of subsidiarity, appropriate to network rather than linear socio-political relationships. Mutual responsibility for one another's data-image is derived from solidarity which, further, offers a response to the angst of a culture of suspicion. %B Studies in Christian Ethics %V 21 %P 362-381 %G English %U http://sce.sagepub.com/content/21/3/362.abstract %N 3 %0 Journal Article %J Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology %D 2013 %T Investigating religious information searching through analysis of a search engine log %A Rita Wan-Chik %A Paul Clough %A Mark Sanderson %K Buddhism %K Christianity %K Digital %K Hinduism %K information %K Islam %K Judaism %K queries %K religion %K search behavior %K search engine %X In this paper we present results from an investigation of religious information searching based on analyzing log files from a large general-purpose search engine. From approximately 15 million queries, we identified 124,422 that were part of 60,759 user sessions. We present a method for categorizing queries based on related terms and show differences in search patterns between religious searches and web searching more generally. We also investigate the search patterns found in queries related to 5 religions: Christianity, Hinduism, Islam, Buddhism, and Judaism. Different search patterns are found to emerge. Results from this study complement existing studies of religious information searching and provide a level of detailed analysis not reported to date. We show, for example, that sessions involving religion-related queries tend to last longer, that the lengths of religion-related queries are greater, and that the number of unique URLs clicked is higher when compared to all queries. The results of the study can serve to provide information on what this large population of users is actually searching for. %B Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology %G eng %U http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/asi.22945/abstract?deniedAccessCustomisedMessage=&userIsAuthenticated=false %0 Book %D 0 %T The Bishop, the Mullah, and the Smartphone %A Bryan Winters %K bishop %K Christianity %K Digital %K history %K Islam %K mullah %K smartphone %X Not so long ago the world resisted change, often using religious-reasoning. Small wonder--the printing press, a sixteenth century disruptive device, split Christianity. Now the globe welcomes digital disruption, even praising it as a solution for faltering economies. Religions don't have much choice but to follow, because information is a prime asset of faith. Believers treasure and reframe their past, and present. However, both old and current data is now available in huge quantities, visually and instantly. Movies provide more spiritual guidance than holy texts, and terror merchants use the uncontrollable Internet to gain hearts and minds. Nevertheless a turbulent re-mythologization of adherents towards peaceful versions of their belief can be tracked. There are positive things we can all do to help, which is just as well in a world that suggests only political acts count. %I Wipf & Stock %C Eugene, Oregon %P 312 %@ 1498217923 %G eng %U http://www.amazon.com/Bishop-Mullah-Smartphone-Journey-Religions/dp/1498217923