EVENT AND PUBLICITY AS SOCIAL DRAMA - A CASE-STUDY OF THE RE-IMAGINING CONFERENCE 1995

This article argues that the Christian/Feminist conference RE-imaginin g and its attendant publicity were a watershed event for contemporary American religion. An analysis of the controversy surrounding it highl ights the degree to which the mediated symbolic environment now contro ls or conditions the practices, prospects, and prerogatives of religio n. Challenging the view that the matter can be explained by the fact t hat religious conservatives were simply better at generating publicity than liberals, the article argues that the event owed its newsworthin ess to the correspondence between its aftermath and a larger social dr ama (using Victor Turner's framework), thus making for a dramatic and engaging news story. Because much of the struggle over the event has t aken place through the mediated public sphere, resolution of these str uggles must be a public and symbolic resolution as well as a personal and institutional one.