Evangelical media functioned less to save souls than to construct shared identity

Evidence

The evangelical consumer marketplace was by then a force to be reckoned with, but this expansive media network functioned less as a traditional soul-saving enterprise and more as a means by which evangelicals created and maintained their own identity—an identity rooted in “family values” and infused with a sense of cultural embattlement. Christian publishing, radio, and television taught evangelicals how to raise children, how to have sex, and whom to fear. And Christian media promoted a distinctive vision of evangelical masculinity. — Kristin Kobes Du Mez, Jesus and John Wayne, 29

Categorization

• DEFINE: Frames the book’s definition of evangelical identity as a commercial-cultural construction rather than a theological one.
• XREF: Parallels communication-as-culture arguments (Carey’s Communication as Culture) where media construct rather than merely transmit.