![Hijacked - A Critical Treatment of the Public Rhetoric of Good and Bad Religion - Leslie Dorrough Smith](https://d8o7ic8fltgc2.cloudfront.net/public/journals/82/cover_issue_2594_en_US-202007300941.jpg)
Hijacked - A Critical Treatment of the Public Rhetoric of Good and Bad Religion - Leslie Dorrough Smith
8. The Strange and Familiar Spiritual Journey of Reza Aslan
Hijacked - A Critical Treatment of the Public Rhetoric of Good and Bad Religion - Leslie Dorrough Smith
Martha Smith Roberts [+ ]
Fullerton College
Description
This anchoring essay of the media section presents the CNN series Believer, hosted by Reza Aslan, as a paradigmatic example for a specific liberal progressive discussion of religion in North American mass media. It delivers a detailed description of the series (considering content, form, as well as marketing and genre of the series) and points out that Believer, rather than interjecting a critical examination of religion into the mass media, instead reinforces a series of popular perennialist ideas that are intellectually problematic. This happens primarily by portraying religion as a personal, “authentic,” universal element of human experience.