Redemptive materialism

Consumption practices in contemporary African Pentecostalism

Dados Bibliográficos

ID13143994
AutoresSamuel K Bonsu (0000-0003-4787-332X, Ghana Institute of Management and Public Administration, autor correspondente), Russell William Belk (0000-0001-6674-9792, York University), Fadwa Chaker (ESCA Ecole de Management)
Ano2025
Páginas1-18
Data de publicação2025-06-05
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessNão
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoConsumption and Society (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 2752-8499 • E-ISSN: 2752-8499
EditoraBristol University Press (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1332/27528499y2025d000000056
OpenAlexW4411050456
IdiomaEN
Referências citadas34

We examine Pentecostal adherents in Ghana to derive a concept of how adherent religious beliefs are reconciled to valorise contemporary consumer pursuits. Based on over ten years of ethnographic inquiry, we suggest the analytical notion of ‘redemptive materialism’ that references some pragmatic processes and practices of contemporary religious consumption – dream-making, legitimisation and moral translation – in a manner that allows adherents to transform experiences of lack into avenues of hope for material abundance. We intend redemptive materialism to speak to how various elements work together to shape how we live, the way we think as well, our consumer tastes, our capacity to pray, the nature of our prayers, and the way religious tutelage instructs our values (Wuthnow, 1995: 15). Future studies are invited to explore the possibilities that abound for religion to embrace seemingly antithetical elements of human existence

Aesthetics · Consumption (sociology · Environmental ethics · Materialism · Sociology · Theology · Anthropological Studies and Insights · Christian Theology and Mission · Pentecostalism and Christianity Studies · Philosophy