Religious Identity And Cultural Negotiation (american Society Of Missiology Monograph Series) [Hardcover]

Given increasing global migration and the importance of positive cross-cultural relations across national borders, this book offers an interdisciplinary and intercultural exploration of identity formation. It uniquely draws from theology, psychology, and sociology--engaging narrative and identity theories, migration and identity studies, and the theologies of identity and migration--and builds on them in an unprecedented study of international migrants to construct an initial theology of Christian identity in migration. New sociological research describes the social construction of religious, ethnic, and national identities among non-North American evangelical graduates who entered the United States to pursue advanced academic studies from 1983 to 2013. It provides an intercultural account of Christian identity formation in the context of migration, transnationalism, and globalization. It ultimately argues that an integral component of Christian identity-making involves the concept of migration, of movement, toward a transformation. Religious Identity and Cultural Negotiationpresents the reflections on personal identity of evangelical graduate students who came to the United States from religious minority communities in Eastern Europe and South/Southeast Asia. Employing sociological and psychological research in conversation with significant theological and biblical reflection, McGill demonstrates how immigration experiences and the nature of Christian identity in general mutually illumine one another. Born out of many years of working with students from abroad, this wide-ranging work offers insights for immigrant education, even as it explores the rich potential of migration studies for Christian thought. --M. Daniel Carroll R., Blanchard Professor of Old Testament, Wheaton College and Graduate School Religious Identity and Cultural Negotiationis an invitation to a practical theology of Christian identity in the context of global migration and higher educatiolƒ!