The Making of Working-Class Religion by Matthew Pehl

Abstract

Book Review| May 01 2018 The Making of Working-Class Religion by Matthew Pehl The Making of Working-Class Religion, Pehl, Matthew, Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2016, 245 pp., $95.00 (cloth); $30.00 (paper); $27.00 (e-book) Heath W. Carter Heath W. Carter Valparaiso University Search for other works by this author on: This Site Google Labor (2018) 15 (2): 138–139. https://doi.org/10.1215/15476715-4353902 Cite Icon Cite Share Icon Share Facebook Twitter Email Permissions Search Site Citation Heath W. Carter; The Making of Working-Class Religion by Matthew Pehl. Labor 1 May 2018; 15 (2): 138–139. doi: https://doi.org/10.1215/15476715-4353902 Download citation file: Zotero Reference Manager EasyBib Bookends Mendeley Papers EndNote RefWorks BibTex toolbar search Search nav search search input Search input auto suggest search filter Books & JournalsAll JournalsLabor Search Advanced Search Historians have mined Detroit’s documentary record to great effect, finding in Motor City a window onto any number of momentous trends in American life, ranging from industrialization and unionization to the rise of working-class conservatism. But as Matthew Pehl’s new book, The Making of Working-Class Religion, underscores, archival treasures aplenty remain to be unearthed.Pehl’s book casts twentieth-century Detroit in new light, as a center of religious creativity and conflict, a place where faith—for all of its ambiguous sociopolitical implications—was seamlessly interwoven into the fabric of not just private but also public life. His story picks up in the 1910s, when diverse streams of migrants, including European Catholics, white Protestants, and African Americans, were pouring into the city’s neighborhoods and factories. Pehl deftly shows how, for all of that diversity, there were also many commonalities in religious experiences. Christian beliefs,... Copyright © 2018 Labor and Working-Class History Association2018 You do not currently have access to this content.