Introduction: alternative childhoods / Susan J. Palmer and
Charlotte E. Hardman
Witches: the next generation / Helen A. Berger
Education and collective identity: public schooling of Hare Krishna
youths / E. Burke Rochford Jr
In whose interest? separating children from mothers in the Sullivan
Institute/Fourth Wall Community / Amy Siskind
God's children: physical and spiritual growth among Evangelical
Christians / Simon Coleman
Osho Ko Hsuan school: educating the "new child" / Elizabeth
Puttick
Growing up as Mother's Children: socializing a second generation in
Sahaja Yoga / Judith Coney
The children of ISOT / Gretchen Siegler
Children of the Underground Temple: growing up in Damanhur /
Massimo Introvigne
Frontiers and families: the children of Island Pond / Susan J.
Palmer
Social control of new religions: from "brainwashing" claims to
child sex abuse accusations / James T. Richardson
The precarious balance between freedom of religion and the best
interests of the child / Michael W. Homer
Children of a Newer God: the English courts, custody disputes, and
NRMs / Anthony Bradney
The ethics of children in three new religions / Charlotte E.
Hardman
SUSAN J. PALMER is an adjunct professor at Dawson College. She has
authored numerous books about new religious movements.
CHARLOTTE E. HARDMAN is a lecturer of religion at the University of
Newcastle Upon Tyne.
What happens to a new religious movement of "born
again" converts when it has to cope with its "born
into" children? What happens to the kids as they grow up? This
important book provides a unique and long-awaited opportunity to
learn about the second-generation membership of a wide range of
alternative religions.
*FBA, Professor of Sociology, London School of Economics*
Palmer and Hardman are acknowledged experts in the study of
religions, especially "new" ones. Until now, very little has
been written about children in new religions except, of course, for
accusations about abuse. . . . There is something remarkably
refreshing, then, to read a series of discussions by authors who
know that there are other matters of interest and more to be said.
. . . Its ethnographies complement more detailed interaction and
presentation of the groups at issue. While the book continues in
the tradition on which the Sociology of Religion predominates as
the methodology of choice in approaching new religions, and while
concerns about power, sex and gender predominate among issue that
excite interest, it does so in new directions. Seeing children, let
alone hearing them, enables some quite different thoughts about new
religions.
*Reviews in Religion and Theology*
Palmer and Hardman . . . make an important point when they note
that the "study of children in new religious movements (NRMs) is a
largely uncharted terrain" (p. 1). Their book opens up this
field of research through thirteen interesting studies by authors
from Europe, Canada, and the United States. For main issues are
considered: the impact of children on NRMs; the socialization of
children within NRMs; issues of religious freedoms surrounding
children in NRMs; and how children in NRMs construct meaning.
*Sociology*
This is a timely and important book focusing on the second
generation of members in new religious movements (NRMs) born
largely in the 1960s or 1970s. The book is important for two
reasons. First, NRMs provide a unique social laboratory to observe
and test ideas and theories about social movements. . . . Second,
as many social scientists have observed, children have a
significant impact on religious movements. . . . This is an
invaluable contribution to the literature on new religions and
social movements. The cross-cultural scope is especially
significant.
*Contemporary Sociology*
As new and alternative religions become standard fixtures in
society, understanding their children becomes an important key to
understanding their future. This wonderfully rich, panoramic book
provides that key.
*Professor of Religious Studies, University of Kansas*
Palmer and Hardman collect much new material about an understudied
dimension of new religious movements.
*Novo Religio*
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