Funded Research
The Place of Religion in the American Metropolis
Source: NEH
Active: 06/01/02 - 05/31/05
Investigator(s):
Stephen Matthews
Wilbur Zelinsky
We wish to describe, explore, and interpret the role of whatever is tangibly sacred, the "churchscape," in an especially representative American metropolis--just how the location and characteristics of Greater Chicago's varied houses of worship and their congregations matter in its general life and social geography. Thus in a study lacking any real precedent, we pose some new and basic questions: What do the physical and geographical attributes of the sacred in our metropolises tell us about the changing character of organized American religion? What can we learn about a new unprecedented phase of church history--and the changing shape of our national culture--from the location and visible aspects of our remarkably varied houses of worship and their ancillary facilities and from the action-spaces of their congregations? In approaching such matters, and related issues, we combine conventional geographic and sociological questions with some fundamental humanistic and aesthetic considerations by integrating quantitative and qualitative data as we start asking how the tangible features of the sacred may affect us individually and collectively.
An initial phase of the study involves extensive fieldwork along with the incorporation of Census and other documentary data and information to be gained from a carefully designed telephone survey of a sample of congregations. We are conducting a visual inventory and mapping of all (ca. 5,100) churches (structures used by all faiths and denominations) and church-related facilities in Cook County, Illinois, i.e., Chicago and its immediate periphery.
The analytical phase of the project entails statistical manipulation of the data set using a variety of standard methods, including GIS (Geographic Information Systems) and mapping church and other data in ways designed to display not just simple location but the complex interrelationships among congregations, the physical traits of their facilities, and their neighborhoods, and change during the 1990-2000 period. Consultation with knowledgeable key informants in church and other organizations is an indispensable part of the research effort. Drawing upon the evidence extracted from statistical and map analyses and qualitative information, we should begin to be able to answer many questions, some as yet unanticipated, concerning the role of location of congregations and their dealings with neighborhoods and the metropolis at large, the changing character and efficacy of religious endeavor, and how the churchscape figures in the larger scheme of things.
