CRUSADERS, MARTYRS, AND SAINTS: REPRESENTATIONS OF CHRISTIAN MILITANCY IN MEXICO, 1850-2013

This study examines the intersections between religious practices and violence, and their representations. It explores how religious insurgents in Mexico have employed religious imagery and expression to foment or justify collective acts of violence. While close reading is my primary critical approach, I also draw on cultural studies, subaltern studies, and postcolonial studies to provide a framework for the interpretation of non-script cultural products (i.e. icons, relics, and bodies) and epistemologies; these instruments facilitate analysis of the broad range of cultural products produced by religious insurgents. My work dialogues with scholars who study religious insurgencies from multiple disciplines including anthropology, history, political science, and communication studies