Believing Identity

The complex and sometimes contradictory articulation of ethnicity, religion and gender informs this book on the cultural construction of identity for Jamaican migrants in Britain. The author argues that religion -- in this case Pentecostalism -- cannot be understood simply as a means of spiritual compensation for the economically disadvantaged. Rather, in the New Testament Church of God, one of Britain's largest African Caribbean churches, the cosmology of the church resolves the questions surrounding identity as well as suffering. Religious participation is one way in which African Caribbean people negotiate the terms of representation and interaction in British society.

Introduction, 'Long time gal me no see you', The Brethren of the King Street New Testament, Church of God , 'Moving up the King's Highway': African-Caribbean Pentecostalism in Jamaica and England, 'Born of The Water, The Spirit and The Blood': The Individual and the Collective 'I may be Black, but we're from the same hand, the hand of God': The Construction and Mediation of Identity , Wives, Mothers and Female Saints: Women in the Church