Colonizing Christianity

Colonizing Christianity employs postcolonial critique to analyze the transformations of Greek and Latin religious identity in the wake of the Fourth Crusade. Through close readings of texts from the period of Latin occupation, this book argues that the experience of colonization splintered the Greek community over how best to respond to the Latin other while illuminating the mechanisms by which Western Christians authorized and exploited the Christian East. The experience of colonial subjugation opened permanent fissures within the Orthodox community, which struggled to develop a consistent response to aggressive demands for submission to the Roman Church.

“In drawing attention to the unique colonial circumstances generated by the Fourth Crusade, Demacopoulos succeeds in opening up the discourse for greater interdisciplinary investigation.”

George Demacopoulos's Colonizing Christianity is a truly extraordinary reevaluation of historical events in light of new theoretical approaches. It is both ground-breaking and measured, revolutionary and rooted in historical specificity. Demacopoulos knows the sources he works with and presents them eloquently. These sources carry their own historiographical baggage--so much so that one might doubt the possibility of saying anything new about them. The author manages, however, to argue convincingly for a new framework in which to understand these sources, and in so doing brings them to life in fascinating ways.-- "Journal of Orthodox Christian Studies"
Colonizing Christianity's analysis of a number of texts through the lens of colonial and postcolonial theory makes for useful, important, reading. There are significant stakes both for medieval historians and those committed to finding pathways of reconciliation among contemporary Christians.---David Perry, Sacred Plunder: Venice and the Aftermath of the Fourth Crusade

George E. Demacopoulos is Fr. John Meyendorff & Patterson Family Chair of Orthodox Christian Studies at Fordham University. He is the author of four monographs, most recently The Invention of Peter: Apostolic Discourse and Papal Authority in Late Antiquity and Gregory the Great: Ascetic Pastor and First-Man of Rome. With Aristotle Papanikolaou, he co-founded the Orthodox Christian Studies Center at Fordham University. He presently serves as co-editor of the Journal of Orthodox Christian Studies.

Colonizing Christianity employs postcolonial critique to analyze the transformations of Greek and Latin religious identity in the wake of the Fourth Crusade. It argues that the experience of colonization splintered the Greek community, which could not agree how best to respond to the Latin other. By offering a close reading of a handful of texts from the era of the Fourth Crusade and subsequent Latin Empire of Byzantium, this book illuminates mechanisms by which Western Christians authorized and exploited the Christian East and, concurrently, the ways in which Eastern Christians understood and responded to the dramatic shift in political and religious fortunes. It offers new insights into the statements of Greek and Latin religious polemic that emerged in the context of the Fourth Crusade and how they more often revealed political or cultural anxiety than they advanced theological ideas. It further demonstrates how the experience of colonial subjugation not only transformed the way that Eastern Christians viewed themselves and the Western Christian other but also how the experience of colonialism opened permanent fissures within the Orthodox community, which struggled to develop a consistent response to aggressive demands for submission to the Roman Church.

This item is eligible for free returns within 30 days of delivery. See our returns policy for further details.