Some professional historians and scholars of American religion have criticized PBS’ God doc. This is not a surprise. After all, when has the academic community ever been comfortable watching its territory invaded by an army of people lacking PhDs? On blogs, religion and history listserves, and chat rooms around the country, academics have labeled the series “oversimplified,” “truly bizarre,” “simplistic,” “intolerable,” “uneventful,” “underwhelming.” Essentially they are calling the series not enough of an “intellectual endeavor.”
Matthew Avery Sutton
Matthew Avery Sutton is the author of Aimee Semple McPherson and the Resurrection of Christian America (Harvard, 2007) and is associate professor of history at Washington State University.
