2. Jesus Camp
Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady's Jesus Camp (2006) is one of the most critically acclaimed documentaries of the 2000s. It was nominated for Best Documentary Feature at the Academy Awards, only to lose to An Inconvenient Truth. The film follows the life of youth minister Becky Fisher and her Kids on Fire summer camp in North Dakota. Jesus Camp introduces us to the work of Fisher and the other ministers and gives us in-depth, up-close portrayals of the many young people and their parents as they participate in the activities at Kids on Fire and other camps. The film also features radio talk show host Mike Papantonio whose presence in the film seems to be the devil's advocate (sorry for the pun!) to Fisher and the other ministers' perspectives. With Papantonio's perspectives countering those of Fisher's, we get a sense of the real stakes of subcultures. Many have claimed that Fisher's Kids on Fire camp was tantamount to brainwashing. In fact, as a result of the negative exposure that the film brought to the program, Fisher closed the camp. There has been much discussion about whether or not Ewing and Grady present the Pentecostals in the film in a positive or negative light. The answer to this issues lies in the subjective opinions of the viewer and in this way Jesus Camp is a great film because it forces all of us to measure our own levels of tolerance when it comes to religion.
Scott A. Lukas
Contributor
Scott A. Lukas has taught anthropology and sociology Lake Tahoe Community College for sixteen years and in 2013 was Visiting Professor of American Studies at the Johannes Gutenberg University of Mainz, Germany. He has been recognized with the McGraw-Hill Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching of Anthropology by the American Anthropological Association (2005), the California Hayward Award for Excellence in Education (2003), and a Sierra Arts Foundation Artist Grant Program Award in Literary–Professional (2009). In 2006, he was a nominee to the California Community College Board of Governors. He is the author/editor of The Immersive Worlds Handbook (2012), Theme Park (2008), The Themed Space: Locating Culture, Nature, and Self (2007), Fear, Cultural Anxiety, and Transformation: Horror, Science Fiction, and Fantasy Films Remade, (co-edited with John Marmysz, 2009), Recent Developments in Criminological Theory (co-edited with Stuart Henry, 2009), and Strategies in Teaching Anthropology (2010). His book Theme Park was recently translated into Arabic. He appeared in the documentary The Nature of Existence and has provided interviews for To the Best of Our Knowledge, The Huffington Post UK, The Daily Beast, The Washington Post, and Caravan (India).
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