Promotions - Choice's Outstanding Academic Titles 2017 -

Throughout the world, various religions consider mountains sacred. Appalachia is no exception for many Christians and others who consider mountaintop removal coal mining sacrilegious. Witt (religion, Mississippi State Univ.) adds significantly to case studies of religious resistance to this desecration through detailed description and critical analysis based on systematic and in-depth field, library, and archival research. He places this resistance in the broader contexts of Appalachia, fossil fuel economy, environmentalism, and religious environmentalism. After the introduction and chapter 1, "Religion, Place, and Mountaintop Removal," successive chapters address the subjects of pursuing social and environmental justice; evangelical "creation care" and opposition to it; biocentrism and nature-venerating spiritualities defending Mother Earth; complexities, difficulties, tensions, and conflicts in the movement; and future prospects, including economic alternatives. Thereby, Witt skillfully describes and analyzes the meaning and significance of place from various religious and utilitarian perspectives, including competing claims to place. This is an important contribution to the publisher's "Place Matters: New Directions in Appalachian Studies" series and as a historical case study of the activism component of spiritual ecology. This case study certainly deserves wide readership and far more public attention for the phenomena it documents.Summing Up: Highly recommended. All levels/libraries.