description of my former doctoral project, "rock/theology"

"rock/theology" is sponsored by the Norwegian Research Council. My supervisors are Professor Trond S. Dokka (Theology) and Professor Stan Hawkins (popular music). For the Fall 2002 I will be a Visiting Researcher at the Union Theological Seminary in New York.

The official description of rock/theology is:
Title: "rock/theology. Theological interpretation of rock music"

The aim of the project "rock/theology" is to offer a theological interpretation of selected tunes by Patti Smith, Nick Cave and U2, all central performers in the rock tradition. Religious language and religious symbols — for instance
quotations, allusions, references and metaphors that can be tied to the Bible, liturgy, music and texts from a broad christian tradition — are found throughout their work. By studying how these songs deals with central theological themes such as "God", "Christ", "prayer"and more general themes like "love", "death"and ethical questions, the project wants to explore the possibillities of "incipient theologies" in the works of these artists.
The project is situated in the interdisciplinary field called theomusicology and will use methods and insights from both theology and musicology, as well as studies of popular culture and literary theory. The project will hopefully give new insights in the relation and interplay between contemporary cultural expressions — exemplified by rock music — and church/theology. Hopefully the results will be of relevance to both musicological and theological research, as well as church, school and the music consuming audiences.