Great Communication Awakening

This week’s readings leave me of two minds.  On one hand Butler’s argument against a single, historical event called the Great Awakening is quite convincing.  On the other hand, Lambert, Stout, and Goff make it clear that the new mode of communication arising out of the itinerant preachers of the mid-eighteenth century had a direct impact on American revolutionaries’ ability to stir common colonialists to revolt against the Crown.  In the end I’m left with the impression that through the itinerant revivalists of the mid-eighteenth century there was a great awakening of mass communication in the common tongue and – by having no set congregation – an example of breaking away from established class structures of order.  This great awakening of seems only to be of great spiritual importance to the deeply religious of the time for whom it was a reaffirming example that their religious convictions were correct and that God was active in an impressive way in Britain and her American colonies.  For the non-religious, the revivals were initially a spectacle for their newness in communication mode and style, but quickly faded into the background as persuasive speeches on a topic not all were interested in.

As I have taken on this new view of the “Great Awakening” I have begun to question what other historical events might have had their meaning defined by a minority placing significance on one part of the event when the greater impact lies under the surface.  Heimert asserts we need to look beyond and through the text.  When the majority of documentation of an event lies mostly with the minority placing significance on the event, that becomes a very difficult task.