Worship Capital: On the Political Economy of Worship Music

American Music

Vol. 36, no. 3: pp. 303–26 (2018)

Abstract

In recent years, the fields of congregational and worship music studies have grown and expanded. Scholars and scholar-practitioners from a wide variety of disciplinary and faith backgrounds have enriched our understandings of the ways in which music functions in worship contexts around the world. Yet, the political economy of worship music remains underexamined and undertheorized. In this article, I develop the theory of ‘worship capital’ as a corrective. Worship capital includes both economic and symbolic forms of capital. I argue that this new concept provides a frame through which we might better understand individuals’ access to worship as well as institutions’ (or congregations’) access to worship economies. I illustrate these concepts through ethnographic research at the Anchor Fellowship in Nashville, Tennessee, U.S.A., a non-denominational evangelical Christian church.