MAKEBELIEF · The Religious Politics of Theme Parks in the 21st century: Imagineering Religion, Heritage and National Sentiments

Why do religious theme parks appear in secular countries? MAKEBELIEF investigates how in the 21th century, immersive media are mobilized to 'imagineer' religion. The project provides a comparative analysis of religious theme parks in China, Turkey the Netherlands and the United States. MAKEBELIEF investigates religious theme parks on three levels: Firstly this project analyses through documentary analysis why religious organizations, heritage institutions, government agencies and corporations in constitutionally secular countries came to design and use immersive media environments to orchestrate a public image of religion. Secondly, by using participatory observation and media genealogy, MAKEBELIEF analyzes how immersive media forms (e.g. animatronics, 4d cinema, re-enactment, the diorama but also the theme park as a genre) are deployed in attempts to engineer people’s image of religion worldwide. Thirdly, through ethnographic engagement with visitors and social media analysis, it researches how audiences react to and re-appropriate such attempts at ‘imagineering’ religion. MAKEBELIEF offers four case studies, a synthesizing and comparative work package and a visual anthropological work package to explore the dynamics of religion in the 21st century.This way, MAKEBELIEF breaks ground in three areas 1) providing an academic framework that integrates the study of religion, heritage and politics to better identify 21st century contestations for public meaning of religion; 2) furthering the study of immersive media environments by researching its roles in religion, heritage and nation 3) an improved understanding of how attempts to influence people’s perception of religion play out in the everyday lives of 21st century citizens. MAKEBELIEF’s findings will be of importance to those concerned with the future role of religion, including policy makers, religious communities and heritage institutions.