ABSTRACT
My work as a curriculum theorist has until now focused primarily on what Brian Casemore has called the autobiographical demand of place. Place for me demands to be unpacked and examined to see its interrelatedness with self and society; place as it is intersected by gender, sexuality, race, and fundamentalist Christianity is a rich context through which to approach curriculum as the interpretation of lived experiences. Southern place is an appropriate stage that allows us to see political and social trends up close and personal. The South’s skeletons are in open closets; thus, we can take the pulse of U.S. culture by examining the Heart of Dixie. This is the shape of my curriculum theory. With this chapter, the demand takes a decidedly theological turn. It is no longer enough to talk about place in terms of how it both shapes and is shaped by religious experience. Religion without theology is vacuous; and while the narratives have value phenomenologically and autobiographically, they now also beg to be theorized theologically.
