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Voices In Concert: Communication Ethnography Of Pentecostal Worship, Bruce C. Coats

Dissertations (1934 -)

We know little about communication in Pentecostal worship service outside of the practice of tongues-speech. Pentecostals uniquely interpret communicative activity as distinctive factors in their identity; yet no research identifies the unique national speech codes operating with the Pentecostal churches. This study applied decreased that knowledge gap using Philipsen's Speech Codes Theory to analyzing the structure and interpretation of Pentecostal worship services, analyzing individual congregations in relationship with local culture and situated within the national Pentecostal movement. Fisher's narrative paradigm was applied to worship services to describe the narrative of a worship service as it extended in the everyday lives …