Convictions of the Soul: Religion, Culture, and Agency in the Central America Solidarity Movement.

• Author: Sanghani, Zarana
• Position: Book review

CONVICTIONS OF THE SOUL: RELIGION, CULTURE, AND AGENCY IN THE CENTRAL AMERICA SOLIDARITY MOVEMENT Sharon Erickson Nepstad (Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press, 2004), 224 pages.

After devoting several years to activism against U.S. foreign policy in Central America, Sharon Erickson Nepstad changed careers plans by becoming a scholar of social change. Yet, when she began studying theories of social movement, she found herself quickly disappointed. Existing theories described important aspects of the structures and environment that often surround social change, but Nepstad recognized that these concepts missed a crucial element of social movements, namely, emotion. In her book Convictions of the Soul: Religion, Culture, and Agency in the Central America Solidarity Movement, Nepstad presents the experiences of activists, especially missionaries, to demonstrate how religion, culture and moral convictions were instrumental in drawing support for the solidarity movement.

In the 1980s and early 1990s, many American missionaries working in Nicaragua, El Salvador and Guatemala joined Central Americans in their struggle against repressive, violent government regimes or U.S.-backed armed opposition groups. Nepstad's extensive interviews of missionaries reveal how...