Paranormal America: Ghost Encounters, UFO Sighting, Bigfoot Hunts, and Other Curiosities in Religion and Culture

Christopher Bader, F. Carson Mencken, and Joseph Baker use the seemingly simple question “Who are these people?” (7) to take readers on a journey through Bigfoot hunts, haunted houses, and psychic fairs in Paranormal America. Along the way, the authors introduce readers to a surgeon and banker, who just happen to be Bigfoot hunters, a victim of the Satanic scares of the 1980s, and a UFO contactee who believes in nearly all things paranormal, to name but a few of the fascinating people described in the work. Intertwined with captivating stories drawn from participant observation, the authors use quantitative data collected in the Baylor Religion Surveys to give readers the most useful picture of who does and does not believe in paranormal phenomena to date. In the end, the authors shed much light on the complex world of the paranormal in the United States and break many of the stereotypes about paranormal believers.