Her Preaching Body: Conversations about Identity Agency and Embodiment Among Contemporary Female Preachers

The preachers body is a tool for proclamation a vehicle by which a sermon comes to life. Female preachers engaged in a task not long their own know well the added attention directed to their physicality. They can experience ordinary decisions about attire accessories hairstyles and movement as complex and occasionally precarious choices around how to bring flesh to their sermons. They can also experience the extraordinary power of their bodies when materiality weighs in on the message. McCullough explores the every-Sunday bodily decisions of contemporary female preachers with an eye to uncovering the meanings about body preaching and God alive underneath. Ultimately she argues for a renewed understanding of embodiment in which ones living body inescapably intertwined with her preaching becomes the avenue for greater knowledge about how to preach and deeper insight into the faith professed.