Everyday is [Not] Like Sunday

Abstract

The secular experience of Sunday in the rhetoric of rock ’n’ roll (sex, drugs and subversion) proves Eliade’s formulation of the profane readily encapsulates with the term’s popular understanding. As David Chidester articulates, rock ’n’ roll is often viewed as “the antithesis of religion, not merely an offensive art form, but a blasphemous, sacrilegious, and antireligious force in society.” In the same way that Christianity sought to differentiate itself from Judaism, so too does rock ’n’ roll seek to make ground from the traditional terms and Puritanical values with which Christianity regularly deals. As in most attempts at differentiation, the differentiator can never escape those fundamental commonalities it shares with the differentiated. Judaism and Christianity, for instance, differ most dramatically in practice and belief, but share a similar discourse. Despite the concerted efforts of some to categorically separate the two into diametric oppositions, Christianity and rock ’n’ roll share certain f...