In The House Of The Serpent Handler A Story Of Fleeting Fame In The Age Of Social Media, By Julia C. Duin

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Book Reviews

149

Julia C. Duin,In The House of the Serpent Handler: A Story of Fleeting Fame in the Age

of Social Media(Knoxville,TN: University of Tennessee Press, 2017). 237 pp. $24.95

paperback.

With In The House of the Serpent Handler: A Story of Fleeting Fame in the Age of Social Media, Julia C. Duin sets out to discuss the ways in which media of the modern era has impacted the Pentecostal snake handlers of the Appalachians. In some ways, Duin’s work is similar to Dennis Covington’s 1995 workSalvation on Sand Mountain, as both authors, working as reporters, developed relation- ships with their subjects, and the books were the product of years of research and church attendance. However, Duin intentionally avoids focusing on the churches in which Covington spent the most time, and her work, coming more than twenty years later, must deal with the ways in which social media and real- ity television have impacted a group of religious practitioners that beforehand was relatively isolated.

Duin opens with the death of Mack Wolford in May 2012 and describes her visits to several snake-handling churches, including the Sand Mountain con- gregation from Covington’s book, but the lion’s share of the work is devoted to the Hamblin and Coots families, the stars of National Geographic’s one sea- son wonder, Snake Salvation. Duin takes the readers through their rise to fame, or at least notoriety, and the enhancement of their celebrity status through social media. However, the same tools that made the snake handlers household names and allowed them to build regional followings across multiple congrega- tions also magnified conflicts both within families and between preachers and congregations, and by the end of the book, the reader realizes that no family or congregation remained intact.

This work is a notable contribution to the literature on snake-handling con- gregations for several reasons, first of which is that Duin is able to illustrate for her readers some aspects of the ways in which the Trinitarian versus One- ness (Jesus’ name) theology debates have played out in their community.While earlier works, particularly Covington’s, have acknowledged that many of the snake handlers embraced a Oneness theology, Duin discusses in more detail the specific ways in which this impacts the community, from public debates over the eternal fate of Jamie Coots, to the importance of Acts 2:38 to Oneness believers and its prevalence in the churches who hold that line. Duin’s analysis here is lacking as she seems to see this as a minor and regional debate rather than one imbedded in the larger Pentecostal movement (45). In fact, what Duin describes here, but does not seem to see the larger significance of, is that the practice of snake handling has seemed to serve as a bridge across what is a wide theological divide for most other Pentecostals. It is as if the common practice

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is more significant for them than the basic theological differences that would typically keep Pentecostals from fellowshipping together.

Duin also recognizes the significance of women’s apparel to this religious community. She frequently provides descriptions of clothing worn by women in the snake-handling churches, descriptions with which women from other Oneness churches would be familiar including long denim skits, no makeup, and uncut hair as a sign of church membership. The author even mentions social media posts from a website specializing in Apostolic (Oneness) women’s clothing styles. While Duin does not connect these fashion choices to the broader Oneness movement, they are indeed made possible because there are a number of Apostolic women nationwide who, due to the rise of the internet and cheap advertising on social media, have cobbled together collections of clothing deemed acceptably modest for sale to other such like-minded women. In this case, if one took away the snakes, many of the snake-handling women would appear as if they were Oneness women with little else to differentiate them. While, one might wish Duin had made further connections here, Duin is one of the few people to look at the material culture of women’s fashion with Oneness groups. Not since the works of Elaine Lawless in the 1980s has atten- tion been paid to the practices of these women.

The author also does well with material culture when discussing the snake boxes. In the scholarly fascination with the snakes, few have stopped to think about how the snakes, often kept in aquariums outside of church, actually get to the church. Typically wood, with a clear top hinged in the middle, the boxes can be passed from one person to another, and may hold deep meaning for their owners, such as the box Pastor Jamie Coots inherited from Punkin Brown, one of the better known snake-handling preachers who had died of snake bite. There is more work for scholars to do in this area, but Duin at least acknowl- edges these fairly plain relics hold real significance.

Throughout the book, Duin notes the poverty from which many snake- handling congregants come and in which they continue to dwell as well the impact of that poverty on their families. Few had much of anything, often strug- gled to hold down jobs, and had little education that might have prepared them for better lives. This, intertwined with an ever-shifting blended family struc- ture has led to instability in some congregations; yet in others, notable families maintain the tradition. Social media has made these struggles and conflicts more apparent as individuals ask for prayer, donations, and advice from their online followers.

This last chapter should give scholars material upon which to expand. While Duin would attribute this instability at least in part to the poverty of the region, it is worth asking if perhaps there are other factors at play here, particularly reli-

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gious beliefs that emphasize the possibilities of both strict piety and redemp- tion and which make it then possible to receive as a preacher or pastor the divorced father who has seemingly abandoned his children while yet com- pelling the laity to live by strict moral codes. It is also worth asking why some churches and families have survived the rise of social media and whether or not the snake-handling churches of the Oneness persuasion significantly differ from Oneness churches where snakes are not a part of the worship. Duin’s book is more descriptive than analytical, and scholars may come away with their questions unanswered, but the author does provide a compelling narrative and a convincing argument that social media has both impacted her subjects and provided a method by which they can be further studied. This book best serves as a quick introduction to the snake-handling churches and to their key prac- titioners.

Andrea Shan Johnson

California State University, Dominguez Hills anjohnson@csudh.edu

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