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Baby Boomers, Quest Culture, and Spiritual Seeking

In this interview, discussion focuses on Roof’s work on the Baby Boom generation and beyond, particularly as expressed in his books A Generation of Seekers (1993) and Spiritual Marketplace (1999). In these books, Roof combined survey data with panel studies and interviews across a broad spectrum ...

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Featuring

Wade Clark Roof

Dusty Hoesly

About this episode

Wade Clark Roof is Emeritus Professor of Religion and Society in the Department of Religious Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and the director of the Walter H. Capps Center for the Study of Ethics, Religion and Public Life. He has published many books and articles on religion in the United States, especially focusing on developments within liberal Protestantism and American mainline congregations, the spiritual journeys of the Baby Boom generation and their effect on the spiritual marketplace, and religious pluralism and civil religion. These investigations have traced the contours of post-WWII American religious and social life, revealing the protean fluidity of “religion” and “spirituality” as scholarly and popular categories.

In this interview with Dusty Hoesly, discussion focuses on Roof’s work on the Baby Boom generation and beyond, particularly as expressed in his books A Generation of Seekers (1993) and Spiritual Marketplace (1999). In these books, Roof combined survey data with panel studies and interviews across a broad spectrum of Americans to describe the “quest culture” and “spiritual seeking” at the heart of America’s changing religious landscape, one which prizes “reflexive spirituality” amidst an increasingly pluralistic and evolving spiritual marketplace.

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Secular, Spiritual, Religious: American Religion Beyond the Baby Boomers

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