Religion as Urban Culture

Abstract

Drawing on evidence from late-nineteenth-century Strasbourg, the article argues that urban culture in imperial Germany had an important religious component, even at the high point of nineteenth-century urbanization. Churches, parishes, and religious groups were active participants in many types of urban cultural life. They helped broaden and diversify the city’s municipal life; they contributed actively to shaping urban associational and press culture. Moreover, religious symbols were still being produced and propagated in powerful ways in the great city. This occurrednot only throughthe construction of church buildings and bell towers but also through obligatory religious education in public schools.