“Less is better” is a dictum that doesn’t just haunt Matt Sheedy. I feel as though that spectral proverb from J.Z. Smith may apply as much to conferences as the classroom. The phrase resonates with my cultural heritage, too. There’s a cookbook title, famous among certain generations of Mennonites, that encapsulates the bent of that culture: “More-with-Less.” […]
continue readingThe New Triple Threat: Programming Omeka
Our Public Humanities and Religious Studies class built a digital collection of @AARWeb material culture: https://t.co/1bzVzAf1cC #aarsbl17 — UA Dept. of REL (@StudyReligion) October 23, 2017 You may have seen this tweet. As part of the Public Humanities and Religious Studies foundations course in our MA program, I collaborated with Sierra Lawson and Emma Gibson […]
continue readingDamned if You Zoo, Damned if You Don’t: Mignolo and the Philosophy of Religion
While the future and composition of the philosophy of religion is being challenged by several authors, I’ll wager that few are daring to teach its topics differently in their 100-level courses. For Labor Day weekend (2017), I was at Drake University for a meeting of the seminar on the Global Critical Philosophy of Religion. Where […]
continue readingInventing Something New: A Public Digital Religious Studies
It’s getting closer and closer to a new academic year. This year we’re starting something new in the Department, our MA in Religion in Culture. That means new(ish) students. That means new classes too. I’m excited for the new semester because I get to teach the first version of our MA course REL 502: Public […]
continue readingThe Limits of the Field
Only recently did it come to my attention that one of the journals in our field now seems to understand itself in a curiously narrow way.
continue readingBarometers in the Field: Another Student Report from the Regional AAR
Sierra Lynn Lawson is an Anthropology and Religious Studies double major and a Spanish minor. She is from a small town in Wyoming and hopes to study the illegality of midwifery in Alabama as it relates to post-civil war identity formation. I was most pleased with my experience at the Southeastern Commission for the Study […]
continue reading“Yes, and I’ve Met His Dog”: A Student Report from the Regional AAR
Parker Evans is junior studying English and Religious Studies. He spends most of his time drinking coffee and making reading lists when he should be reading. The regional AAR, or SECSOR, was a fantastic chance for a professionalizing experience. Sierra Lawson, another REL major, and I arrived late in the afternoon, and between checking into […]
continue readingReadying the Ground for Us
I’ve got some plants in my office that William Doty gave me back in 2001. Peace lilies. I was thinking about that yesterday, during a memorial service for William (who passed away on January 2, 2017, at the age of 77), at which people said some kind words and told a few stories — some […]
continue readingFor Members Only
I recall, in the Fall of 2015, a job ad appearing on our main professional online site for a pastor for a church. Then, not long after, I saw an ad there for someone to co-write a “15-20 page paper … on the theology and praxis of the engineering profession for it’s Christian members.” Both […]
continue readingREL Heads to Texas for the American Academy of Religion
Something happens every weekend before Thanksgiving. No, not the cupcake tune up game before the Iron Bowl. It’s the annual meeting of the American Academy of Religion (AAR), the national scholarly society for the academic study of religion. This weekend many of the faculty from REL are headed to San Antonio for the meeting and […]
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