Identity

12 June 2023

Mediatizing “Evangelicalism”: Authenticity, Identity, and Power

Podcast

In today's episode, Daniel Jones talks with Travis Warren Cooper about Cooper's recent book, _The Digital Evangelicals_, and they discuss how issues of authenticity, authority, and power are deeply intertwined with US "evangelicalism" and its mediatization. Be sure to tune in!

16 September 2022

Shifting the Focus of Graduate Education in the Study of Religion

Podcast

Join Carmen Becker and Andie Alexander for the RSP's 400th episode where they discuss the new international MA program at Leibniz University, Hannover.

18 February 2022

Does Critical Islam Make the Familiar Strange?

Response

In this response to our episode with Khurram Hussain, Matt Sheedy situates Hussain's work and outlines the usefulness of Hussain’s ‘critical humanist approach’. Sheedy then furthers the conversation by posing some questions about the implications of this approach and how it might translate to other disciplines.

7 February 2022

The Critical Humanist Study of Islam

Podcast

What sort of discursive traps to we fall into when talking about 'Islam' or 'the West'? How might we reframe our discussions with a critical humanist approach? In this episode, Khurram Hussain joins Andie Alexander to discuss his recent book, The Muslim Speaks (Zed Books, 2020) explore the benefits of critically engaging these issues in a way that takes seriously the human-focused study of religion.

6 December 2021

Genealogy of the Jewish Notion

Podcast

Dr. Breann Fallon sits down with Professor Daniel Boyarin to discuss the difficulty of defining Judaism and Boyarin's new book Judaism: Genealogy of a Modern Notion

1 July 2021

Using Archaeology to Learn about Christian Diversity and Martyr Shrines

Response

Sarah Griffis highlights how Morehouse demonstrates the central issue of studying diverse social groups in antiquity: "how do you get something new out of what’s already there before it? Whatever it is that’s new needs to be intelligible enough to be compelling and persuasive."

28 May 2021

Sovereignty, Historical Memory, and the Importance of Aliite Worldviews

Response

"The processes by which the Aliites imagine their history reveal much about how state sanctioned ideas and institutions gain and maintain seeming natural validity," writes Chernoh Sesay, Jr., in response to our interview with Spencer Dew on the Aliites.

3 May 2021

Power and Diversity in 4th Century Martyr Shrines

Podcast

How were 4th century Christian martyr shrines locations for the negotiation of power and diversity? In this interview, Nathaniel Morehouse explains the contested nature of these shrines.

21 March 2021

Lamenting the Lie

Response

"The struggle to fight for truth in an age of Lies must be relentless," writes Darrius D. Hills in this week's response to our episode with Eddie Glaude and his work on James Baldwin, Begin Again.

1 March 2021

Race and the Aliites

Podcast

Complex issues of race, identity, citizenship, sovereignty, and Law come together in this interview with Spencer Dew about the New Religious Movements surrounding Noble Drew Ali and the groups he inspired.

22 January 2021

Encountering the Historical Jesus-People

Response

"No matter where we do our reading, we bring ourselves to the task," writes Dr. Allison L. Gray in this response to our interview with William Arnal on "Ancient Christian Origins"

18 January 2021

The Lie at the Heart of America

Podcast

James Baldwin's critique of America and its racism is an "urgent lesson" for contemporary America, writes Dr. Eddie S. Glaude, Jr. in his new book Begin Again.

18 December 2020

The Secret Life of Scriptures: Black Scriptures as Tending to New Afro-Futures

Response

In Joseph L. Tucker Edmond's response to our interview with Richard Newton, we see a continuation of the extended, organic metaphors of Newton's scriptural lens for studying Alex Haley's Roots. What does it mean to tend a future, asks Tucker Edmonds, and who tends the futures for Black subjects?

19 October 2020

Ancient Christian Origins: A Heterogeneous History

Podcast

In this week’s episode, the RSP’s Sidney Castillo talks with Professor William Arnal about ancient Christian origins and the development of Christianity through New Testament sources such as the Gospel of Thomas and Q.

12 June 2020

Painfully Stripped Away, Painfully Added

Response

Adam Park's response to episode 330 highlights boxing as a site for identity creation and the legacy of muscular Christianity as two important takeaways of our interview with Arlene Sanchez-Walsh.

4 May 2020

May the Fourth Be With You

Podcast

To honor May the Fourth, International Star Wars Day, please enjoy this compilation of classic Religious Studies Project interviews about Star Wars!

25 January 2020

The Essential and Complex Relationship of Religion and Media

Response

The use of new digital media may sometimes be clumsy, not well understood, and subject to failure at times, writes Robin Harragin Hussey, but it is the current and future manifestation of the way many religions and religious people want to share and make themselves known.

20 January 2020

Media and the Study of Religion

Podcast

Vivian Asimos, Chris Cotter, Time Hutchings and Suzanne Owen discuss the intersections of Media and the Study of Religion.

9 December 2019

Secular Jewish Millennials in Israel/Palestine

Podcast

In this podcast, Chris Cotter is joined by Dr Stacey Gutkowski to discuss what it means to be a ‘secular Jewish Israeli millennial’.

11 November 2019

Reflections on “Thinking with Jonathan Z. Smith”

Podcast

Aaron W. Hughes, the keynote speaker for the #JZSatNTNU Conference in Trondheim, Norway, talks conference panelist Andie Alexander about the legacy of Jonathan Z. Smith's work for the field of religious studies.

12 April 2019

Ideal Types, Semantic Anarchy, and the Study of Atheism (etc.)

Response

7 November 2018

Patrons Special: RSP Discourse #2 (October 2018)

Podcast

Welcome to the second issue of “Discourse”, where our editors and guests take a critical look at how the category “religion” is being used in the media, the public sphere, and the academic field. This episode, Chris (Cotter) is joined by Chris (Silver) and Theo Wildcroft, both long-time friends and contributors to the RSP, for a cross-Atlantic discussion. After the inevitable discussion of US identity conflicts and terrorism, and ugly manifestation of the KKK in Northern Ireland, discussion moved on to the accepted protocols of trick or treating, and the use of patisserie in debates on LGBT human rights vs religious freedom. Can’t access this episode? Subscribe at https://www.patreon.com/projectrs

10 May 2018

Religious cliché and stigma

Response

As part of the podcast on pervasive clichés, Chris Cotter interviews Brad Stoddard and Craig Martin regarding their recent work how popular clichés are enculturated within our culture. This conversation explores how clichés are both useful and detrimental to the study of religion in that they frame expectations about religion and speak to the social expectations of religious groups by others.

20 November 2017

Changing Your Story: Assessing Ex-Member Narratives

Podcast

Ex-member testimony can be a difficult to deal with. Such testimony tends to receive privileged treatment in anti-cult literature, while some academics are prone to be sceptical, even suggesting ex-member testimony is worthless due to the danger of adaption and fiction.

28 January 2016

Report: 2015 Joint Conferences of the New Zealand and Australian Associations for the Study of Religion

Response

The biennial conference of the New Zealand Association for the Study of Religions (NZASR) and the annual conference of the Australian Association for the Study of Religions (AASR) were held together in Queenstown, New Zealand from December 8-10 2015. Interdisciplinary perspectives and theoretical approaches across the humanities and social sciences were evident in the wide-range of papers presented. Islam, and Asian religions more generally, were the most consistent objects of focus, perhaps unsurprising given Australasia’s proximity to Asia and recent increased media attention to the Islamic State.

30 November 2015

Gender, queer theory and religion

Podcast

In this interview, Dr. Mary Jo Neitz continues the conversation about religion and gender by focusing on theories from LGBT studies and queer studies. Using her work as an ethnographer, as well as the work of American philosopher Judith Butler, Neitz distinguishes the categories ...

23 November 2015

Religious Demography in the US

Podcast

In this week's podcast we focus on religious demography and identification, survey tools used for religious demography in America, differences between religious identities and identifications, Americans’ shifting religious identifications, correlations between religion and social positions such as ethnicity or generational cohort, and correlations with various social and political issues.

2 November 2015

Religion and Planetary Ethics

Podcast

Speaking of religions as “eco-social constructions across multiple species, over multiple generations, and over multiple histories,” in this interview Whitney Bauman puts forward an ethics of understanding ourselves and others as planetary creatures, and understanding religion, science, and nature as non-foundational, non-substantive categories.

5 October 2015

21st Century Irish Paganism

Podcast

in this interview, we discuss Jenny Butler's work on Paganism in Ireland, the impact of that particular context upon the Paganism/s she has researched - particularly in terms of language, mythology, and the natural landscape - and also some of the issues associated with the academic study of Paganism in general.

17 September 2015

What is ‘Buddhism in the West’?

Response

I often see “Buddhism in the West” lumped in with new religious movements (NRMs) or more interestingly as sources of therapeutic influence for new styles of mental health treatment such as those seen in the field of Psychology. The compulsion to lump Buddhism with new religious movements may derive from a variety of influences. There appears to be much debate regarding what defines Buddhism in the West. Particularly, ...

11 June 2015

Hyphenating Identities

Response

We find ourselves in a time when countries like the UK and the US are, even now, officially providing their citizens the option of identifying via the use of hyphenated ethnicities. In yet another excellent Religious Studies Project interview, we hear from University of California Santa Barbara Associate Professor Rudy Busto talking about race and religion in the United States.

18 May 2015

Sri Lankan Buddhism and Colonialism

Podcast

Usually one of the first associations upon hearing ‘Sri Lankan Buddhism’ is either the religious violence that swept across the island in the recent decades, or the Pali canon and Theravada Buddhism. In this interview with Anja Pogacnik, Dr. Stephen Berkwitz doesn’t really speak of either.

23 March 2015

Religious Experience: Understanding and Explaining (Video)

Response

The RSP collaborated with Society for the Scientific Study of Religion at their 2014 Annual Meeting in Indianapolis to offer and video record an interdisciplinary panel on the study of religion. Each of the papers presented are not only from different fields in the study of religion but also methodologically or theoretically apply an interdisciplinary approach. The authors represent the best in their fields. Some are established scholars with a body of work while others are up-and-coming talent.

16 March 2015

Is Britain still a Christian country?

Podcast

In what sense can a country be “Christian”? Today on the Religious Studies Project, we welcome back Professor Linda Woodhead to discuss and interrogate the question "Is Britain Still a Christian Country?", the topic of her recent Croall Lectures at the University of Edinburgh.

2 March 2015

Comics and the Superhero Afterlife

Podcast

In this wide-ranging interview with A. David Lewis, comic books are presented as an irreplaceable cultural medium for engaging with issues of mortality, identity, subjectivity, and cosmology. With an overwhelming slate of comic book driven television series (Walking Dead, Gotham, ...

17 March 2014

“Would You Still Call Yourself an Asianist?”

Podcast

Over the course of Ramey's career he has gradually and smoothly made a significant shift. Of course he still studies material relevant to his earlier training, but a shift in research focus from inter-religious cooperation to diaspora religion, eventually studying south Asian communities in the U.S.

13 January 2014

‘Religion’ as ‘sui generis’

Podcast

In this interview with Thomas Coleman, McCutcheon discusses what he terms as the “socio-political strategy” behind the label of “sui generis” as it is applied to religion. The interview begins by exploring some of the terms used to support sui generis claims to religion (e.g. un-mediated, irreducible etc.)...

19 June 2013

Identity or Identification?

Podcast

Identity or Identification? In this second podcast for Identities? Week, the Culture on the Edge group address the issue of religious identity. Is our identity – cultural, religious or other – something which causes us to act, or something which we choose to mobilise in certain circumstances? And what part do scholars have in reifying these discourses?

17 June 2013

Cross-Cultural Identities Roundtable

Podcast

It’s Identities? Week here at the Religious Studies Project, with not one but two specially-recorded roundtable discussions about how identity is negotiated (if indeed it is) through our religious, ethnic, sexual and socio-cultural identities. This first podcast focuses on identity and dislocation, either through diaspora or through rapid social change.

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Identity

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